'Twisted' analogy obscures gender's role in appointments

Those who have seen President Tilghman speak informally with students know she has the capacity for effective leadership. Her willingness to defend the seven-week athletics moratorium in the face of a hostile student body — including direct exchanges with students in a packed lecture hall — suggests as much. If I didn't disagree with three-quarters of her publicly held positions, I'd probably say she was doing a fantastic job.

Her student and faculty supporters are a different story.

Shortly after Tilghman appointed Janet Rapelye to head the admissions office, the 'Prince' Opinion Board conjectured that gender exerted some influence on the decision-making process, citing the scarcity of experienced female administrators eligible for the position. As if anticipating the vitriol awaiting them, the Opinion Board added a few caveats: They actually support affirmative action; they're not sexists; they love watching 'The View;' and so on.

Professor Deborah Nord retorted in the following issue that the 'Prince's' observations reflect longstanding prejudices against women in the academy. Nord and the 'Prince' are essentially making the same claim about different people: At bottom, both argue that someone holds gender biases. Only one, however, has used a twisted analogy — one heard so often in discussing Tilghman's appointments that it deserves some attention.

Nord wrote: "Would [the 'Prince'] have been prompted to detect a pattern of gender preference if President Tilghman had appointed men to the provostship and the deanships of the Woodrow Wilson School and the School of Engineering . . . ?" Katherine Reilly followed up with a similar counterfactual: "No one would question the appointment of four men in a row."

To begin with, I think this is factually incorrect. Plenty of people would be — and have been, quite legitimately — griping about a consistently male-biased hiring pattern in higher education. The people doing the griping would be different, but that's a separate issue.

But even if this weren't the case, the analogy is poor, for it overlooks two things. First, there is the importance of the demonstrated intent of the allegedly biased person. Nord and Reilly cannot show statements by 'Prince' editors condemning the ascent of women to leadership roles in the administration. (Based on their editorial, it's quite the opposite, in fact.) In contrast, Tilghman's ideological predispositions on the role of women in the academy are a matter of historical record.

The Boston Globe reported two years ago concerning Tilghman: "As a member of the school's powerful Committee of Three, which oversees promotions and appointments, she has lobbied hard to increase the numbers of ranking women. Nationally, she has called on the federal government to deny funding to scientific conferences that do not include women on their panels." An account in The New York Times is even more explicit: "She holds very definite ideas about increasing the representation of women in top academic and administrative positions," the paper reported, labeling her a "committed feminist."

And here's the real kicker, from that same article in the Times: "And she continues to argue that the most effective way to increase the number of women among faculties' senior ranks is not to increase the number of women entering a field — that has been done, and women are still underrepresented at the top — but to put women in department chairs and other crucial positions. Those women in turn will make decisions about things like hiring and who speaks at conferences where reputations and connections are made."

Two 'Prince' reporters, one of whom was a signatory on the staff editorial in question, interviewed Tilghman before her installation and asked about her thoughts on women in academia. Her response: "I have pretty strong views about that."

There's more. Recall that these statements and reports came after the announcement of her selection for the University's top spot. In years prior, when tact wasn't part of her job description, her views could only be construed as radical. A 1996 New York Times profile called her "an unrepentant feminist and liberal." In 1993, she famously opined that tenure was a "dirty trick" that discriminated against women.

A second problem with those who use this analogy revolves around the tension in their premises. On the one hand, they rightly demand recognition of the extensive and recent history of discrimination against women at Princeton. On the other, they would have us believe that discrimination has not significantly reduced the pool of women eligible for top administrative positions.

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None of this really bears on the legitimacy or prudence of the Rapelye appointment. By most accounts, she is an excellent choice. Nor should Tilghman's liberalism or feminism undermine her credibility in all cases; in fact, as far as tenure goes, she is definitely on to something.

We do, however, need to correct this misguided analogy.

The real parallel is this: Suppose a devout Catholic had taken over the presidency two years ago. Suppose this person had written op-eds and told reporters for years that people of faith face nearly insurmountable barriers in academia, that longstanding academic traditions like tenure discriminate against openly religious persons, that the only solution was to increase their "representation in top academic and administrative positions." And suppose, in fact, that these charges were largely accurate. Suppose that the new president professed to be blind to religion when making appointments, but that within two years of the presidential installation, four devoutly religious people are appointed to the top university posts.

If that happened, of course, only bigots would entertain the idea that religion influenced the appointments. Right, Professor Nord?