Divestment is the act of selling company shares, bonds or investment funds for a political or social reason. An investor may publicly and intentionally divest — rather than sell a stock because it is not performing well — in order to reprimand unethical or morally ambiguous corporations. Divestment movements are not only effective in ending fossil fuel sponsorship, but also for generating awareness for social issues at large. In the past, divestment movements have successfully publicized crises like the apartheid in South Africa, genocide in Sudan and repression in Burma. Removing investments from firms that do business with oppressive or apartheid regimes does not eradicate these regimes. However, it sends a strong message to companies that it is unacceptable to enable governments to infringe on human rights. 

Divestment is an especially important stance to take at Brandeis, considering that the University was founded on principles of social justice — climate justice is a social justice issue. 

As we have seen this year, climate change is happening now and affecting the most vulnerable communities most intensely, exacerbating pre-existing intersections of oppression. Examples include the California wildfires and recent hurricanes’ impacts on low-lying islands. The fossil fuel industry continues to deny climate change and delay action against climate change. The industry creates uncertainty about climate change by funding skewed research that disputes already existing climate science and explores the extraction of more fossil fuels despite the threat of climate change. According to Brandeis’ Final Report and Recommendations on divestment, “Scholars of public policy, environmental activists, and political leaders eager to rein in carbon emissions have pointed with dismay to the role played by a number of anti-regulatory industry groups, including the American Petroleum Institute, among many others, in cultivating doubt, impugning the motives of climate scientists, and delaying regulatory action.” For example, aerospace engineer Wei-Hock “Willie” Soon wrote multiple papers claiming the sun, rather than human activities, caused climate change, and his work was funded by major players in the fossil fuel industry, including Exxon Mobil Corp. and Charles Koch, according to the Union of Concerned Scientists. 

Brandeis, by investing in the fossil fuel industry, supports these actions that contribute to climate-change denial and climate change itself. However, Brandeis is an institution dedicated to social justice, and its investment policy states, “Only when the corporation is directly and substantially involved in activities clearly considered by the university community to be contrary to fundamental and widely shared ethical principles should the portfolio managers be instructed to avoid purchase of its securities.”  Therefore, Brandeis should prioritize divestment to uphold its reputation of social justice, stand up to the fossil fuel industry and be a leader in an important political movement. Other universities and institutions have supported various forms of fossil fuel divestment; divestment organization Fossil Free reports that there are 813 institutions divesting. Some examples include Stanford University divesting from coal, and the University of Massachusetts Foundation fully divesting. 

Brandeis Climate Justice works with the group Faculty Against the Climate Threat to advocate for fossil fuel divestment at Brandeis. BCJ originally started as a branch of Students For Environmental Action in 2012. Originally just called “divestment” or “divestment movement,” this student group rallied other students to call for a student referendum. This referendum revealed that approximately 79 percent of students wanted Brandeis University to take its money out of fossil fuels. Eventually, the administration formed an exploratory committee of students, professors and members from the Board of Trustees to discuss fossil fuel divestment. The committee presented in spring 2015 in favor of fossil fuel divestment.
In April 2016, students from BCJ and members of Faculty Against the Climate Threat presented before the Board of Trustees with a strong show of support from other students outside. BCJ took the next school year to regroup, discuss goals and work on material solidarity for and education about communities most affected by climate change, including the people at Standing Rock Indian Reservation. This year, BCJ has renewed its campaign for fossil fuel divestment, with a petition and call in to the Senate Sustainability Committee last semester and a meeting with University President Ron Liebowitz in early January. This semester, students and faculty members will meet with the Board of Trustees to present about divestment. 

Becoming informed is an important step in combating climate change, and Go Fossil Free and the Brandeis University’s Exploratory Committee on Fossil Fuel Divestment Final Report and Recommendations are useful resources. Other major ways to support movements like these are by attending general events like rallies or doing small things like signing petitions. Events and actions like these are posted on social media by groups all over the Boston area. Raising awareness on this issue and attending events like rallies show administrations and Board of Trustee members that the student body is informed and supports divestment, bringing these campaigns closer to reaching divestment.