Harvard Report Highlights Concerns About Exclusive All-Male Clubs

A sexual-assault-prevention task force at Harvard University this week presented a damning portrayal of the institution’s prestigious “final clubs,” saying the mostly male-only social organizations foster “a strong sense of sexual entitlement” and “deeply misogynistic attitudes.” The task force’s report has stirred debate about the role of the clubs — which are akin to similarly exclusive groups at other elite colleges — in a university community that strives to be welcoming to all.

Harvard’s final clubs play a role similar to that of fraternities elsewhere; they are private groups that host many of the parties that students attend even if they are not of legal drinking age. The clubs have also faced similar criticism.

But the Harvard groups carry an even more controversial reputation as bastions of white, male, wealthy privilege. Students have to be invited to participate in new-member recruitment, and the clubs aren’t recognized by Harvard or national affiliates, so they operate with even less institutional oversight than most Greek groups.

The task force’s scathing comments indicate a desire among some faculty members and students at Harvard to push for meaningful change in the clubs. Without specifying what that change might look like, the report expresses “strong support” for Harvard to take action “that would result in expanded membership practices that include all genders.” A coeducational roster, the group suggests, could help reduce the number of sexual assaults at the clubs, which are the most likely location outside of dormitories for Harvard undergraduates to experience nonconsensual sexual contact.

Two of Harvard’s male-only clubs began accepting women last fall; the other six remain restricted to men. The university also has five female-only final clubs, but they were created only in the past 25 years; the male clubs date back more than a century.

Some see the male-only organizations as holdouts, compared with similar groups at other Ivy League institutions that have opened their doors — many only after protracted legal battles — to women. A number of those organizations have also instituted more-democratic selection processes, choosing members through lotteries and actively seeking out students from diverse backgrounds.

The Harvard report stresses that “final clubs are not the exclusive or even the principal cause of sexual assault” at Harvard, but adds that “we also do not see any solution that does not involve addressing the disturbing practical and cultural implications they present in undergraduate life.”

Several members of the task force contacted by The Chronicle either declined to comment or did not respond to interview requests. But the panel’s report makes clear that the final clubs clash with the university’s efforts to treat men and women equally.

It notes that, in interviews, task-force members “heard reports from students of a strong sense of sexual entitlement within some of the male final clubs, stemming in part from the members’ control of social spaces that are imbued with a certain historical tradition and that elevate members’ social status on campus.”

The task force also states: “In our view, the very structure of the clubs — men in positions of power engaging with women on unequal and too often on very sexual terms — speaks tellingly to the work ahead of us if we are to create an environment where all students, of all genders, can thrive.”

‘Rogue Organizations’

Final clubs have a reputation for being “white, male-only spaces,” Shaiba Rather, a junior and president of Harvard’s Undergraduate Council, said in an interview. Dues tend to cost more than at most fraternities, she said, and in recruitment “there’s a notion of them already knowing who they want.”

The groups fly mostly under the radar, with membership lists that Ms. Rather described as “secretive.” Even if the clubs actually reflected the diversity of Harvard’s campus, she said, nobody would know it.

The clubs are a hotly contested topic among students, she added. “A number of students recognize that these spaces are not always the safest,” she said. But many students, particularly freshmen, have nowhere else to socialize. “A lot of people see it as a last resort,” she said. “It’s like, If I don’t go to a final club, what am I doing on a Friday night?”

And some members of the clubs resent efforts by administrators to crack down on male-only social groups, especially when they aren’t officially part of the university. Alumni often take such prohibitions the hardest.

Two years ago, Amherst College expanded a 1984 ban on official fraternities and sororities to include “underground organizations” — a move that angered some students. A resolution passed by the Massachusetts college’s Board of Trustees warned that students could be suspended or expelled for belonging to groups that are similar to Greek organizations.

Final clubs at Harvard exist as largely underground organizations, but the university doesn’t discipline students for joining them. More than 30 years ago, Harvard gave the clubs an ultimatum: become coed or move off campus. The clubs refused to admit women, and they’ve been unrecognized ever since. Their leaders meet from time to time with administrators about issues like sexual-assault education and alcohol safety, but the relationship ends there, for the most part.

