THE INSTITUTE of Politics in the John Fitzgerald Kennedy School of Government is understaffed, overpublicized, and its most immediately visible aspect, the Honorary Associates program, has stirred up a cloud of controversy that has still not settled.

As Richard E. Neustadt, the director of the Institute, puts it, "We got a cockeyed image--some of it was due to the McNamara incident, some of it to the fanfare that greeted the renaming of the Graduate School of Public Administration, and some of it to the article by Henry Fairlie."

Fairlie's article, perhaps the most vehement attack mounted thus far on the Institute, alleged that the Kennedy family had moved in on Harvard to set up an out-of-town recruiting base for Senator Robert F. Kennedy '48. It was immediately rebutted by the dean of the Kennedy School, Don K. Price, who explained that Fairlie had made numerous faulty assumptions, and got his facts wrong in places.

The Institute's Functions

For all of the article's sensationalism, however, it did raise implicitly the serious issue of what the Institute's functions are and whether they deserved a place in the Harvard community. The most commonly voiced criticism of the Institute is that it is too preoccupied with matters of decision-making and policy implementation. Somehow, many critics think, the Institute may have the effect of reducing the concern of many students and Faculty for more scholarly disciplines.

On a less academic level, others feel that the Institute is "too Establishment," and that its leaders are perhaps insensitive to the views of many members of the Harvard community who are disenchanted with the entire governmental process in America.

Dean Price, however, stresses the Institute's financial independence, the range of views represented in its various visitors and affiliates, and sees little conflict between the Institute and academic disciplines. "There is no doubt that the University must protect its basic strength in the purely academic fields above all things, but I don't believe that activity in applied fields will detract from pure scholarship," he says.

In fact, the Institute's top officials feel that the temperament of the Harvard community over the years has created a need for a University body with the facilities and opportunities the Institute will provide. "There is a long-standing tradition of members of all the Faculties in the University having a serious interest in public affairs," Price observes. Besides, he adds, no one will ever be required to participate in any of the Institute's activities.

No Rigidity

Ironically, for all the interest and concern the Institute seems to have stimulated, its operations this fall have been of a limited and experimental nature. Neustadt himself has gone to great lengths to emphasize that the Institute will not, for awhile at least, impose a rigid pattern on any of its major programs--the Faculty study groups, the Institute Fellowships, the undergraduate seminars, or the visits of the Honorary Associates.

For example, Neustadt is not yet sure what specific role the Institute Fellows--a group of young men leaving government service for private life with the expectation of returning to service--will play. Presently, many of them conduct non-credit seminars for undergraduates on public policy problems and policies. They also attend House lunch tables, and participate in other informal discussions. But they have not, as Neustadt explains with some regret, been brought into the existing Faculty study groups as fully as he'd like. Adam Yarmolinsky '43, professor and chairman of the Institute's Fellowships Committee, blamed this on the difficulty of internally coordinating activities at the Institute during its first hectic months.

It is difficult to cast the Fellows into any particular category of responsibility. Some of them are hard at work on Ph.D. dissertations, others are writing articles and books. Still others came to Harvard for the specific purpose of reflecting on their government experience, and as John G. Wofford '57, one of the original Fellows and now the Institute's Associate Director, says "to get caught up on reading."

'In-and-Outer'

One of the concepts behind the Fellowship program was Neustadt's "in-and-outer"--that is, someone who intermittently crosses the bridge between public and private life. He feels that a year at Harvard, where a young ex-official could exchange ideas with members of the academic community and contribute some insights into practical policy matters, would be valuable.

Even this idea, however, has encountered some criticism within the Institute. Abram J. Chayes 43, a Faculty Associate of the Institute and professor of Law, sees two problems. First, "no one does his most productive work if he's concerned about what he's going to do next, and most of the Fellows may not be sure what they'll be doing after Harvard." Second, Chayes feels that the notion that a person should expect to shuttle back and forth between government and private life "isn't too relevant." "The point of returning to private life," he explains, "is not to wait for some alarm to ring calling you back, but to settle down, adjust, and do some good work without worrying about your future in Washington."