Amherst Divests from Sudan

Amherst has voted to divest from some two dozen companies (for a full list, see the article in the Amherst Magazine) whose business relationships with the Sudanese government render them morally complicit in the genocide. Significantly, Amherst voted not only to refrain from direct investments, but to also pressure their funds managers to avoid investing in those companies.

The Amherst Board of Trustees, which voted unanimously in favor of divestment, includes Nobel Prize winning economist Joseph Stiglitz, who is quoted in the press release noting the lack of any benefit to the Sudanese people arising from the activities of these companies.

The Amherst list is much more extensive than the short list of companies now formally excluded from Dartmouth's direct investments. Our Advisory Committee on Investor Responsibility is seeking to expand its research to include more companies guilty of moral comlicity in the genocide, and this decision from Amherst provides good precendent for such expansion. The ACIR is also considering purchasing a product by KLD which would provide information on the involvement of 120 different companies active in Sudan.