The Association's membership, assembled at Los Angeles last September, acted wisely in giving itself another year to reflect on the need (if any) for total constitutional revision. A new charter had been prepared in two versions, one by a committee headed by Professor Aaron Wildavsky, and the other by the Association's outgoing Council. So engrossed had each of these bodies been in its labors, and perhaps in the minor differences between the resulting documents, that their first publication, in the summer 1970 issue of PS, was delayed until just before the Annual Meeting. Nor was either version, as published, accompanied by any rationale or explanation. All anyone had to go by was the bare text of the two proposed charters—which most of us saw for the first time when we picked it up at the entrance of the ballroom of the Los Angeles Hilton, on the way to the session that was to choose between these two alternatives—or the status quo ante.

Professor Wildavsky still has not supplied the missing rationale for the document that he helped to father; and the 1969–70 Council allowed its term to expire without venturing any public justification of its further emendations. Meanwhile, however, two members of the Constitutional Revision Committee, Professors Hawkinson and Rosenblum, claiming “obviously … to speak only for themselves,” have published one modest argument in favor of the Committee's draft (see PS Winter 1971, pp. 6–18). Above all, the membership has now had time to study the two proposed charters and to compare them to the one under which, with gradual historical accretions and deletions, American political scientists have managed to operate for about seventy years. A close reading of the three texts is likely to make a conservative of even the most impetuous of our colleagues.

The organization of graduate programs has received increasing attention lately within political science. Teaching techniques, course requirements, class size, student representation in departmental decision-making processes have all been Investigated. This paper examines another aspect of graduate education, the effect of departmental structure on the learning process. We do not deal with the substance of a political science education, but rather with various dimensions of political science departments as organizations. Our findings are based on a survey of fourteen political science departments that was conducted in the winter of 1970. Questionnaires were sent to faculty and to graduate students In the selected departments, and both sets of respondents were asked questions about their attitudes, preferences, perceptions of others, and their interaction patterns in the department.

Our Interest is in departments and the Individual responses are used to define departmental variables. In this paper we examine different characteristics of political science departments, not characteristics of individual students or faculty. Although we get some clues as to what we might expect from organizational theory, our approach is frankly exploratory. First we draw on McQultty's elementary linkage analysis to identify basic distinctions among the departments in our study, and second we use rank order correlation techniques to explore how these and other dimensions go together.

What unique problems currently confront women eager to pursue careers in the discipline of political science? This question was a central one for the Association's Committee on the Status of Women, organized two years ago. As a major part of its fact-finding activities, the Committee conducted a mail survey of graduate students and post-graduate professionals in the discipline during the spring of 1970.

It is obvious that the development of all careers present obstacles. But the Committee survey was designed to arrive at some balanced and realistic view of those points at which women in particular encounter difficulties that are less prevalent for men in comparable situations.

In the background stood the obvious fact, well documented elsewhere, that in the progress over career development hurdles from undergraduate majors in political science through to active roles as adult professionals in the discipline, women show much more marked rates of attrition than men. Clearly a substantial proportion of the extra attrition arises because of a choice on the part of the female at one point or another in favor of a conventional sex role within the family, with a consequent abandonment of career aspirations. However, increasing numbers of women would like to maintain a mix of family and career roles, and there is reason to believe that the current structure of opportunities raises artificial obstacles to such professional participation, and loses important talent to the profession.

The members of the Constitutional Revision Committee of the APSA were predominantly in agreement over the proposed text, though their reasons for supporting the text of the draft may have varied in particular instances. The authors of this article, in presenting their views in support of the draft, obviously claim to speak only for themselves. Hopefully, sufficient time and agenda space will be available at the business meeting during the 1971 Convention so that all the members of the Constitutional Revision Committee will feel encouraged to develop their particular arguments in behalf of the document in full detail.

In many respects the proposed new Constitution speaks for itself and needs no explanation. It seemed pointless and wasteful to us, for example, to specify the cost of annual dues as was done in the original Constitution. A Constitutional amendment was necessary, pursuant to the original document, each time the dues structure had to be altered. It is more consonant with the nature of a Constitution as a general framework of governance to leave such detailed items for careful deliberation by the assembly rather than to freeze them into the Constitution.

