Word: acsr
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Dates: during 1980-1989
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...proxy calling on Atlantic Richfield Company to halt its expansion in Chile until the Pinochet government loosens its restrictions on civil rights, and another committing Occidental Petroleum--the parent company of the polluter of the Love Canal--to establish a policy for responsible disposal of chemical waste. With the ACSR backing the two resolutions, the Corporation was once again caught between its reluctance to oppose management and its desire not to counter the urgings of the ACSR. Again, it abstained...
...ACSR's glimmer of activism caught the Corporation off-guard. Until this spring, the ACSR consistently followed the Corporation's line on shareholder matters, backing management's position on all proxies. In response to the ACSR's pro-management alignment, the undergraduate representative to the committee resigned in the winter of 1979, saying the ACSR failed to fulfill its mandate by subordinating the moral and ethical implications of Harvard's investments to the financial. This year, however, with a new undergraduate member, and with the alumni, faculty and graduate student members weathered by five laborious years of debate on Harvard...
Robert A. Cameron '49, a committee member and the president of Johnson and Higgins insurance brokerage firm, says the ACSR is less conservative than in the past and "in general, its members are thinking a bit more, not just blindly voting" at the urging of certain committee members. Richard Valelly, a graduate student in government and committee member, also notes a "more receptive frame of mind" on the part of faculty and alumni members; both he and Vagts attribute the more activist votes in part to the fact that "students did their homework and presented their arguments well...
...Jorge I. Dominguez, professor of Government and a committee member, believes the ACSR's "very clear break from the votes of last year" goes deeper. Dominguez says there is a general feeling within the ACSR that a policy of actively encouraging corporations to accomodate the interests of Blacks in South Africa is more consistent with the University's policy than the more passive course the Corporation has followed. "If you do not see divestiture as a justifiable means to bringing change in South Africa, then you must take an activist stand and often vote against management" to ensure that...
Although Dominguez notes that the Corporation and its advisory committee disagree over the degree of zeal the University should show in encouraging corporate progressivism in South Africa, he believes the Corporation moved to a more activist position this year, though not "as far or as fast as the ACSR. The Corporation is no longer casting affirmative votes with management and is not holding the same uncritical position as last year," Dominguez says, adding that "the direction of the Corporation and ACSR was the same this year, with both moving at different degrees." Valelly disagrees, however, saying the Corporation's "view...