Not all Faculty are wishing for a return to the Rudenstine era. Wolfson Professor of Jewish Studies Jay M. Harris called Summers’ willingness to challenge professors “refreshing.”

According to Peretz Professor of Yiddish Literature Ruth R. Wisse, Summers’ straightforwardness may put him at an unfair political disadvantage.

“Perhaps it’s easier to see the risks of leaders who give a very clear direction where they want to lead,” she says.

And according to Thomas Professor of Government and Sociology Theda Skocpol, just because Summers is more direct than his predecessor does not mean professors cannot be heard. “He’s a vigorous questioner and a critical listener,” she says. “If he doesn’t agree, he’s likely to say that. You can get through to him if you’re well-prepared and talk back.”

Predisposed Positions

But, says Skocpol, Harvard Faculty are not used to being put so openly on the defensive. “He’s not a big respecter of established routine,” she says. “Universities are highly ritualized institutions, and he doesn’t have a knack for it.”

According to Hochschild, Summers’ style can be broken down into three primary approaches, depending on how familiar he feels with an issue.

With issues where he feels like a newcomer, she says, his questioning is straightforward and neutral. Numerous senior Faculty members from the humanities, social sciences and natural sciences alike say Summers appears sincerely inquisitive in committees, is an attentive listener and processes new information rapidly.

But when he has already formed an opinion, Hochschild says, his questioning sometimes appears less than genuine. “He listens to answers but he’s starting from a standpoint,” she says. “He’ll say things like, ‘why would you ever imagine that’ in the guise of a question…Sometimes it sounds like he’s dismissing or disagreeing with you, when in fact it’s just a style. I’m not sure he conveys clearly enough that he’s really listening.”

This style is especially vexing, says Skocpol, when Faculty believe Summers’ position is not well-informed.

“He sometimes forms his views before he’s heard what everyone has to say,” she says. “Sometimes he’s right on the mark and sometimes he’s half-baked, and when he’s half-baked you talk back.”

Summers’ third manner of interacting with faculty, Hochschild says, is when he is firmly set on a view and scarcely expends enough energy to ask slanted questions. Professors who have been on the wrong side of these interchanges are the ones who have been the most vocal in their criticism.

“Once you get behind closed doors among the Faculty, there is a very strong negative reaction to how he is dealing with Faculty,” says one senior professor. “We have a senior Faculty uniformly composed of smart people, who...don’t fall for snap judgements. They don’t disagree with them necessarily, they just believe they should be made in a thoughtful, considered, studied way. So they are angry.”

When professors express concern, the professor says, “he doesn’t really listen to people very much. He’s telling you what he’s going to do. When I’ve been in a committee room and everyone is trying to get him to understand one fact, he’s just not listening.”

Despite the occasional first-year troubles in Summers’ relations with the Faculty, professors still hopefully look toward the future of their dealings with the president.

“There’s nervousness, but the Faculty sincerely wish him well,” Mendelsohn says.

—Staff writer Dan Rosenheck can be reached at rosenhec@fas.harvard.edu.