University of Virginia Library

Ode To Harris

Mr. E. D. David's ode to Robert
J. Harris, Dean of the Faculty
(see letter to Cavalier Daily of
February 16th), is interesting for
those who are not familiar with
that gentleman's past contributions
to the University community, but
quite irrelevant to the central issue
raised by the continuing dismemberment
of the University of Virginia
Department of Economics.
The failure to promote Mr. Tullock,
notwithstanding a departmental
recommendation,
vigorous support form his students
and a general respect for the
caliber of his scholarship (as distinct
from agreement with his
policy proposals), leads one to
question the criteria upon which
such a decision was formulated.

The revealed by Mr. David,
to wit, that Dean Harris is a fine
scholar, or even the startling revelation
that a Graduate Record
Examination once asked students
to identify him, has little to do
with whether the current controversy
stems from (a) an error in
judgment, or (b) an arbitrary act
motivated by professional jealousy
and/or bias, or (c) an overly centralized
system for faculty recruitment
and promotion. Given
the quality of the pre-purged
Economics Department and the
secrecy with which faculty promotion
and recruitment is traditionally
guarded, it does not seem unreasonable
to speculate that all
of the above three elements affected
the decision in question. Mr.
David would have us believe that
item (b) could not possibly have
influenced Mr. Harris; it will certainly
take more than a general
testimonial to convince the deprived
and unhappy Economics
students of such a view.

In any event, the results of this
episode will not bode well for
future faculty recruitment. Unfair
treatment of faculty members has
a way of being quickly known within
the academic community. And
the idea that something more is required
of professional staff at the
University of Virginia than that
they are sound scholars and excellent
teachers is not one designed
to attract prospective candidates.

Perhaps Togliatti's observation
that Stalin's excesses were less
attributable to the man than to
the system within which he
operated is applicable to current
promotional policies here at the
University. It is evident that a
restructuring of the decisional apparatus
is needed to assure that
first-rate teacher-scholars may not
only be attracted to Charlottesville,
but retained by offers of
competitive salaries and working
conditions. For Dean Harris, notwithstanding
Mr. David's ecstatic
admiration, is, alas, a mortal,
capable of errors and/or professional
biases to which all of the
human species are susceptible. It
is hoped that a new system
might be developed to assure that
extraneous factors such as political
orientation, or skin color, or
height, might not interfere with
the rather serious and sometimes
controversial task of evaluating a
man's worth qua educator.

In view of recent events, which
have rendered less effective a
once highly regarded Economics
Department, perhaps apologies are
in order, but one hesitates to suggest
from whom they should emanate.