Seite - 44 - in Universities in Imperial Austria, 1848–1918 - A Social History of a Multilingual Space

44 ♦  Universities in Imperial Austria, 1848–1918 the scientific folk life [wissenschaftliches Volksleben] . . . is to be adamantly defended and fought for.”107 In November 1848 Feuchtersleben resigned, leaving countless projects unfinished; only two were partially completed, namely, the renewal of the Viennese medical faculty through the pensioning off of five, in his eyes, overage professors and the reorganization of philo- sophical study into a faculty.108 Shortly after Feuchtersleben’s resignation, the government published two laws on 11 December 1848 changing the appointment rules for professors and on 19 December a law concerning those for Privatdozenten. The academic senate remained officially responsible for preparing proposals for new pro- fessorships and sending them to the Ministry of Education. Instead of the Kompetenztabelle, faculties were now obliged to prepare terna proposals, which were much less formal in style.109 Once a chair was unoccupied, the university had to ask the provincial government to issue a public tender with deadlines; it was, however, by no means obliged to include in the terna those scholars who applied. Rather, the proposal should discuss scholars appropri- ate for the post, both domestic and foreign. Only in exceptional cases were Conkursverfahren allowed, held not by the faculty but by the ministry. The ministry could also hold its own Conkurs, if unsatisfied with the proposal. Also, the three-year probationary period (Probetriennium) was retained, leading later to protests by the universities, which regarded it as demeaning academic dignity.110 Importantly, the ministry also established the minimum remuneration for full professors. Associate professors—scholars permanently appointed for disciplines that were not part of the curriculum, who thus could be specific to a single university—negotiated their salaries on a case-by-case basis until 1918. In this, Vienna remained the best-paying university, with Prague in second place, followed by Cracow and L’viv and, finally, Graz, Innsbruck, and Olomouc, where the regular salary was only two-thirds of the salary in the capital (see table 1). This salary structure had an immense influence on the career paths of professors until the end of the empire in 1918. The law concerning Privatdozenten superseded the local regulations, which had often been provisional and chaotically enacted. While these had stressed university autonomy and had given academic bodies control over the habilitation procedures, the new law privileged the ministry. In addition to being accepted by the faculty, a candidate for Privatdozent had to go through a public examination, a test lecture, and confirmation by the min- istry before being officially permitted to teach.111 The Privatdozentur was limited to the faculty and the university that approved it; any change in either