The Policy of the University?

When the Faculty first discussed its study of minority and women Faculty in December. there were few fireworks.

But when it resumed debate Tuesday, two professors immediately rose to challenge the study's recommendation that the University implement policies requiring departments to recruit minority and women faculty aggressively--they argued the policies would undercut the importance of merit in hiring.

James Q. Wilson, Shattuck Professor of Government, criticized the report for stressing numerical goals as yardsticks of successful affirmative action and cited the need for a "fair and wide search."

Moments later, Harvey C. Mansfield Jr. '53, professor of Government, assailed the report--which would allow departments to seek special permission to hire qualified minorities and women for whom they do not have positions available--as creating "a category in which no white male could qualify."

But Dean Rosovsky defended the study, which was overwhelmingly supported by the Faculty Council in late October, as neither prescribing rigid quotas for minorities or women, nor causing "a decline in quality."

Noting how infrequently he "appears as a liberal," Rosovsky called affirmative action "the policy of the land and the policy of the University" and stressed the need for the University to redress the shortages of women and minority scholars in certain departments--imbalances he said are "hard to believe" are "statistical accidents."

Subsequent speakers also lauded the report, which Rosovsky will likely implement soon. But Mansfield and Wilson seemed less than satisfied after the meeting. "I'll leave it to your impression whether the answers he [Rosovsky] gave were satisfactory." Mansfield said.

Peter M. Lange, associate professor of Government, predicted after the session that the report--which he helped to prepare--will probably boost the number of women more than Black Faculty members. He explained that "the small school of Blacks on which we have draw" and the need to maintain quality account for this difference.