If I, in some final reckoning, were asked to state my view of the essential impact of the proposed Wildavsky constitution, I should say that it transfers the debate from the substantive to the procedural. I would say that it abstracts, mystifies, and confuses what was originally a rather clear cut disagreement within the Association. (For a more specific critique of the provisions of the Wildavsky draft see Dankwart A. Rustow, this issue.)

The original disagreement and the one that is still with us may be viewed as a difference of opinion as to certain boundaries: the boundaries between science and politics, science and policy, the Association and the government and/or the regime norms. Those engaged in this disagreement tend to cluster around two positions. One position, that has been called the “establishment” position, tends to draw the older and more established behavioral scholars. For their part they view the boundaries as being rather well established, and since workable, it is felt that they should be maintained. An opposing position, generally attracting younger scholars and some “traditionalists,” has developed around the Caucus for a New Political Science. In its search for what might roughly be called more “relevance,” it sees the “establishment” position as part of the given status quo. According to this position the boundaries are arbitrary, somewhat hypocritically maintained and supportive of a regime that is considered, if not absolutely evil, certainly ill advised as to its priorities. In a word, the distinction between science and politics is surely arbitrary, probably false, and maybe specious.

The annual election for officers and members of the Council of the American Political Science Association took place between November 2 and 23, 1970, with results reported in the Winter, 1971, issue of this journal. Voting was for one President-elect, three Vice Presidents, one Secretary, one Treasurer and eight members of the Council. There were two candidates each for President-elect, Secretary and Treasurer, five for Vice President and sixteen for Council. These candidates were nominated and supported by a variety of groups and three of these groups—The American Political Science Association nominating committee, the Ad Hoc Committee and the Caucus for a New Political Science—fielded complete or virtually complete slates.

This report is an analysis of some of the patterns in the voting. We have worked with constraints, however. Since we received only ballots for the candidates, we were unable to analyze voting on constitutional amendments and resolutions or to look at candidate voting patterns in conjunction with voting patterns on issues. Secondly, there was the limitation inherent in any secret ballot; it was not possible directly to relate voting patterns to attributes of the voters. Thirdly, we did not receive the ballots until early April, 1971. Carding and analyzing them took so much time that we were not able to do all that we had planned. Thus this article is a great deal less comprehensive than we would have liked.

Since this paper in substantially its present form was delivered at the APSA annual meeting in Los Angeles in September, 1970 it has been seen and commented on by several of my friends who are intimate enough to be frank. Views ranged all the way from “don't spoil it by changing it,” to “bury it.” Clearly this is not the stuff of which neutral principles are made. In deciding to go forward, therefore, a plea of confession and avoidance is in order. This is an evocative paper, not a scholarly article. It suggests but does not prove a hypothesis, the real question being how much of it is true and what if anything should political science do about it. Because of the panel format there is intentional hyperbole in my characterization of certain aspects of the behavioral movement, and suggestion that for some researchers it may be almost a “cop-out” on current political and social problems. I trust that those I venture to chide a bit will receive it in the spirit of Marilyn Monroe, who used to say, better to be photographed nude than not at all.

The woman who is now entering (or contemplating entry) into the political science profession confronts a field that is biased against her (“political science is no place for a woman”) and which admits her only grudgingly and accords her limited status. The following is a summary of the data now available on the status of women in the profession.

From the survey conducted by the APSA Committee on the Status of Women (1969, 473 departments responding), we have the following information on female participation:

23.2% of undergraduate majors are women

17.5% of graduates enrolled are women

14.7% of Ph.D. candidates are women

8.7% of those receiving the Ph.D. 1960-1968 are women

8.6% of assistant professors are women

6.7% of associate professors are women; and

4.1 % of full professors are women.

The Cambodian invasion and the tragedies at Jackson and Kent State this spring led to explosions on college campuses all across the country. There was a great deal of talk of massive student intervention in the fall congressional elections and universities adopted various measures in response to the crisis. Some abandoned institutional neutrality by taking positions condemning the President's actions, others scheduled fall courses on elections and “practical politics”, while others opted for some variant of the two week “Princeton Plan” pre-election recess.

Most observers assumed that student political interest would remain high and that the student impact would be significant. By early summer university-based groups had been set up to lobby congressmen to support “end the war amendments”, to raise money for anti-war candidates, and to supply student volunteers to work actively for such candidates.

