Global Citizenship— Brought to You by… Apartheid?

Sarah Levy

November 13, 2009

I’m going to start off by saying that yes, I know the new Institute was paid for with specific donations for said Institute. But what I want to get at is this: while so much of our campus and the supposed ideals we aspire to revolve around being Good Global Citizens, how can we continue our business relations with, let alone prosper financially from, international atrocities?

Right now Macalester’s endowment is kept largely in hedge funds—much like mutual funds,—which the Macalester Investment Board chooses outside investors to be in charge of. Each year tuition pays for about 60% of the college’s expenditures, and money from the endowment pays for the remaining 40%. The details of the endowment are kept classified, and on top of this the complex web of people and funds we pass our money to makes it so that not even Brian Rosenberg is fully aware of the companies we are invested in. While we have a Social Responsibility Committee and the Board of Trustees is supposedly allowed to “take non-economic factors into consideration when making investment decisions,” ultimately the only instruction we give our investors—and the only one they are likely to follow—is to maximize the earnings on our money. Period.

For instance, despite seeking to avoid investments that cause “grave social harm,” right now we are invested in the S&P 500, America’s top 500 companies, indirectly through an index fund. As of September of this year, the S&P 500 included Boeing, Caterpillar, Coca Cola, Citigroup, General Electric, Halliburton, Starbucks, and Wal-Mart, all and all making it a very socially irresponsible package.

This means that while Café Mac serves Fair Trade coffee (thanks to an effort by the students of MPIRG), Macalester is simultaneously supporting and benefiting from companies such as Knight Ridder that rely on the work of slaves in the Amazon state of Para to produce their wood products. Or, while MacCARES and other student groups push to make our college and the greater community energy efficient and environmentally friendly, we are still funding and profiting from the oil and coal giants who are deterring global efforts against climate change.

But besides the distressing hypocrisy of the issue, why does any of this matter?

Divestment from corporations we don’t want to be invested in is often seen as dogmatic—a way to put weight behind the principles we stand for as a school.

However, divestment can and has also been used successfully as a direct tactic to stop injustices around the world, most famously being South African Apartheid which was finally ended after a widespread campaign of boycott, divestment, and sanctions (BDS) that involved many campuses across the U.S.

Which brings us to the situation today.

In 2005 Palestinians put out a call for “boycott, divestment and sanctions against Israel until it complies with international law and universal principles of human rights.” They call for Israel to 1.) End its occupation and colonization of all Arab lands and dismantling the Wall; 2.) Recognize the fundamental rights of the Arab-Palestinian citizens of Israel to full equality; and 3.) Respect, protect and promote the rights of Palestinian refugees to return to their homes and properties as stipulated in UN resolution 194.

It is precisely that the BDS movement comes from within Palestinian civil society that makes it so powerful and effective, and the fact that we are in the U.S. makes it all the more important to respond to the call. Each year the U.S. gives Israel $3 billion in the form of both military and economic aid, which is crucial to continuing its policy of territorial expansion and repression of Palestinians. Being in this economically dependent relationship with the U.S. necessarily makes Israel’s actions far more accountable to the international community—and thus makes divestment a crucial tactic—more so than with places like Sudan.

Yet as long as we are invested in companies such as Caterpillar, Motorolla, General Electric, and ITT Corp, (to name a few), Macalester College is indirectly supporting Israel’s military occupation of the Palestinian people. (For more information, check out http://www.inminds.co.uk/boycott-israel.php) And with our endowment assembled the way it is, we are essentially making the statement that although we may say we stand for Higher Global Social Principles, when it comes down to it, we care about money first.

If we truly want Mac to be both sustainable and socially responsible, we need to approach the issue from a deeper level and expand the frame of our global consciousness. We’ve already taken a lead in sustainable building, let’s not be left in the dust when it comes to the sustainability of where our money comes from.

