Harvard University - Red Book Yearbook (Cambridge, MA)

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torical research can prove stultifying to creative work and de- generate into something comparable in sterility to japanese court etiquette, so economic theory factually of course there are a number of them and doctrinal differences frequently break the academic quietj can in its turn sink to the level of a new scholasticism. Political Science QGovernment is the local word for itj is in a somewhat different situation. Political scientists are not limited by a common discipline or a frame of theoretical concepts. Individual political scientists may have such sustenance because they have been converted to their task after training in history or law. As a group, how- ever, political scientists are amazingly diverse in their origins and notably confused as to their mission. The proof of this lies in watching them at work. Variety is the keynote of their course offerings and variety has an appeal in a confused time. Undergraduate enrollment in Government has been very large, second only to Economics in the College as a whole. The Government Department purports to deal with the problems of power--and it takes little argument to convince young men that there are important problems. The Department is also blessed with a number of attractive platform performers, men of some learning, considerable oratorical ability and fin at least a few instancesj a kind of pedogical magnetism which, although rare, can be exceptionally effective. So the Govern- ment Department packs them in, purporting to treat important issues, always in an attractive way. But when we come to examine genuine intellectual contributions to the University and to society, the record is with a few exceptions sadly de- ficient. Whether this should be balanced against the very important practical contributions made by Elliott, Friedrich, Holcombe, and Fainsod and Emerson in the public service, or by Wild, Wright, and Hanford in the administration of the University is an interesting and open question. A More Sweeping Sense of Mission g The one deficiency which characterizes the social scien- tists as a group is the lack ofa sense of mission. It is not so much a lack of a sense of urgency about the fate of man as an absence of urgency about anything in the intellectual sphere. Here the historians are least vulnerable because they can rely on the discovery of the past almosr as an end in itself. The political scientists are the worst for they undertake to cover the most ground with the least preparation and the sketchiest technical equipment. The economists occupy a peculiar middle position, with some of them showing an interest in Seymour Harris from gives the General Education course in economics, is the Faculty's most prolific author. Among his latest books are How Shall We Pay for Eclucation and The European Recovery Program. Alvin Hansen Qcenlerj is one of world's leading economists. He was one of the architects of New Deal fiscal policies. Visiting Professor Herman Finer fbottomj taught British govern- ment and international relations at Harvard during the war. He is now at the University of Chicago. i20l

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The New Scholasticism What are the causes behind this general failure of the social scientists at Harvard? There is no single, simple ex- planation. The phenomenon is not limited to Cambridge although, I think, its origins may be discovered there as well as at any other institution. At the outset it should be noted that there are varying degrees of failure to be encountered here. The historians, for example, are sustained in their exertions by the rigid dis- ciplines of historical research. These disciplines seem to act as a kind of insurance against the absolute mediocrity of their product, so that in a sense no historian blessed with some GEORGE HOMANS BRUCE CAMPBELL HOPPER flssflvlflll' l'l'Uf NHU1' 'Pl S'N'lUlUl-U' Assoi-late l'rofi-ssor of fi0Yl'l'lllll4'Ili Q- K- M- KLUCKHOHN MORRIS BRYAN LAMBIE H l'l'Hl1'NN0l' Ur. flllllll'Ull l'U1N' l'x'nl't'sHm' of fiUYI'I'lllll0l1ii Dirt-r-Im' of lillibllllll li1'N!'lll'l'll fli-nli-r Dir, of lillfvllll of Rlunia-ipul lh-si-:irq-li CW' WILLIAM LANGER WASSILY LEONTIEF Cooliilgi- l'ruf1-ssor of llistury l'roI'4-asm' of l'lK'llll0llllK'S training and a modicum of conscience can be as bad as a bad political scientist. The economists, too, have their saving advantage in the form of economic theory and here Harvard is fortunate. No other institution in the world has, or probably has ever had, so distinguished a group of economic theorists assembled at any one time. But just as the disciplines ofhis- Jlwl Professor W. L. Crum, economic statistician, left Harvard last year for the University of California. Anthropologist Earnest Hooton wrote Why Mm Bvlmm' Lila' fffllif, Young M411 You Are Nowmzl. He measured hundreds of South Station travelers to develop the Hooton Coach Seat. Gaetano Salvemini, authority on the Italian Risorgimento, was once imprisoned by Mussolini. He retired in 1948.

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CHARLES HOWARD MCILWAIN DONALD COPE-MCKAY l'llllUll Prof. ol Clmw-1'll1xx4-III, l'Inn-rilus l'rnf1-ssor of lllSl.Hl'y ROGER BIGELOW MERRIMAN SAMUEL ELIOT MORISON Q l'lUl'llH'I' Gurney Prof. of llistory ,lmmilmn 'l'1-umlmll l'l'ofr-ssor :tml l'oliticu.l Sl'lt'lll'l' of lxllll3ll1'llll lllstory li: Cljiutl Svptit-lube-r 7, 19455 -i Charles Cherington-is the Government Department's'youngest Associate Professor, is a popular lecturer. and understanding of public policy questions which is quite atypical of Harvard social scientists as a whole. There are, of course, many of our social scientists who are filled with rio ii ' s of Y ' ' I 1 eral matters, Tactical DAVID EDWARD OWEN TALCOTT PARSONS pe t c sen es urgency about ep 16 n 4 . 4 1 l'l'of1-ssor of llistory l'rol't-Hsor of Sociology Russian-born Michael Karpovich is a keen critic Psychologist Gordon Allport has written books on per- Frederick Merk gives one of the Col- Of Communism, a specialist in modern European sonality, propaganda, and Orson Welles' Invasion of lege's most popular courses, the history history. Mars. of the American Wfestward Movement. . A -1 -, ggpfiagty' ' :L ,V . -u' EL. Vk,'wTWI- -i:- I ll'- l