Gerhard Casper

Gerhard Casper


9th President of Stanford University
In office September 1, 1992^[1] – August 31, 2000
Preceded by	Donald Kennedy
Succeeded by	John L. Hennessy

Personal details
Born	(1937-12-25) December 25, 1937 (age 86) Hamburg, Germany
Alma mater	University of Hamburg (LLB) Yale University (LLM) University of Freiburg (PhD)
Profession	Political Scientist

Gerhard Casper (born December 25, 1937)^[2] is a political scientist who is a former president of Stanford University from 1992 to 2000, a former Dean of the University of Chicago Law School from 1979 to 1987, and a former provost of the University of Chicago from 1989 to 1992.^[3] Casper was president of the American Academy in Berlin from July 2015 through July 2016; from August 2019 to January 24, 2020, he served as the institution's trustee-in-residence.^[4]^[5]^[6]

Casper is also a senior fellow at the Freeman Spogli Institute for International Studies (FSI) at Stanford, and served as the institute's director between September 2012 and June 2013.^[7] Casper is also the Peter and Helen Bing Professor in Undergraduate Education, emeritus, and is a professor with emeritus status at Stanford Law School.

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The book was written for two reasons, really. One was, I had put a lot of effort into my various speeches and they were very carefully thought through. But, of course what gets lost, because, often, you cannot talk about it directly in your speech, is what is the context. And I was struck from, from the very beginning that the issue of the freedoms of the university, the freedoms of faculty, students, and in particular, the university as an institution, its autonomy, were important subjects. And I obviously had, taken them right on in my inaugural address. [SOUND] Stanford's first president, David Starr Jordan chose the [FOREIGN], the wind of freedom blows as the informal motto. What I read impressed on me, what a splendid choice, Jordan and Stanford made, when they invoked the winds of freedom as the short expression of principle to guide Stanford University. >> The Stanford model is something very important. It has a very interesting history that I could not lay out in detail in the inaugural speech. But that then, led me to address concerns of mine, that I had had since my Chicago days. For instance, I kind of had begun to notice that certain subjects in the classroom were so explosive that both faculty and students engaged in self-censorship. Let us say that in a Liberal setting of the Supreme Court's decision on abortion, or Roe v Wade, could not really any longer often be discussed in its own context and, and the questionable aspects of the discussion. Because so many people felt so strongly about it in the classroom. And I wanted to emphasize that that was really improper, inappropriate for a university. You have to have a wide open discussion of all aspects of human phenomenon. >> A university's freedom must be the freedom of its members, faculty, and students to think and speak for themselves. A university must not have dominant ways of thinking. I'm very, always concerned about the fragility of universities. Part of that clearly reflects my own background, my German background because, when Hitler came to power in 1933, he almost immediately forced the universities to comply with the ideology of the Nazis. Politicians and strong social forces in society try to leverage universities for their purposes. It is not so much trying to influence the content of universities, or forcing them to think particular ways, as you had in, in, in the Third Reich, for instance. But it is, the fact, that government nevertheless, for all kinds of well-meaning reasons believes it should regulate. And I think what is happening now, the world over, to universities, by no means in the United States alone, that everybody looks to universities as the institutions that will save their societies. By that I mean, save their societies economically. People look at Stanford and, and Silicon Valley and innovation and entrepreneurship, and they say, that's what we should, believe the University of Munich should be doing. Right? The question is how we do it. And I, I'm concerned that, increasingly, as everybody is throwing money at us for this purpose or that purpose, we get entangled. I believe universities have autonomy, we have academic freedom, we should make our decisions based only on academic considerations, and we have that for a reason. And that is to make sure that the academic enterprise is uninhibited and robust. [SOUND] [MUSIC]

Biography and academic career

Born December 25, 1937, Gerhard Casper grew up in Hamburg, Germany. He earned his first law degree from the University of Hamburg in 1961. In 1962, he received his LL.M. from Yale University. He then attended the University of Freiburg, where he obtained his doctorate in 1964.

In the fall of 1964, Casper emigrated to the United States and spent two years as an assistant professor of political science at the University of California, Berkeley. In 1966, he joined the faculty of the University of Chicago Law School. Between 1979 and 1987, he served as dean of the law school. In 1989, Casper was appointed provost of the University of Chicago and served in that capacity until 1992. He served as president of Stanford University from 1992 to 2000.