Macalester Joins the Masses as they Demand Full Equality for LGBT People

Sarah Levy
October 14, 2009

Last Sunday, October 11, while the majority of Macalester was enjoying a typical weekend, 16 students were in Washington, D.C., marching along with over 200,000 people to demand equal rights for all LGBT people under the 14^th amendment.

The march was called by Cleve Jones, a close collaborator of the late Harvey Milk, after he received thousands of letters and messages from mostly young activists who wanted something to be done following Proposition Eight’s loss last November. The intention was to get people from all 50 states and all 435 congressional districts to the capital, in a new effort to make the struggle a national one.

“I am sick and tired of fighting state by state, county by county, city by city, for fractions of equality--for impermanent victories that can be done away with by a popular vote of 50 percent-plus-one, and we're returned to second-class citizenship again,” said Jones in a rally on the lawn of the capital following the march. “Because the most important and significant rights granted to heterosexuals through marriage are determined not by the states, but by the federal government.”

This is a crucial point to be made.

Currently LGBT couples are denied over 1,100 basic rights that are attached to the legality of the word “marriage.” These include things such as: the legal rights to visit a spouse in the hospital; the right to special consideration for the immigration of a spouse when from a foreign country; being eligible to receive a spouse’s healthcare benefits; the right to filing taxes jointly (resulting in significantly higher taxes for LGBT couples); the right to inheritance of property; and many other basic rights that most heterosexual couples take for granted.

Of note Sunday was the prevalence of young people. With an actual rainbow in the sky above them and enough sun to qualify the day as “hot,” a student contingent of hundreds led the march from McPherson Square to the U.S. Capitol, chanting “Hey! Obama! Let Mamma marry Mamma!” and “Get Up! Get Down! There’s a Civil Rights Movement in this Town!”

In addition, according to Time Magazine, the average age of the people behind most of the organizing effort wasn’t above 30.

“You young people really have a hand up on what we’re trying to do here,” said Catharine Marino Thomas of Marriage Equality New York, addressing the packed and overflowing capital lawn.

In a message to students prior to the march, Glenn Omatsu, Professor at California State University, Northridge had expressed a similar sentiment.

"Students around the world have been at the forefront of movements to promote democracy and human rights,” he said. “Student movements have toppled powerful dictatorships and military juntas. Student movements have ended wars. And student activism has often served as the conscience for nations, reminding people in times of turmoil of the founding ideals of their countries and the aspirations of all people for justice, dignity, and equality."

Brett Srader, a Macalester student, was affected by this conscience and took home a sense of motivation from the march, saying that it gave him new knowledge and insight into the LGBT struggle. He said he saw it as a call to action, particularly for those who consider themselves allies.

“It is hard at times to motivate yourself to fight for the causes of others, and unfortunately [before the march] I had fallen into this trap,” said Srader. “[However,] the march stressed the importance of [straight] allies in pushing for change. Speaker after speaker reminded me that my country cannot consider itself the land of the free until all people are truly equal under law in all 50 states.”

Another theme of the rally was that the day was by no means an end in and of itself, but rather a point from which to strategize and grow as a movement.

“[There was the main idea that] during the march, the National Mall belonged to LGBT Americans and the Struggle for Equality, but that we all must continue the fight in our own "backyards" -- geographically, socially, politically, in our workplace, etc.,” said Kevin Schaeffer ’13. “The purpose of the NEM was not just to show the nation that we fight together for equality, but also to show those who feel alone that they are very much NOT alone.”

Srader said he could envision several ways Macalester could bring the fight into its backyard, focusing on the importance of the upcoming vote in Maine that could repeal marriage equality in the same way as Prop 8.

“Phone banks should be set up on campus for Mac students to make calls to voters in Maine to garner support for voting No on 1,” he said. “Or fundraisers could be another possible route, because the Equality movement in Maine is being out fundraised by huge margins.”

Back in Washington, Jones ended his speech by addressing the importance of mass demonstrations, besides just lobbying and letter-writing.

“Protest confirms dignity,” he said. “This march is an act of self-respect—that we will settle for nothing less than full equality under the law. We must take our president’s advice and command the audacity of hope.”