Should Universities Take a Stand on Public Issues? How Effectively Are Universities Governed?

Harvard and many of our most respected universities are going through a period of unprecedented turmoil. In a recent Harvard Magazine article entitled “Why Americans Love to Hate Harvard,” former Harvard President Derek Bok described the “rising tide of antagonism to higher education.”

Why is this happening? Public hostility and mistrust of higher education undoubtedly reflects escalating social and political divisions within the U.S., but some of the fault rests within the universities themselves.

President Bok recommends an improved focus on “civil education” and a more balanced curriculum representing conservative as well as progressive ideas. I believe that in addition to teaching reforms and campus culture, Harvard and other universities need to address problems of ineffective governance, opaque decision-making and poor communication.

Let’s start with the first question: Should universities take a stand on public issues?* One of the prevailing views has been that universities should observe “strict neutrality” and remain silent on the issues of the day. This policy is set forth in the Kalven Report published by the University of Chicago in 1967. In today’s environment we have to question whether a policy of strict neutrality is in fact the best way to achieve neutrality in practice. Silence can be interpreted as a choice (supporting the status quo) and strict neutrality can reinforce an elitist, ivory-tower image of universities unconcerned about the real, everyday problems of society.

I believe that in a democracy, institutions of higher education are too important to sit on the sidelines when issues affecting their mission and their constituencies are in question. I favor restraint, rather than strict neutrality. This was the approach recommended by Professor Robert Post of Yale Law School during a recent webinar sponsored by the Radcliffe Institute. For universities to enforce a policy of restraint I would impose three requirements: First, the issue should be of material concern to the university, with materiality defined in terms of the university’s stakeholders and its educational mission. Second, the university should objectify and depoliticize the issue by framing it within the educational context. Third, the university should explain the rationale for its position and the internal processes by which its decision was reached.

In my opinion, the current governance structure of Harvard and other universities does not fulfill these three conditions, particularly the third requirement for transparency.*

This leads to the second question: How effectively are universities governed?

The quality of Harvard’s current governance is difficult to evaluate from an external perspective. In the words of the authors of the dissident weekly publication “1636 Forum,” Harvard’s governance is “insular and secretive.” We cannot tell how power is exercised, how stewardship decisions are made, how succession planning is conducted, how risks are assessed, how strategy is developed within a centralized but amorphous governance structure that includes the administration, the President and Fellows of Harvard College (aka the Harvard Corporation) and the Harvard Board of Overseers.

Recent events at Harvard reveal significant governance disfunction. The administration, the Faculty of Arts and Sciences and the Harvard Corporation disagreed publicly as to whether 13 students should be denied graduation privileges following campus protests. This embarrassing public squabble could have been avoided if competing views had been discussed internally before the Corporation made public its final decision. In addition, the standards for judging which students would be denied graduation should have been disclosed, thereby clarifying Harvard’s support for academic freedom and reinforcing its respect for students’ free speech rights while standing firm on the conduct of student protests.

Another recurring governance issue, often raised by students concerned about environmental policy and climate change, is to what degree the President and Fellows oversee the investment (and divestment) decisions of the Harvard Management Company, the wholly-owned, non-profit subsidiary that invests Harvard’s $50 billion endowment. Here again governance best practice would benefit from greater transparency around this complex stewardship issue.

What needs to be done to strengthen Harvard’s governance and restore confidence in the university’s role as a global educational leader?

The first step should be for Harvard to undertake a comprehensive assessment of its current governance to determine whether it is aligned with the four pillars of good governance: responsibility, accountability, fairness and transparency. These pillars have been tested and refined during more than 40 years of corporate governance reforms. Corporate governance does in fact provide useful guidance and best practice standards for strengthening the governance of universities and non-profit organizations.

Here are some of the basic questions that I think should be asked in assessing Harvard’s governing boards: Do the boards have the means to inform themselves about the interests of Harvard’s diverse stakeholders (bearing in mind that a university’s stakeholders include faculty members, administrative staff, undergraduate and graduate students, parents of students, alumni, donors, local communities and relevant legal and political entities)? What criteria are used in the selection of Harvard Fellows – does the corporation use a matrix of expertise and skills to evaluate candidates? Are there explicit charter provisions, fiduciary standards and accountability mechanisms applicable to the Fellows? Is there an effort to bring independent thinking into boardroom deliberations? Do either the Fellows or the Overseers include representatives of important stakeholder groups such as faculty and students? Do the boards have access to outside experts? Do the Fellows periodically review the performance of the administration? Do they review and assess their own performance? How do they conduct succession planning? What is the role of the boards in Harvard’s strategic planning? And most important, do the Fellows support greater transparency that would clarify their stewardship and explain the rationale for their policy decisions?

A hot topic in today’s headlines illustrates the importance of these questions: Artificial Intelligence is a rapidly evolving technology that clearly alters our most basic assumptions about how education should work. While Harvard has been conducting cutting-edge internal education and teaching programs relating to AI, is this expertise shared with the governing boards? Are Harvard’s Overseers and Fellows sufficiently informed to evaluate the strategic risks and potential value of AI to the university? Is Harvard positioned to provide guidance on public policy relating to AI?

I raise these questions because I believe there is an urgent need to rethink how our country’s great universities and non-profit organizations are governed and how they communicate with the constituencies they serve. Harvard, because of its fame and leadership position, will always be a target for activists and critics of higher education. If Harvard takes action to strengthen its governance and increase transparency, other institutions will surely follow.

These are not trivial questions. Institutions of higher education are a critical source of strength in our democracy. They educate our citizens, safeguard our societal values, serve the public interest and provide stability in times such as these, when so many of our democratic institutions are under siege.

*Note: On May 28, 2024, Harvard’s Institutional Voice Working Group issued a thoughtful Report on Institutional Voice in the University that confirms the university’s commitment to speak out, but only on core “issues directly relevant to the university’s operation.” As discussed above, the success of this policy will depend on how it is implemented.