Not the Moral Answer

At today’s monthly Faculty meeting, a handful of anti-war professors are expected to ask the Harvard Management Corporation, responsible for managing the University’s endowment, to divest from domestic defense sector stocks—which currently make up 0.5 percent of its endowment. To withdraw all assets from a company is, as activists are well aware, a strong symbolic statement, and as such, Harvard should not divest from an industry at just the slightest hint of moral ambiguity. For the defense industry, the case for divestment cannot be convincingly made.

Divestment reflects a sentiment that a particular company—or, in this case, an entire industry—is categorically immoral. Just over a year ago, this criterion was fulfilled when Harvard rightly divested from tobacco companies, which market a product that is uniquely addictive, harmful and irredeemable by today’s health standards. But the requirement is not met by the 11 top American defense companies in which Harvard invests. The weapons they produce, though designed to destroy, still have an important deterrent value. Just as it did during the Cold War, America today arms itself to maintain peace. Moreover, even when they are used in battle, the weapons’ increased precision has provided commanders with an enhanced ability to discriminate between strategic and civilian targets.

Despite our view that this current conflict in Iraq is illegitimate, a financial affirmation of the weaponry of war must not be confused with an affirmation of war itself. As it stands, the divestment proponents cannot charge as immoral companies that produce modern-day weapons, which are still necessary to the defense of America and our allies.

Of course, it is unsavory to profit from war—and that is what Harvard and hundreds of thousands of other shareholders are doing this very instant. Similarly, each purchase of a Coke product funds a company that denies its African workers ample AIDS medication; each pair of Nike shoes funds third-world sweatshops. And while some have approached these problems through a lens of divestment, most activists have correctly taken far more innovative and engaging approaches to solving these problems. Simply put, although divestment from defense contractors is a feel-good move, it does nothing to realistically address the problems of war.

Furthermore, making a snap judgment to pull funding from defense companies opens the floodgates for divestment from other morally ambiguous industries. Coca-Cola and Nike are only a few examples; given adamant students and faculty, an argument could be made that nearly every company is socially irresponsible, that each is giving rise to societal ills in some manner or another. And on each example, there would likely not be a clear moral consensus.

Antiwar protesters should keep their focus. The government’s seemingly uncaring attitude about the voices who have consistently opposed the war is frustrating. Yet those who deserve targeting are not defense contractors, whose services are vital to our nation in many other ways, but the present administration.

Dissent: Merchants of Death

Just as the University does not invest in tobacco companies, so it should divest from all companies that bank on killing and destruction.

While the staff claims that the moral status of weapons companies is murky, this could not be further from the truth. Regardless of one’s view of the U.S. military, these arms manufacturers sell billions of dollars of equipment to dictatorial regimes around the world. These weapons are used by tyrants who engage in aggressive wars and oppress their own people. To cite just one morally unambiguous example, U.S. companies have sold the repressive Saudi monarchy over $40 billion worth of arms since 1990. This alone should be reason enough to divest.

This divestment will not greatly effect Harvard’s finances. Currently, only 0.5 percent of the endowment is invested with arms manufacturers—a sum that could easily be reinvested with just as high a rate of return in companies that are not morally deplorable.

Fundamentally, The Staff misunderstands the purpose of Harvard’s investments. The University is not a for-profit corporation. It should never hesitate from sacrificing financial profit so as not to compromise its moral integrity. If the University fails to impose limits on its greed, its hands will forever be stained with Crimson blood.

—Erol N. Gulay ’05, Nicholas F. Josefowitz ’05,

Phoebe Kosman ’05, Nicholas F.B. Smyth ’05

and David W. Rizk ’05.