When Summers appeared before a group of scholars at a National Bureau of Economic Research (NBER) conference on Jan. 14, his relationship with FAS professors was already tenuous, strained by disagreements over his treatment of faculty and an impression of a lack of transparency.

His suggestion that “issues of intrinsic aptitude” might be responsible for the dearth of women professors in the sciences sparked what many saw as an inevitable explosion, as criticisms of Summers’ remarks rapidly transformed into broader concerns with his leadership on many different fronts.

“The conflict between President Summers and FAS was surely inevitable,” says Professor of Economics Edward L. Glaeser, who has spoken out in support of the president. “You have one strong-minded president and one very strong-minded group of people in the Faculty of Arts and Sciences.”

Caught in between Summers and the Faculty is Kirby. Although he represents FAS, he also answers directly to the president and must serve as an effectual intermediary between the two.

Some professors place part of the blame for the centralization of power on Kirby, saying that he has not been firm enough in defending the interests of the Faculty in the face of Summers’ aggressive leadership style.

“If he had been strong, he could have alleviated some of the problems,” says one faculty member. “A lot of changes have been imposed on FAS and he’s accepted those.”

“The hope that Kirby might assert himself on behalf of FAS and in any way against the will of Summers is no more than a hope at this point,” adds another senior faculty member.

Both professors spoke on the condition of anonymity to preserve their working relationships with Kirby.

But some professors are eager to see how Kirby will act if Summers retreats from FAS affairs. They say that Kirby has been placed in a difficult position by the winter crisis, forced to publicly support Summers while his faculty rose in open revolt against the president.

It is possible, though, that while Kirby has not publicly dissented from Summers’ policies, in private he may be a more forceful advocate for his Faculty.

As adviser to the president, Kirby cannot easily criticize Summers—if he were to do so, “the whole institution is headed to a breakdown,” Saltonstall Professor of History Charles S. Maier ’60 said in March.

But some professors point to Kirby’s controversial decision at the end of last year to take control of a set of funds that individual departments had been rolling over annually as proof that centralization is not only happening at Summers’ behest.

Until last year, departments that had not used up their entire budget were allowed to save the surplus funds and use them for special academic functions.

For example, the Comparative Literature Department used the funds to finance graduate student research and trips to academic conferences, according to the department’s chair, William Mills Todd III.

Todd, who is a member of the group of chairs, says smaller departments lost tens of thousands of dollars, while larger departments lost hundreds of thousands. “This is chump change,” he says. “The University bought itself a lot of ill will with this, and didn’t buy itself the ability to put up the Guggenheim.”