Such a lack of oversight leads to what Steve Veldkamp calls “rogue organizations.” When student groups are kicked off campus but still operate in the community, colleges have little ability to work with them, said Mr. Veldkamp, executive director of the Center for the Study of the College Fraternity, at Indiana University at Bloomington.

Social groups, like fraternity chapters, that are affiliated with a national organization and involve administrators, faculty members, and parents tend to be safer, Mr. Veldkamp said. “You’re talking about a lot of eyes and ears around an organization that can enable it to become a really solid educational experience,” he said. When groups are as autonomous as Harvard’s final clubs, he said, “individual students can be held accountable through the code of conduct, and that’s the only real recourse.”

Other Ivies’ Experiences

Harvard isn’t the only Ivy League institution that has taken heat for elite social clubs that have been unwilling to accept women as members.

In 1990 the Supreme Court of New Jersey ordered the last remaining all-male undergraduate clubs at Princeton University — Ivy Club and Tiger Inn — to start admitting women. The 11 eating clubs, where three-quarters of undergraduate upperclassmen dine, are housed in mansions and are not officially affiliated with the university.

The integration of women into the Princeton clubs hasn’t eliminated complaints about misogynistic behavior at the organizations, which play a key role in undergraduate social life. The vice president of Tiger Inn was ousted from his position in 2014 after allegedly emailing fellow members a photo of a student, whom he described as “an Asian chick,” engaging in a sex act during a party at the club. The treasurer was also removed after he allegedly sent an email urging his classmates to boo a visiting speaker — an alumna whose lawsuit had led to the integration of women into the eating clubs.

The club has since tried to clean up its sexist reputation; three of the six officers elected last year, including the president, are women.

Meanwhile, Yale University’s most exclusive social club, Skull and Bones, has been trying to shed its reputation as an old boys’ network since it began admitting women, in 1992. The secret society, which counts the former president George H.W. Bush among its members, selects 15 to 20 incoming seniors each year, about half of whom now are women.

Members aren’t allowed to talk about what happens in their meetings, which take place in a windowless building they call the Tomb, but activities reportedly involve macabre rituals and lengthy discussions about cultural and social affairs. The members, who develop intense personal ties, also delve into more personal matters, which led some people to argue, back in the early 1990s, that making the club coed could lead to rape.

Secret societies like Skull and Bones affect the lives of relatively few Yale students, though, and they haven’t been called out for sexist behavior in the way the university’s fraternities have.

At Harvard, on the other hand, the final clubs “have a disproportionate influence on campus culture,” according to the task force.

The panel’s criticism of the club’s “gender-exclusionary” structure echoes debates that have occurred at other colleges over single-sex social organizations. Some colleges have tried to make Greek life coed, though one of them that attempted to impose such a requirement recently abandoned the idea. Trinity College, in Connecticut, cast aside a coed mandate for its fraternities and sororities last fall after making little progress.

Not everyone thinks forcing the final clubs to accept women will make the clubs safer. Mr. Veldkamp sees coed mandates as “moving the issue and not solving the issue.” The high-risk culture of the clubs doesn’t exist in a vacuum, he said.

“The clubs themselves are a container for some activity,” he said, “but people are coming in with ideas and mind-sets that need to be challenged.”

Some activists believe that focusing on the clubs oversimplifies sexual violence at Harvard. “I think the university is much more comfortable saying these off-campus final clubs have problems as opposed to talking about the perpetrators in dorms,” said Jessica Fournier, a junior and organizer with Our Harvard Can Do Better, a sexual-assault-prevention group.

Ms. Rather, the Harvard Undergraduate Council leader, agrees that the problems in final clubs, and on the campus more broadly, stretch well beyond gender exclusivity. “The report talked about entitlement and privilege, and that crosses all genders and all sexualities,” she said. “How we’re treating that needs to go beyond just letting a few girls into the space.”

Sarah Brown writes about a range of higher-education topics, including sexual assault, race on campus, and Greek life. Follow her on Twitter @Brown_e_Points, or email her at sarah.brown@chronicle.com.

Katherine Mangan writes about community colleges, completion efforts, and job training, as well as other topics in daily news. Follow her on Twitter @KatherineMangan, or email her at katherine.mangan@chronicle.com.