The Wall Street Journal reports on the departure of Blair and Caroline Hoxby for Stanford.

Aside from a sunnier clime, Stanford offered Ms. Hoxby the attractive lure of a tenured position for her husband, Blair Hoxby – something that Harvard, where Mr. Hoxby taught history and literature, had failed to do.

....In an interview with the Chronicle of Higher Education, Ms. Hoxby, 41, said the tenure offer had helped clinch the deal. She said she and the Harvard economics department had made various attempts to give the university a chance to keep her, but that “there is a sense in which no one is in charge” at the venerable institution.

Here's the most relevant part of that interview:

Ms. Hoxby, who is 41, joined Harvard's economics department in 1994. Her chairman tried hard to keep her, she said, but she never heard from anyone in the administration. She even telephoned Drew Gilpin Faust, Harvard's incoming president, to let her know the couple was about to leave, but nothing happened, Ms. Hoxby said.

Hoxby's is a profound criticism: There is no one in charge at Harvard. Is it true? Is Harvard a little, well, adrift?