Divestment No Answer

To the Editors of the Crimson:

Hurray! We finally know how 3000 students (the majority view) acted on behalf of South Africa and the Undergraduate Council when they voted in dining halls last week.

After years of controversy over the divestment issue, we students feel we understand the problems in South Africa. Its solution, we believe, is divestment. We understand the implications of this course and are willing to stand by our decisions.

Let's imagine this series of events: with enough bothering of the Administration about this very important issue, Bok and the others will have to listen to us. He will decide that he and the Corporation have not yet been thinking on moral grounds and will immediately recant previous policy and all other statements. We the students will now be able to sleep easier at night, and Bishop Tutu will thank us for our part in the struggle.

Turning their attention from less important affairs, like running the University, the Corporation will devote all of its time to divesting the stock of these horrible, immoral companies.

Because of the large amount of money invested and because of the urgency of our efforts, ("we cannot continue to support this regime for one moment longer") we will take 49 cents on the dollar in selling off our stock.

With other universities following suit, (all the "Harvards of the South," Midwest, West, etc.), companies such as IBM will find that large amounts of stock will be dumped on the market. As a result, stockholders in the general public will get scared, also selling quickly.

With enough of this snowball effect, IBM and the others will, of course, be forced to close down its South African operations.

The results of all of this: if IBM, South Africa goes under and other companies react in the same way, more than 100,000 Blacks will lose jobs--the best jobs made available to them under the Sullivan Principles. Most probably, they will go back to the "homelands."

Back here the Ivory Tower will slowly be crumbling (we will need renovations but Harvard is already struggling to complete its renovations projects for lack of funds).

More importantly, we students, future students, our renowned professors, and the country as a whole will suffer because Harvard students decided in their dining halls that they are willing to take a lower level of education for the moral divestment of South African stock.

I wish I knew the solution, but no quick, well-packaged answer will work. I don't believe our divestment will bring apartheid to its knees.