Today’s Canberra Times confirms that Lee Kuan Yew’s degree broke ANU rules on honorary degrees:
[ANU Chancellor] Dr Hawke conceded he was personally responsible for nominating Mr Lee for the honour, discussing it with his vice-chancellor Ian Chubb before taking the suggestion straight to council for approval. Under normal circumstances, the nomination would first have been considered by the Committee for Honorary Degrees, but Professor Chubb said yesterday that the fast scheduling of the diplomatic visit in December meant it went straight to council which, he noted, also contained six members of the Honorary Degrees Committee. “It was simply a timing thing and you can argue it is right or wrong, but you can’t put every decision out for public acclamation.”
I don’t think public acclamation is the issue. The issue is due process. The Honorary Degree Rules of 2006 [honorarydegsrules1.pdf] make it clear that proposals “must” be referred to the Honorary Degrees Committee. The quorum for the committee is eight and the proposal must be approved by at least 80 percent of those present. Importantly the Rules provide for academic staff and student representation on the Honorary Degrees Committee. While the rules emphasise the confidentiality of the process (not “public acclamation”) there is provision for consultation with appropriate persons.
Reading the Rules, I get the clear impression that they were specifically designed to avoid ill thought out proposals being rushed through.
All this make me wonder if the earlier proposal to award Korean industrialist Ku-Taek Lee with an honorary Doctor of Science also received Dr Hawke’s fast-track treatment:
The Chancellor, Dr Allan Hawke, would like to invite the academic staff of the ANU College of Asia and the Pacific to a special ceremony at which he will be conferring the degree of Doctor of Science, honoris causa, on Mr Ku-Taek Lee, AC, Chair of POSCO, the Korean steel manufacturing company. The ceremony will take place at 11am on Thursday, 15 March, in the Great Hall of University House… The ceremony is a special occasion to honour Mr Lee’s achievements and further the University’s relationship with Korea. The Chancellor hopes you will join him for this event.
The ANU honorary degree “citations” for the two Lees are now available. Enjoy the reading.
9 responses so far ↓
1 Historicus // Mar 29, 2007 at 12:50 pm
Clearly the VC has bungled this, avoided the rules or made them up as he has gone along, and should fall on his sword. For the disdain that he has shown towards his faculty, he should take responsibility, apologise and resign.
2 ANU Graduate // Mar 29, 2007 at 9:30 pm
The obvious point: if the VC can not be trusted to follow the rules then why should staff or for that matter students at ANU feel themselves bound by university regulations?
And a question: if the awarding of the degree was against university rules, then can the degree be revoked on these grounds? Or at least, can the decision to award the degree to Lee be reconsidered by the Honorary Degrees Committee under the existing Honorary Degree Rules? (which, one would think, would have the same outcome).
3 jeplang // Mar 30, 2007 at 3:37 am
Can Lee’s degree be revoked,even if the rules have not been followed?
Can a non-honorary degree be revoked if certain procedures are not followed,even though the degree was awarded at a graduation ceremony?
What does the ANU Act say about all this?
4 W.B Yeats // Mar 30, 2007 at 1:27 pm
Bald heads forgetful of their sins,
Old, learned, respectable bald heads
Edit and annotate the lines
That young men, tossing on their beds,
Rhymed out in love’s despair
To flatter beauty’s ignorant ear.
All shuffle there; all cough in ink;
All wear the carpet with their shoes;
All think what other people think;
All know the man their neighbour knows.
Lord, what would they say
Did their Catullus walk that way?
5 John Tan // Mar 30, 2007 at 8:15 pm
I happened to surf into your cool site. It’s really good to know there are people who take these things seriously. Alas, there are always those who would do anything in the name economic expedience.
