ABSTRACT
Just as the Fall semester was about to open at Berkeley in 1964, the Dean of Students informed student organizations that the sidewalk area in front of the campus could no longer be used for political purposes. The formal authority of university administrators thus depended on the maintenance of consensus. The new style of confrontation was effective precisely because it shattered the tacit acceptance of the status quo. The formal authority of university administrators thus depended on the maintenance of consensus. If the failing of the research universities was the lack of coherence and consensus in undergraduate education, the new offerings brought appreciably greater incoherence and dissensus. Institutions that were capable of maintaining a semblance of internal coherence and consensus were able to weather confrontations with radical students with minimal damage. In the late 1960s the financial environment became decidedly less congenial for the endowed private universities.
