Faculty Unit at UCSD Calls for Divestiture

The UC San Diego Faculty Senate has joined similar legislative bodies at UCLA, UC Irvine and UC Santa Barbara in calling for the University of California to divest itself of $2.4 billion in investments in corporations that do business in South Africa. The professors object to South Africa’s apartheid form of government.

Michael Parish, chairman of the UCSD history department and a Faculty Senate member, said Wednesday that similar votes will be taken at other UC campuses before June 20, when the UC regents are scheduled to vote on the divestment issue.

The 35 corporations in the UC portfolio that do business in South Africa represent 40% of the university system’s investments. The corporations include IBM, Ford Motor Co., Exxon and Mobil.

The vote on the divestment issue Tuesday at UCSD was 49-27, with four abstentions. Lynn Harris, secretary to the faculty legislative body, said some of those members opposed to a full divestment feared that the UC system’s $6.3-billion fund of retirement assets, endowments and trusts controlled by the regents would be jeopardized by the action.

Parish said, however, that supporters of the measure realized that divestment could not be achieved overnight. “We favor a full divestment rather than a selective action,” Parish said.

“But we want it carried out in a responsible manner. We can’t reasonably expect to dump all of these investments in three days, or three weeks--it could take more than a year. We want to shift the money into non-South African investments, but without unnecessarily jeopardizing the value of those securities.”

In addition, the Faculty Senate recommended that the UC regents refuse in the future to invest in companies doing business in South Africa.

The divestment issue has been the subject of numerous student protests on UC campuses. Last month, about 1,500 students at UCSD held a rally to urge the UC system to reinvest its assets in companies doing business in South Africa, and about 500 local students later traveled to Berkeley to participate in a larger rally at that campus.

“We believe it is necessary to send the government of South Africa the strongest message possible that we will not support its positions and racist policies of apartheid,” Parish said.

“To support only a partial divestment would involve the UC system in an intensely political situation. We believe that the only way to affirm the independence and neutrality of the university is to pull out of South African investments completely; otherwise, we are supporting and condoning the apartheid policy.”