Word: rationale
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That is the hope. However, it is by no means a certainty. The prospects for economic recovery are bleak. Moreover, even if reform does succeed, it may not outweigh the divisive forces that are now so evident. Politics, after all, is not just a rational accounting of assets and liabilities...
On this moral disagreement, rational persuasion doesn't carry much weight, because it is the Corporation--hardly an impartial judge--that decides which arguments to accept.
The implications of Bok's statement surprised me. I had expected him to say that he could understand the students' views on divestment, or at least that he was sensitive to student concerns. Instead, he categorically dismissed those students who support divestment and claimed that their arguments lacked rational justification...
But this alone will not persuade Bok and the Corporation to divest. After all, the comprehensive, well-argued Undergraduate Council report of 1986--presumably the type of "rational argument" that Bok wants--has yet to change his mind.
We have offered plenty of rational arguments for divestment: the vast majority of South African opposition leaders call for the international isolation of South Africa. Many of them, including Archbishop Desmond M. Tutu, specifically call upon Harvard to divest. Isolating South Africa has worked to effect positive change. Harvard's...