oxford

[helixaspersa]

Oxford (or rather, Congregation) has just voted against governance reform, by a strong majority (c. 450 to c. 740). An interesting afternoon - I was impressed with the quality of the speeches and (for the most part) their courteous and respectful tone, as well as the range of those offering their views. Glad I went.

Comments

[shreena]

Perhaps you can answer the questions that I think are crucial but none of the media reports seem to mention:

How were the external members going to be chosen? How could they be got rid off, if they reneged on what they said they stood for at interview/election?

[helixaspersa]

These are very good questions and similar things were bothering me too. Those proposing kept pointing out that Congregation 'elects' the external members in the first place - but inevitably that must mean, votes on a shortlist drawn up by some sub-committee, and how exactly this was going to work was not made clear; equally, they were at pains to emphasise that Congregation could always oust the whole finance committee with a vote of no-confidence (but again, that sort of thing tends not to happen). I should say though that I haven't read the White Paper thoroughly - just particular bits of it that were referred to by the discussions I did read. I think a large part of why the proposal was rejected was that there are too many questions of this kind that were not being clearly answered - rather than that the majority were actually opposed to quite serious reform, or indeed to the presence of selected external members on any governing body. Some of the best speeches (on both sides) were by people who were quite honest about the fact

[shreena]

Interesting - I wonder if the fudging on these things was a tactic or just incompetance.

[fpb]

I have loved Oxford since before I even got in there, but lately my love has been rather sicklied o'er. What with Richard Dawkins and Tariq Ramadan on the teaching body...

[helixaspersa]

Was she speaking? only about three women spoke, so yes, I remember them quite clearly (though not their names obviously!).