It is chaos in university leadership right now. The vice-chancellor (VC) of the Vaal University of Technology has been placed on special leave by his council, the VC of the University of Fort Hare narrowly escaped assassination for his stand on corruption and on Wednesday news broke that the VC of the University of Cape Town (UCT) has settled for a R12m golden handshake to leave the institution. All this happens as starry-eyed first-year students start registration and orientation for the most exciting journey of their learning lives. How sad that we could not provide the incoming class of 2023 with more stable campuses and more inviting leadership. It is, however, the events at UCT that will raise eyebrows.
The case is fascinating for those of us who study higher education leadership. We know what happened. It has been amply reported. What needs explanation is how this venerable institution landed on its feet despite an unprecedented challenge to leadership stability there.
But first, how did UCT end up in this tragic situation? When Harvard University started letting go of its president (our vice-chancellor), the famed economist Larry Summers, there was a revealing statement by one member of the corporation (our council). It spoke of “profound issues of temperament” on the part of Harvard’s leader. This does not mean he was not a brilliant academic — there were rumours of Summers being a candidate for the Nobel prize in economics. What was being said, in effect, is that academic credentials are not enough; what the leader of a large and complex university also needs is a sound temperament.
What was being said, in effect, is that academic credentials are not enough; what the leader of a large and complex university also needs is a sound temperament.
Generally, you do not have a sound temperament if you bully colleagues. You cannot lead an organisation if you are paranoid and keep a mental, if not also written, record of those who appear to sleight you. No leader, whether in a university or corporation, should ever lie to its council or board of trustees; that is a fireable offence. In South Africa, no leader of a public (or private) institution can afford to racially divide its membership or promote xenophobic thinking within its ranks. As a sitting leader of a company or university, you absorb the insults that inevitably come your way and find ways to mend broken relationships as far as you can. Leading a university is an incredibly demanding job that weighs heavily on all your senses; it is, in a word, exhausting. All the more reason that its leader have a strong and healthy temperament or the result will be chaos.
Scholars I know, astute observers of higher education, predicted the fall of UCT. The shameless tribal politics that mobilised in defence of the leader reached its lowest point this week when the ANC Women’s League, long bereft of moral purpose, called the possible suspension of UCT’s head “an annihilation of the vice-chancellor due to her gender and race”. Yes, irresponsible language, but enough to raise the emotive stakes among supporters. Others predicted the EFF would adjourn its fight with university administration concerning blocked registrations and get behind the embattled vice-chancellor.
None of that happened and the question is: why not? It is a question I pondered in the book Corrupted (Wits University Press) when I referred to the institutional capacity (the ability to get things done, skills) and integrity (the core values of an institution) of highly functional universities such as UCT. At some point it did look as if the institution would collapse, but then two seminal events happened.
The senate, which recommended the leader’s appointment and reappointment (yes, they are not innocent in this debacle), found its spine through a courageous position taken by the Academic Union that challenged misrepresentations by the leader to this august body. The council, which refused to act when the previous ombud brought serious charges on behalf of UCT staff, also found its spine and into the early hours gained a growing majority that recognised the crisis had little to do with forced departures of senior staff; those were symptoms of a much more serious problem — intemperate leadership.
In other words, when the chips were down, UCT could rely on the DNA that defined its academic governance for more than a century. However, if it makes the same mistake in appointing its next leader, it might not be so lucky.
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