The race to be the next chancellor of Oxford University

After months of not-so-secret campaigning, the race to become the next chancellor of Oxford University is entering the home straight, with voting opening for students, staff and graduates next week.

The first ballot involves 38 candidates, ranging from political heavyweights such as Peter Mandelson and William Hague to an "anti-woke" Anglican clergyman and a Zumba teacher.

The former cricketer and Pakistani PM Imran Khan had been among the favourites to replace outgoing chancellor Lord Patten before his last-minute exclusion from the contest. A spokeswoman for the university refused to be drawn on why Khan had been barred from standing but pointed to requirements that the chancellor must be deemed "fit and proper" as the trustee of a charity, under the terms of Britain's Charities Act. Khan is currently serving time in a Pakistani prison on charges his supporters say are politically motivated.

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It has added yet another twist to what is normally a low-key affair to lead one of the world's oldest and most prestigious academic institutions.

"Unpaid, onerous and irksome," said The Spectator: "no wonder many academics shrink at the prospect of the post", which former holder Roy Jenkins famously described as "impotence assuaged by magnificence".

"Yet such is its magnificence that so many others are attracted to the role, fully aware of all the politics and pressures that it brings."

Voting by a convocation

The position of chancellor of the University of Oxford has existed since 1224. A "largely ceremonial" role, according to the BBC, past officeholders include figures such as Oliver Cromwell, the Duke of Wellington, and former prime minister Harold Macmillan.

In all that time the post has never been held by a woman – but if former Tory leader Lord Hague wins, "he would be its 36th 'William'", said The Economist.

The forthcoming election features several notable firsts. One is that the incoming chancellor will be elected for 10 years, a departure from the previous convention that the post would be held for life. The second is that voting by "a convocation" of Oxford students, staff and graduates will take place online, a move which "has not only expanded the candidate pool, but also made it more international", said The New York Times. About 26,000 alumni of Oxford have registered to vote, with an additional 5,000 faculty and senior staff also eligible.

Initial voting will take place in the week commencing 28 October, using the alternative vote system, which allows voters to rank candidates in order of preference. The field of candidates will be reduced to five in a first round of voting, with a winner selected in a second round in late November.

The frontrunners

Some 38 candidates have put their name forward to replace Patten. According to The New York Times these range from an Anglican clergyman who presents himself as the "anti-woke candidate", to a left-wing activist who boasts that he has never "invaded any Middle Eastern countries" to a Zumba teacher who says her cardio training would help her face the rigours of the job.

But three peers "lead the pack", said The Spectator. New Labour architect Peter Mandelson, who studied at St Catherine's College, has sought to position himself as the candidate of the left, noting during his campaign launch that just two of the nine chancellors in the last century had not been Tories.

"I don't see why the Conservatives should have a monopoly on this position," he said, promising to use his links with the new Labour government to advocate for Oxford and the university sector more broadly.

It is perhaps fitting then that his biggest challenge is likely to come from former Tory leader William Hague. The "frontrunner", according to The Times, the former foreign secretary and now author credits his time at Oxford for "everything I've done in the last 42 years in government, the literary world and everything else". He said he'd "be more than happy to play a part in inspiring other people to have that same experience".

Jan Royall, who served in the same Labour cabinet as Mandelson, has pitched herself as the "candidate for welfare and widening access" and vowed to build on her work as principal of Somerville College, championing unconscious bias training and purging octopus from college dinners.

Other contenders include Margaret Casely-Hayford, the first Black British woman to be made a partner at a City law firm, Dominic Grieve, the former attorney-general, and former Tory universities and science minister David Willetts.

Elish Angiolini, Scotland's former lord advocate and head of St Hugh's College, is a "favoured internal choice", said The Spectator.

But "for all the whimsy of the fringe candidates, the chancellor's job is likely to go to one of a small circle of politically connected Oxonians", said The New York Times – "candidates not unlike Patten or his 158 or so predecessors".