We’re Glad Garber Got the Job. Here’s Hoping He Doesn’t Keep It.

Let’s hope the only thing that isn’t interim about Harvard’s 31st president is the name.

President Alan M. Garber ’76 is just the person to lead the University through the dark times that still lie ahead, but this institution requires more than a caretaker presidency to take it boldly into a brighter future.

When the Harvard Corporation announced Friday that Garber would remain on through at least the 2026-2027 academic year, losing the word “interim” from his title, it was so clearly the right choice that it almost didn’t feel like news.

In the first few months of his tenure, Garber has, by all accounts, met one of the most uniquely challenging moments in this University’s more than 400 year history. He has crisscrossed the world to reassure donors, alumni, and politicians; taken surprisingly swift action on questions raised in the past year, like whether to adopt a policy of institutional neutrality; and managed a pro-Palestine encampment far more deftly and peaceably than many of his police-happy peers.

Garber’s string of successes should come as no surprise. Having spent more than a decade in the University’s second-highest administrative post, he had the experience, the relationships, and, most importantly, the hard-earned trust necessary to steady the institution after he ascended to the role over winter break.

Now, while the immense problems that foisted his predecessor continue — congressional investigations, federal discrimination suits, war between Israel and Hamas — so must Garber.

Back still against the wall, the University simply does not have the luxury to press the reset button again, leaving a new president to build, from scratch, relationships with the donors, politicians, and other key stakeholders who hold Harvard’s fate in their hands. There would be no better way to end the tenure of the University’s 32nd president before it begins than dropping them directly into the fire, particularly as a wider war in the Middle East or a second Trump presidency threaten to throw on more fuel.

In short, Harvard’s 32nd president deserves as close to a blank slate as possible, and Garber can give it to them. But give it to them he must.

Having now followed two of its shortest-ever presidencies with what will likely be a third, this University has gone too long without a transformative leader at its head — someone with a real vision for not just the next year but the next quarter-century. For just the same reasons he’s an excellent caretaker for this moment, steady, cerebral, unflappable Garber does not immediately strike us as the kind of dynamic changemaker we’d prefer for the next.

We have reason to believe that the Corporation really does intend to search for Garber’s successor in roughly two years — Why make a promise you don’t intend to keep? — but because the world can disturb even the best-laid plans, we feel compelled to say: Do not let prudence become paralysis.

So far as practicably possible, the Corporation must not allow new challenges or complications to further delay the beginning of this storied institution’s next chapter, using the coming few years to conduct a thorough presidential search in close consultation with all corners of the University community.

In this strange interregnal presidency, meanwhile, Garber has a delicate balance to strike between action and deference. The past year has surfaced many pressing questions about the future, from how to ethically manage the endowment to how to ensure more open and constructive engagement on campus. Some may require answers now — the quickly-advancing faculty senate proposal comes to mind — but Garber would do well to leave the largest questions about Harvard’s future to the president who will be hand-selected to lead us into it.

Of course, Garber does not lack for near-term priorities to fill his agenda, one of which should assuredly be mending fences with the pro-Palestine coalition.

Toward the end of an impressively cool-headed performance managing the encampment last spring, Garber bungled. After he wrote in a University-wide message that he would encourage the schools to discipline students involved with the encampment in line with “existing practices and precedents,” the College Administrative Board took action that appeared unambiguously more harsh than in analogous cases past, to outrage from many students and faculty. Whether Garber overpromised or underdelivered, the episode left a sour taste in the mouths of many — this board included — and he should take the start of his full presidency as an opportunity to reach out and rebuild trust.

We greet Garber’s promotion warmly because we know continuing problems require continuous leadership. But because we remain convinced that continuity rarely takes an institution anywhere truly new, we do so with the hope that we will soon enough say goodbye.

This staff editorial solely represents the majority view of The Crimson Editorial Board. It is the product of discussions at regular Editorial Board meetings. In order to ensure the impartiality of our journalism, Crimson editors who choose to opine and vote at these meetings are not involved in the reporting of articles on similar topics.

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