During the 1960s and extending through the present decade, universities have been undergoing a crisis with respect to the role of students in decisionmaking. This crisis has involved a fundamental reconsideration of the nature of university government, and the relationships of faculty to students. Presented in this paper is a case study of one of the first contemporary institutions to adopt departmental wide participatory democracy. The paper is in 3 sections. The first section outlines the formal structure of departmental authority, the nature of the departmental community, and describes the first major political debate of the year in question. The second section reviews 3 sets of implications which followed from participatory democracy in this department: group conflict, role conflict, and some general effects of the modification of the balance of power. The third section is a discussion of participatory democracy in relation to other forms of departmental government. The paper concludes with two alternative interpretations of the effects of the structure of authority in their form of university government. (Author/PG)