BTW, I have an opt-ed piece on this matter at http://www.singaporedemocrat.org/articleop-ed1_johntan.html
cheers,
john
6 K D Yeo // Apr 9, 2007 at 2:50 pm
One day all the parts of the body held a meeting to decide who should become the boss. The brain claimed that it was the smartest so it should be the boss. The eyes said that it does all the seeing so it should be the boss. The ears said it does all the hearing so it should be the boss. The mouth said it does all the talking and eating so it should be the boss. The heart said it pumps the blood that gives life so it should be the boss. The lungs said it does all the breathing that makes life possible so it should be the boss.
And this went on with all the parts of the body shouting and disagreeing as to who should be the boss. Suddenly, while all this argument was going on, they heard a squeak from the bottom. They all stopped arguing and every part of the body fell silent. “What’s that again?” asked the brain.
“What about me? Can I be the boss?” It was the arse hole joining the debate as to who should be the boss.
When all the parts of the body heard this they all fell down laughing. They could not stop laughing. The eyes were watering with laughter. The wax from the ears popped out because of the uncontrollable laughter. The mouth laughed so furiously that it accidentally bit the tongue. The tongue was bleeding profusely but it felt no pain because it was laughing until the throat could no longer produce any sound. This laughter went on for a full ten minutes and the entire body rocked and shaked like it was being hit by the greatest earthquake in history.
But the arse hole did not join in the laughter. It kept very silent. It was very angry and hurt. When all the parts of the body had regained their composure the brain said, “You are just an arse hole. You cannot be the boss. Arse holes can never be the boss.”
When the arse hole heard this it became real mad, hopping mad, mad as hell. It said, “Oh yeah. Then let me show you who the boss is.”
From thereon the arse hole clammed up and refused to open any longer. It shut very tight and would not talk to all the other parts of the body - what the Malays would call merajuk. For many, many days no shit could pass through. After a week the brain started getting very groggy. The eyes became so watery it could no longer see. The heart started beating so softly you could no longer detect its beat. The lungs became so short of breath that oxygen was no longer being sent to the blood. It was now apparent that the entire body was dying.
Finally, all the parts of the body admitted defeat and ceded that the arse hole is the most powerful part of the body and should be made the boss. So they called another meeting and all the parts of the body unanimously agreed to appoint the arse hole as the boss, proving once and for all that all you need to be is an arse hole to become boss.
7 Rex Luther // Apr 9, 2007 at 7:15 pm
Let me just post some reports and lets see if the you guys are smart or have been outsmarted again
Mr Lee was also conciliatory about past comments in which he warned Australia would become a “white trash” nation, saying “there are some words sometimes sown in the heat of the argument. You have changed and the Australia I came to in 1965 was a very different Australia.”
We are going to prosper, you are going to prosper. But if I ALLOW YOU TO RUN MY COUNTRY IT WILL SPIRAL DOWNWARDS AND WILL HIT ROCK BOTTOM”
Go figure what that means what it tells of your system.
8 Stanford // Sep 29, 2007 at 4:46 pm
“We are going to prosper, you are going to prosper. But if I ALLOW YOU TO RUN MY COUNTRY IT WILL SPIRAL DOWNWARDS AND WILL HIT ROCK BOTTOM”” ? Didn’t you know the media spun this to make it look like he was speaking to the ‘whole of Australia’ when he was just talking to the hostile crowd?
—
You ‘forgot’ to quote the first part of the statement Luther. “I’m quite accustomed to a hostile group… it’s not going to change me and I’m not going to change you – ” Even without knowing who the other party is he’s addressing, through a logical process of ensuring credibility of a statement, you can see he’s clearly speaking to the ‘hostile group,’ not the Australian people collectively. Go do your research. I don’t think a foreign politician would accept an award and insult the country that confers it upon him. No wonder so many ‘graduates’ are coming out of school with paper not worth the crap its wiped with.
What is credibility of your source guys? A joke excuse of an Australian newspaper? Read the entire quote in context and prove you’re not an ignorant gossip monger. Don’t be a media slave. What is the point of liberty if you don’t know how to think for yourself?
9 AsianRacism // May 13, 2008 at 12:45 pm
What was the outcome of the purported legal challenge to the conferal of the degree?
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