Researching Divestment

Divestment, also known as divestiture, refers to when a business sells off some assets (e.g. stocks, property, subsidiaries) to achieve some financial, ethical, or political goal. To divest from a business or class of businesses (e.g. energy companies that utilize fossil fuels) means to end financial and business relationships with them so neither party may continue to benefit financially from the other.

A divestment campaign involves coordinated efforts by people who oppose an institution’s investments or business ties to particular types of companies, usually for political or ethical reasons. Divestment campaigns in higher education have typically been driven by student organizers and activists who plan coordinated actions on campuses to place pressure on administrators to cut financial ties countries or businesses which contribute to mass death, violence, social injustice, and/or environmental destruction.

Here are some materials that document the response of Barnard administration to divestment campaigns.

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Divestment from South Africa

Campaigns to divest from businesses operating in South Africa in protest of the nation’s system of apartheid had existed in the U.S and internationally since the 1960s. By taking a look at the archives of student publications the Barnard Bulletin and the Columbia Spectator, it is clear that divestment was an issue on Barnard and Columbia students’ minds by the early 1970s.

The Board of Trustees Records in the Barnard Archives includes many materials that shed light on the College administration’s discussions of divestment. In the wake of intense student protests and the well-documented occupation of Hamilton Hall in April 1985, the Board of Trustees began taking concrete actions to enact an official divestment policy on South Africa business holdings in spring 1985. Here are a few excerpts of meeting minutes contained in the February 1984-December 1985 volume of meeting minutes, located in Subseries 1.1, Box 8 of the Board of Trustees Records.

The Board’s official resolution to divest from businesses with operations in South Africa was passed on May 29, 1985:

This letter from Barnard President Ellen Futter, located in the Correspondence sub-series of the Board of Trustees Records, announced the Board’s complete divestment from South Africa to the wider Barnard community:

On the same date as Ellen Futter’s letter, Columbia’s Office of Public Information released a report from the Ad Hoc Committee Regarding Investments in Companies with Operations in South Africa. The committee recommended that the Columbia Board of Trustees divest its $39M of common stock of American corporations with operations in South Africa within two years. The committee report is followed by a statement from Columbia spokeperson Fred Knubel, in which he states that the committee report will not be voted on until the Trustees’ next meeting on October 7. In the statement, Knubel argues that the committee’s report is not in response to student protest, but rather the result of the committee’s independent research into the social and economic consequences of divestment.

From 1985 to 1993, the South Africa policy was frequently referenced by the Investment Committee, a standing Board committee that manages the “investment and reinvestment of the funds of the College” and establishes “investment guidelines in accordance with an investment policy approved by the Board”[1]. Boxes 63 and 64 in Subseries 3.5 cover the 1980s and 1990s, at which time the College’s policies on South African investments were often under discussion:

Following calls from Nelson Mandela for US institutions to reinvest in South Africa given the abolition of apartheid in 1994 and the improvement of social conditions, the Board quickly moved to reverse its 1985 divestment policy:

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Divestment from Israel

Administrative materials related to campus debates about Israel-Palestine appear most prominently in Series 6 of the President’s Office Records. Series 6 contains correspondence between Barnard College President Judith R. Shapiro (1994-2008) and academic departments, professors, administrators, administrative departments, students, and donors.

Shapiro released this statement on November 7, 2002 in response to a petition signed by Barnard and Columbia community members calling on academic institutions to sanction Israel in response to increased violence in Israel-Palestine:

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Divestment from fossil fuels

The student-led movement for fossil fuel divestment in the US saw significant growth in the 2010s. In their article titled “Fossil fuel divestment in US higher education: student-led organizing for climate justice,” Jessica Grady-Benson and Brinda Sarathy observe two primary motivations for students’ increased climate activism: “On one hand, the student movement for FFD may be understood as a response to years of inadequate political action to address climate change and the social consequences of fossil fuel extraction and production. On the other hand, it is also an alternative to insufficient attempts at individualised environmental responsibility which encourages consumer-based approaches such as personal carbon footprint reduction” [2].

The campaign for fossil fuel divestment at Barnard is preserved in the Barnard Archives primarily within the Divest Barnard collection. Divest Barnard was a student organization founded in 2014 that actively organized protest actions, educational events, and communications with Barnard administrators with the goal of pressuring Barnard admin to divest from fossil fuel companies contributing to global climate change.

Members of Divest Barnard compiled research and publications regarding the broader movement for fossil fuel divestment, as sharing resources and information across institutions throughout the country was important for organizing effective actions and communications:

In response to increasing campus organizing and discussions about fossil fuel divestment, Barnard’s Board of Trustees established a Presidential Task Force to Examine Divestment on December 9, 2015. The Task Force comprised trustees, faculty, staff, and students including two representatives from Divest Barnard. The Task Force collaborated throughout 2016 and 2017 to compile research about the strategies and impacts of fossil fuel divestments historically and at different higher education institutions. The Task Force eventually produced a final report which recommended that the Board of Trustees divest from fossil fuel companies that deny climate science. The Divest Barnard representatives maintained meeting agendas, draft reports, presentation slides, research publications, and notes from their participation in the Task Force, all of which are now located in Box 9, Folders 9-11 in the Divest Barnard collection. Here are a few materials that illustrate the development of the Task Force’s administration, research, and recommendations:

This draft of the Task Force’s final report, which is undated but likely authored during the fall of 2016, includes over 50 pages of research on climate change and fossil fuel divestment at higher education institutions:

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Questions & Group Exercise

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Citations