Students Initiate Forum to Fill Gap In Courses on Developing Nations

A group of students who are dissatisfied with the Harvard course offering on developing nations have organized their own lecture series on the subject.

Called the Eliot House Forum on the Developing Nations, the series will be launched Wednesday night when Don Humphrey, William Clayton Professor of International Economic Affairs at the Fletcher School, lectures on "Requirements for Economic Growth."

According to Daniel H. Saks '65, chairman of the forum, the series promises to be successful "if only for the fact that there are a great number of students whose interest in the subject is not satisfied in regular course work."

Saks said that for various reasons key professors are not at Harvard this year, and as a result, the course offering on developing nations "is not as strong as it has been in the past."

"The Rudolphs [Lloyd I. Rudolph, assistant professor of Government and Mrs. Suzanne H. Rudolph], who are experts on India, will not be here at all, Martin Kilson [lecturer on Government] on Africa is gone, and Rupert Emerson [professor of Government] will be at Harvard for only one semester," Saks said.

He added that, "to my knowledge, there are only two or three courses on Africa and one or two on India."

Saks hopes the forum will demonstrate to the University the amount of student interest in the problems of developing nations. "Then perhaps this year's course situation will not occur again," he said.

He stated, however, that the main purpose of the lecture series is to enable students to pursue the subject on their own, outside the regular curriculum.

Thirteen other lectures will be given in the course of the year, on such topics as traditional societies, new elites, regional integration, and colonialism.

Lecturers will include Rupert Emerson, L.C. Brown, assistant professor of Middle Eastern Studies, Alex Inkeles, professor at the Russian Research Center, and Professor Lucien Pye of M.I.T.

Each lecture will be free and open to the public. Saks said he hopes there will be informal and free-wheeling discussion after the lecture.

In an attempt to achieve this result, the audience will sit at tables grouped in a U and coffee will be served.

Humphrey's lecture will begin at 8.30 p.m. in the Eliot House dining hall.