Never Too Old for Tenure

President Lawrence H. Summers’ reported rejection of two promising tenure candidates, in the face of unanimous support from their respective departments, has embroiled him in a new controversy over the role of age in Harvard’s tenure process. At the end of an inaugural semester highlighted by public disagreement with faculty, Summers stunned members of the government department by overruling their undivided votes to approve Istvan Hont, 54, a political theorist from Cambridge. The Wall Street Journal has reported that Summers also chose to deny tenure to Karol Berger, a music historian from Stanford who is also 54 years old.

Although Summers has denied that age played a major role in those tenure decisions, his general policy on the importance of age in the tenure process is far from clear. At a law school dinner this summer, Summers reportedly argued that age is a reasonable factor to consider when awarding tenure. Moreover, his stated emphasis on recruiting “younger faculty” begs the question of whether older candidates are left at a disadvantage.

On the one hand, an aggressive interest in the quality of tenured faculty is encouraging, especially in light of Summers’ oft-repeated goals of improving undergraduate education as well as enriching and expanding Harvard’s faculties. Tenured professors should be first-rate scholars, with a history of brilliant research and a future that looks equally promising. The tenure process has tended to select professors with distinguished work already behind them, and it is reasonable for the University to seek scholars who will instead do their best work on this campus.

Harvard also has good reason to award tenure more frequently to junior faculty members. Junior faculty have already developed relationships with students and are familiar with teaching at Harvard. And if it becomes well-known that there is potential for promotion from within, Harvard will attract even better scholars to its junior ranks. Unfortunately, only 36 percent of tenure appointments went to junior faculty between 1996 and 2000—even though many of the most qualified candidates are right here under our noses.

But as Summers works to reform the tenure process to align with his goals of a larger Faculty drawn more from within, he must be careful not to overstep the bounds of either the law or the University’s interest. Age alone does not limit academic promise, and it should not be used as the sole measure of potential—in tenure hearings or elsewhere. No one would deny the talents or scholarship of the Faculty’s tenured professors, who have an average age of 55. Most are not past their prime. And to those who thought 28 too young for tenure, Summers himself proved as mature and daring as any professor.

Summers must also bear in mind the president’s proper role in tenure cases. The president has a great deal of power in Harvard’s complex tenure process, but he must wield it wisely. Departments can best judge the talent of scholars in their field. They can assess the candidates’ academic standing in the community, the quality of their work and their potential for new research in the years ahead. Specialists know their own, and Summers should heed their advice carefully in every case—especially when they speak unanimously.

Instead, Summers has overridden two undivided recommendations for reasons that—due to the extreme and unnecessary secrecy that surrounds Harvard’s tenure process—remain unknown. Reform of the tenure process is long overdue. But it only requires an assertive president, not an uncooperative one.