Gay Seidman, the first member of the Harvard Board of Overseers to be elected on a pro-divestment platform, wrote this letter Africa to Bishop Desmond Tutu explaining the background of Harvard's position on investing in corporations involved in South Africa. Tutu had recently been elected to the Board. She explained that, in the mid-1970s, Harvard was the first major institution to adopt a "selective investment" policy based on the Sullivan Principles. Harvard's positions on stockholder resolutions are determined by the Corporation Committee on Shareholder Responsibility, which rarely adopts the stance of its somewhat more-representative Advisory Committee on Shareholder Responsibility. And...
Gay Seidman, the first member of the Harvard Board of Overseers to be elected on a pro-divestment platform, wrote this letter Africa to Bishop Desmond Tutu explaining the background of Harvard's position on investing in corporations involved in South Africa. Tutu had recently been elected to the Board. She explained that, in the mid-1970s, Harvard was the first major institution to adopt a "selective investment" policy based on the Sullivan Principles. Harvard's positions on stockholder resolutions are determined by the Corporation Committee on Shareholder Responsibility, which rarely adopts the stance of its somewhat more-representative Advisory Committee on Shareholder Responsibility. And Harvard has been unwilling to divest from corporations doing business in South Africa even when the few stockholder resolutions on South Africa that it has supported have failed. The pro-divestment group on the Board of Overseers is continuing to try to get a vote on divestment by that body.
