著者
羽田 貴史 金井 徹
出版者
日本教育行政学会
雑誌
日本教育行政学会年報 (ISSN:09198393)
巻号頁・発行日
vol.36, pp.158-175, 2010-10-01 (Released:2018-01-09)

The purpose of this paper is to consider the big picture of the presidential appointment system of national universities after World War II and to explore what kinds of presidents were selected under the system. The system of president appointment prevailed in all imperial universities since the system was established in the wake of the Tomizu and Sawayanagi incidents, although legislation to this effect was not fulfilled. This system restricted the constituency of candidates to professors with methods of election : 1) Candidates narrowed down by preliminary committee in advance and 2) A president elected through several elections without a prior selection of candidates. The election system remained with an expansion in the constituency even after the postwar national university system was inaugurated in 1953 which included provision for electing a president independently. In the presidential selection at that time there were only four presidents who were elected at their old universities. The internal promotion system of a president was not a common pattern given the circumstances of antagonism among faculties and the shortage of candidates eligible for president. In addition, "the principal as the professional" that was the personnel transfer route of the Ministry of Education was dismantled because of the system entitling national universities to hold an independent election for presidents. Recommendations of the Central Council for Education (1963) and University Council (1995) pointed out that nearly all presidents actually had little in the way of management skills and that elections tended to become sensational and be favorable for large-scale faculties. The election system, however, has remained in national universities even after these recommendations. The presidents of national universities selected under the postwar election system have had the following characteristics : 1) Almost all national university presidents were selected in their early 60s as they came up to forced retirement as professors of a national university, 2) The number of presidents who graduated from imperial universities or former imperial universities has decreased, and the number of inbred candidates for national universities for presidents has increased, 3) Presidents being given internal promotion have become the majority, and 4) Almost all of these presidents in the postwar period were from the faculties of medicine, technology, science, education, agriculture, or economics. The presidents of national universities have been transformed from being seen as the "president as a symbol of the university" who was a graduate of other imperial universities, which was found at the beginning of the postwar period, to the "president as a symbol of collegiality" selected from his university and well-informed about that particular university. This tendency has remained after national universities were incorporated.