Lawrence H. Summers resigned Tuesday as president of Harvard University after a relatively brief and turbulent tenure of five years, nudged by Harvard’s governing corporation and facing a vote of no confidence from the influential Faculty of Arts and Sciences.
The announcement by Summers, 51, an economist and a former secretary of the Treasury, disappointed many students on the campus and raised questions about future leaders’ ability to govern Harvard with its vocal and independent-minded faculty.
But advisers of Summers said he privately concluded a week ago that he should step down, after members of Harvard’s governing corporation and friends, particularly from the Clinton administration, made it clear his presidency was lost.
Summers, who earned a base salary of $563,000 in the 2004-05 academic year and received a 3 percent raise last July, is to leave office June 30. Derek C. Bok, 75, who was Harvard’s president from 1971 to 1991, will serve as interim president.
Hailed in his first days as a once-in-a-century leader, Summers arrived with plans to expand the campus, put new focus on undergraduate education and integrate schools. But he eventually alienated professors with a style many saw as arrogant.
His desire to change Harvard’s culture, which he saw as complacent, was accompanied by slights to some faculty and missteps like his 2005 statement that women might lack intrinsic aptitude for math and science.
Several prominent donors said they were aghast at Summers’ fall.
“How can anyone govern a university where a fraction of faculty members can force a president out?” said Joseph O’Donnell, a Boston business executive who is a former member of Harvard’s Board of Overseers and a prominent donor.
But several of Summers’ faculty critics said the president made the right decision. “A strong leader is not just someone who can name a goal or force a change,” said Mary C. Waters, a sociology professor, “but someone who can bring out the best in people and find ways to encourage teamwork.”