Word: fiat
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...boost publicity, I built an eight-foot windmill with my bare hands. We yelled, we postered, we e-mailed, and the referendum passed with a resounding 82 percent of the vote. That spring, however, the administrators all shook their heads in unison. President Summers even issued a special fiat expressly forbidding termbill fees. We found ourselves shrugged off into meetings with assistants, all the fall’s energy blowing away like dust in the proverbial wind. As a freshman, I was in way over my head. Fresh off Lester Brown’s “Eco-Economy...
...worst words in the English language. But it should suffer the ignominious death of disuse, not the arbitrary end of a censor’s decree. Hatred and racism are ugly and despicable. But the only way to deal with them without lowering ourselves is through education and tolerance; fiat and prohibition lead only to other evils...
...attempt to isolate students that do not fit within traditional gender roles but instead a pragmatic allocation of resources to those who would best be served by them. Ideally, transgender students at Harvard would not face a harsh and prejudicial climate. While the administration cannot undo stereotypes by fiat, it can and should create a more accepting environment by giving transgender students priority for gender-neutral housing...
...university leader faces the additional challenges that accompany the not-for-profit, voluntary nature of a university. The central members of such an institution—the senior faculty—are tenured for life. In the long run, their job security insulates them from motivation by fear, fiat, fist, or fury, and they remain free to move should they become dissatisfied with their leader. A shrewd observer once quipped that the president of the university must be able to “listen charismatically.” This does not mean that the president must always...
...most important of her presidency. It is certainly far from easy to find leaders capable of motivating tenured professors, who live cloistered in their labs or offices. Combating this academic apathy is a challenging task, but one that Harvard’s new deans can achieve not through fiat, but by reaching out to critics and supporters alike. Harvard’s leaders cannot be the faculty’s handmaidens but neither can they be firebrands...