Casper has written and taught primarily in the fields of constitutional law, constitutional history, comparative law, and legal theory. Among his books is Separating Power (Harvard University Press, 1997). From 1977 to 1990, he was an editor of The Supreme Court Review.

Stanford University

In 1992, Casper became the ninth president of Stanford University. His concerns as president ranged from resolution of the indirect cost dispute with the federal government to restoration of the campus after the 1989 Loma Prieta earthquake to innovation in curriculum, programs, and physical plant.

Casper's Commission on Undergraduate Education^[8] was the first comprehensive examination of undergraduate education at Stanford in 25 years. The commission and other faculty initiatives led to a new approach to the first two years of college, Stanford Introductory Studies (SIS),^[9] which provides small-group learning and research experiences. SIS includes the Freshman and Sophomore Introductory Seminars and Sophomore College.

Casper kept tuition increases to a minimum while increasing financial aid.

Casper also initiated the Stanford Graduate Fellowships and helped raise a substantial endowment for their support. The purpose of the Stanford Graduate Fellowships is to attract the best graduate students and give them full freedom to pursue their work at Stanford without worrying about the vagaries of sponsored research or other traditional sources of support.

Recruitment and retention of exceptional faculty members who excel in both research and teaching was emphasized during Casper's presidency through Research Grants for Junior Faculty in the three schools that offer undergraduate degrees: Earth Sciences, Engineering, and Humanities and Sciences. The university's bureaucracy was also streamlined through internal reorganizations and a reduction in the number of vice presidential positions.

The integration of the Stanford Alumni Association into the university in 1998 enhanced outreach to Stanford's alumni worldwide. Donations to Stanford, especially from alumni, increased sharply under Casper's leadership, with particular emphasis on fortifying Stanford's endowment and increasing participation through the creation of the Stanford Fund for Undergraduate Education.

During Casper's presidency, the physical infrastructure of the campus improved substantially. Restoration of buildings damaged in the 1989 Loma Prieta earthquake was completed, and the architectural value of new buildings was enhanced with competitions attracting some of the world's most gifted architects. The 1893 Leland Stanford Junior Museum became part of an expanded complex, the Iris and B. Gerald Cantor Center for Visual Arts. The reconstructed Bing Wing of Cecil H. Green Library opened in 1999, a decade after the severe damage inflicted by the Loma Prieta earthquake closed its doors. Other new constructions included the Science and Engineering Quad, the Center for Clinical Sciences Research, graduate residences, and the Arrillaga Alumni Center.

In 1993, Casper chose Condoleezza Rice as provost of the university. She was succeeded in 1999 by John L. Hennessy. In 2000, Hennessy became the tenth president of the university. About the Stanford presidency, Casper wrote Cares of the University^[10] (Stanford, CA, 1997), in which he addressed many issues facing the contemporary university. His most recent book about higher education is The Winds of Freedom: Addressing Challenges to the University, which was published by Yale University Press in 2014.^[11]

American Academy in Berlin

In July 2015, Casper was appointed one-year interim president of the American Academy in Berlin, an institute for culture and research founded in 1994 by Ambassador Richard Holbrooke. The independent, privately funded, nonpartisan American Academy in Berlin seeks to improve cultural and academic ties between Germany and the USA. Since August 2019, Casper serves as the American Academy's trustee-in-residence. He returned to the Academy's board in 2015, after having previously served as trustee from 2000 to 2009.^[12]

While acting as president, Casper arranged a visit by Nobel Prize winner Eric Kandel, in September 2015, who discussed "The Quest to Understand the Unconscious in Art, Mind, and Brain."^[13] Casper also helped to oversee the Richard C. Holbrooke Forum, which was created in memory of the Academy's founder.^[14]

The intercultural and interdisciplinary setting and the creative program made the Academy a prestigious center according to the German magazine Der Spiegel.^[15]

Honors, awards and leadership

Casper has been elected to membership in the American Law Institute, the International Academy of Comparative Law, the American Academy of Arts and Sciences, the Orden Pour le mérite für Wissenschaften und Künste (Order Pour le mérite for the Sciences and Arts),^[16] and the American Philosophical Society.^[17] During the fall of 2006, he held the Kluge Chair in American Law and Governance at the Library of Congress.^[18] He has been awarded various honorary doctorates. On May 26, 2000 Casper received an honorary doctorate from the Faculty of Social Sciences at Uppsala University, Sweden^[19] That spring, he also received an honorary doctorate from Yale.^[20]