Most of what Professors Hawkinson and Rosenblum have written on behalf of the proposed new Constitution for the Association—about membership qualifications, about purpose and about taking positions on current public issues—appears to me to argue equally in favor of the Constitution we already have. On these matters the two documents are not far apart. Since I find their arguments for the status quo well stated and persuasive, I shall confine my comments to some major points of difference between the documents, and to changes proposed that would, as I think, be for the worse.

1. The draft is loaded with unnecessary and impractical detail. To be sure, Hawkinson and Rosenblum make a virtue out of relieving the membership of the power to pass on the dues structure by way of constitutional amendment. I will not dispute that view myself, but I can sympathize with those who feel that a referendum on dues is not merely “pointless and wasteful.” On the other hand, what is gained by specifying that the President shall (Art. VII, Sec. 2(f)) “be responsible for the preparation of the budget…” and that the Executive Director shall (Art. IX, Sec. 4 (b)) “assist the President in preparing the annual budget”? Who else, when the natural office for that responsibility, an elected Treasurer, is to be abolished?

Congratulations on your admission and fellowship for graduate work at ………. It should be the beginning of a very promising career and I'll be glad to give you whatever advice I can on the subject.

In answer to your question, there is probably less overt discrimination against women now. Graduate admissions and fellowships look fairly good on the record. And although departments are still lagging in professorial positions and salaries for women, some of them are making an effort to catch up. It shouldn't be too long before most departments have their “quota” of assistant professors. The problem now is with the subtler forms of discrimination — “Phase II” of whatever it is we are involved in. (Phase II, like Phase I, uses sex as a basis for choice, but its arguments are more sophisticated. Phase I says “A woman's place is in the home.” Phase II says “We'd like to hire a woman, but …”)

The number of political scientists registered in the National Register of Scientific and Technical Personnel increased 25% from 1968 to 1970, from 5,176 to 6,493. This reflects a “natural” growth of perhaps 15–20%, over the two years while the remaining increase can be attributed to the greater scope of the American Political Science Association survey of political scientists in 1970. This growth in the political science section of the Register occurred despite a more restrictive definition of “professional political scientist” than had been used in 1968. Insofar as the APSA membership list can be used to gauge the completeness of the response, it would suggest that the Register is substantially complete for political science, allowing for the non-professional members of the Association and a probable residue of non-respondents. Political scientists comprise 2% of the total number of United States scientists (313,000 in 1970) in both years. More than half of National Register scientists are in three disciplines, chemistry, biology and physics.

I have just read with dismay, Council-proposed amendments to the proposed Constitution, PS, Winter, 1971, page 17, Article III.

Apparently Council members feel only those who possess Doctor of Philosophy degrees are capable of knowledge and perceiving “truth”. This type of blatant elitism is difficult to believe or understand coming from those professing a concern for the minorities within APSA who have difficulty communicating and developing. I wonder if Council members feel restricting membership will increase the participation of the minorities.

The draft constitution for the Association, presented to us by the Constitutional Revision Committee, responds to a widely expressed desire for assurance that our officers are representative of our membership. We live in a time of increasing demands on all of our institutions, including those of the APSA, An important purpose in devising workable democratic forms is therefore to insure that those who make these demands do not feel that they have been unheard because of biases in their institutions of government. Although this is not the only purpose of our constitution, it is an important one, and the central one that the framers of the proposed draft seem to have had in mind. I do not believe that this purpose can easily be attained by other alternatives before us, including our present constitution.

I was a late appointee to the Constitutional Revision Committee, appointed by President Deutsch. Unfortunately, no meeting of the Committee was arranged at a time when I could attend.

Had I been able to attend meetings of the Committee, I would have vigorously opposed the proposed Constitution for many reasons. I will mention ONLY ONE; the proposed Constitution sharply reduces the opportunity for members of APSA to participate in important decisions. During the last three years, the Ad Hoc Committee has proposed three amendments to the present Constitution providing for broader participation by the whole membership in the governance of the Association. These amendments gave members an opportunity to vote for officers and Council members in contested elections, to vote on constitutional amendments, and to vote on resolutions. All three amendments were adopted by large majorities. I cannot believe that those who voted for these amendments will vote for a new Constitution that greatly curtails their chance to participate in governing the Association.