In 1997, Casper received the Golden Plate Award of the American Academy of Achievement.^[21]

Casper is the 2014 recipient of the American Law Institute's Distinguished Service Award.^[22] He served on ALI's Council from 1980 to 2010, and continues to participate as an emeritus member. From 2000 to 2008, he served as a successor trustee of Yale University. From 2010 to 2016, he was chairman of the Board of the Terra Foundation for American Art. Casper is a trustee of the Central European University in Budapest and a member of international advisory councils at the Israel Democracy Institute, the European University at St. Petersburg, and Koç University, Istanbul.

Casper also has the honor of having been the subject of the first Google search by someone not a part of the Google team. In 1998, the future founders of Google was demonstrating their search software for John Hennessy. He chose to search for "Gerhard Casper".^[23]

Notes

^ O'Toole, Kathleen (March 18, 1992). "Chicago's Gerhard Casper named Stanford's ninth president". Stanford News. Retrieved December 1, 2023.
^ U.S. Public Records Index Vol 2 (Provo, UT: Ancestry.com Operations, Inc.), 2010.
^ "History | Office of the Provost".
^ "Gerhard Casper Homepage". gcasper.stanford.edu. Retrieved 27 September 2022.
^ "Stanford President Emeritus Gerhard Casper named president of American Academy in Berlin". 4 December 2014.
^ "Zwist in der American Academy: Präsident McCarthy gibt nach wenigen Monaten auf". Der Tagesspiegel Online (in German). 22 May 2019. Retrieved 27 September 2022. referring to Gerhard Casper's renewed tenure at the American Academy in Berlin
^ "Gerhard Casper". Freeman Spogli Institute for International Studies. Stanford University. Retrieved 27 September 2022.
^ "Commission on Undergraduate Education Report" (PDF). stanford.eu.
^ Casper, Gerhard (May 9, 1996). "On the Synthesis of Teachers and Students". stanford.edu.
^ Casper, Gerhard (1997). "Cares of the University". stanford.edu.
^ "Winds of Freedom | Yale University Press".
^ "Archived copy" (PDF). Archived from the original (PDF) on 2015-09-21. Retrieved 2015-09-22.{{cite web}}: CS1 maint: archived copy as title (link)
^ Riechelmann, Cord (2015-09-11). "Die Wahrheit unter der Haut". Die Tageszeitung. Retrieved 2017-10-17.
^ "Initiative". American Academy in Berlin. Retrieved 2017-10-17.
^ "Der Netzwerker". Der Spiegel (27). 2008-06-30. Retrieved 2017-10-17.
^ "ORDEN POUR LE MÉRITE - FÜR WISSENSCHAFTEN UND KÜNSTE - ORDEN POUR LE MÉRITE". orden-pourlemerite.de.
^ "APS Member History". search.amphilsoc.org. Retrieved 2021-12-10.
^ "Caesarism in Democratic Politics: Reflections on Max Weber Webcast - Library of Congress". loc.gov.
^ "Honorary doctorates - Uppsala University, Sweden". 9 June 2023.
^ "Casper receives honorary degrees from Yale and Uppsala University". 23 January 2023.
^ "Golden Plate Awardees of the American Academy of Achievement". www.achievement.org. American Academy of Achievement.
^ "Awards". 2014annualmeeting.org. Archived from the original on 2014-05-12.
^ Auletta, Ken. "Get Rich U." The New Yorker. Condé Nast. Retrieved 16 November 2018.

External links

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Academic offices
Preceded by Donald Kennedy	President of Stanford University 1992–2000	Succeeded by John L. Hennessy

v t e Stanford University presidents
David Starr Jordan John Casper Branner Ray Lyman Wilbur Robert E. Swain (acting) Donald Tresidder Alvin C. Eurich (acting) Wallace Sterling Kenneth Pitzer Richard Wall Lyman Donald Kennedy Gerhard Casper John L. Hennessy Marc Tessier-Lavigne Richard Saller (acting)

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This page was last edited on 1 January 2024, at 10:02

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