The challenge colleges face with student demands for Israeli divestment

Geoff Bennett:

Pro-Palestinian protests showed no signs of letting up today across many college and university campuses.

If anything, encampments and protests have actually been growing. Universities handled their respective situations differently, but several schools are drawing a tougher line. Columbia University said it started suspending some students who stayed in encampments after a deadline. State Troopers were called in at the University of Texas at Austin, and nearly 300 people were arrested at other schools over the weekend.

Tensions again at a boiling point today, with State Troopers arresting students at the University of Texas at Austin after an encampment went up. Meantime, at Columbia University, students refused to leave their encampment. It has been up for nearly two weeks.

Sudea Polat, Columbia University Student:

We will not be moved by these intimidation tactics. You can see outside you now that the students are mobilized. There's hundreds of them here today.

Geoff Bennett:

This morning, Columbia University President Minouche Shafik delivered a deadline to students: Either voluntarily end the encampment or face suspension. Shafik said Columbia was in danger of violating Title VI civil rights laws.

"We must take into account the rights of all members of our community," Shafik said in a statement. "The encampment has created an unwelcoming environment for many of our Jewish students and faculty. External actors have contributed to creating a hostile environment that is unsafe for everyone, including our neighbors."

And there were arrests at a number of other schools in the past few days, including at Virginia Tech, Washington University in St. Louis, Arizona State, the University of Georgia and Indiana University. New encampments sprung up at Wesleyan and other campuses.

At some schools, like UCLA, there were dueling demonstrations, where supporters of Israel also turned out. At other campuses, college officials said the majority of those arrested over the weekend were not students. At Arizona State, for example, only 20 percent of those arrested were students there.

In the meantime, a number of schools, including Columbia, have said they will not divest from Israel. Protesters have said they want to see schools cut investments with Israeli companies that may benefit from the war in Gaza. They're also demanding schools divest from military weapons manufacturers and cut research and academic ties with other Israeli universities.

Marie Salem, UCLA Student:

We will accomplish divestment. We are going to stay here until that. Without divestment, the siege will not end. We need to put pressure now. Historically, this is how it has happened on many universities. We are going to continue to push for that, and we will not leave.

Geoff Bennett:

We're going to get one of many perspectives now on the student protesters' demands of divestment, what it is and how it works.

Charlie Eaton is assistant professor of sociology at the University of California, Merced. He's also the author of the book "Bankers in the Ivory Tower."

Thanks so much for being with us.

And we should say that the calls for divestment vary in scope from school to school, but on the specific matter of divesting endowments from any company linked to Israel or businesses that might be profiting from the war, how realistic is that for most major American colleges and universities? What does it actually require?

Charlie Eaton, Author, "Bankers in the Ivory Tower: The Troubling Rise of Financiers in U.S. Higher Education": Divestment is something that's technically very doable. There's hundreds of socially and environmentally responsible investment managers out there, that any endowment could shift its funds into those socially and environmentally responsible funds that have a range of criteria that guide their investment.

So it's a matter of a university finding an investment manager whose investment practices match the values and principles of the community.

Geoff Bennett:

Aren't fiduciaries of a university's endowment, aren't they bound by a duty to increase the endowment's value, which is a responsibility that's unaffected by outside social pressure or ideology?

Charlie Eaton:

Any endowment can be managed to grow and to serve the university community even while being managed in a way that's socially and environmentally responsible.

And that's why many university endowments already have social responsibility guidelines for their endowment investments. The case of for-profit prison divestment, we have already seen at Columbia University, for example. We have already seen fossil fuel divestment from Columbia University and from the University of California system, where I work.

So it's something where there is a precedence for doing this.

Geoff Bennett:

Many major U.S. companies, like Amazon, Coca-Cola, Microsoft, as I understand it, are or have been invested in Israel. These are the types of companies that are likely to be included in the portfolios of many American colleges and universities.

What is the impact on a college's bottom line if they remove these kinds of funds from their investment portfolios, these Fortune 500, Fortune 100 companies?

Charlie Eaton:

Yes, well, I'm not in a position to say one way or the other whether a given company's involvement in the Israeli economy accords with principles of justice or equity at a given university.

But I can say there are many, many other assets that a school can invest in. There's no shortage of investment opportunities in our global economy that are socially responsible and can both grow the endowment and align the university's economic ties to the larger economy in a way that fits university values about equity and justice.

Geoff Bennett:

A spokesperson for NYU said the school is not considering Israeli divestment in part because its $5.9 billion endowment needs maximum returns and, this is a quote, "to help the university fulfill its research and educational mission."

What's the big picture risk here?

Charlie Eaton:

The biggest risk here is that this issue is opening fault lines in the university community.

And there is a lot of concerns about freedom of speech on campus, concerns about letting the university's values and principles guide the university's on-campus life, but also how it's related to the larger economy. The NYU endowment is going to be fine, no matter what they decide to do.

There are plenty of corners of the global economy and the U.S. economy where the NYU endowment could be invested and yield equitable returns. So I wouldn't be worried about investment returns. Instead, I think universities need to be asking themselves, what are our values? What are our principles? And how do we apply them in a consistent way where the entire university community feels part of that?

Geoff Bennett:

Is there a way to do that without a university's endowment taking a hit?

Charlie Eaton:

You look at Columbia University, you look at the University of California endowment, the University of California has $150 billion in assets under management across its endowment and pension funds.

It divested from fossil fuels in 2020. The endowment is still doing fine. The Columbia endowment is still doing fine. So I think it's possible to let justice and equity also guide endowment investment decisions without the endowment taking a hit.

Geoff Bennett:

Charlie Eaton, assistant professor of sociology at the University of California, Merced, thanks for your time and for your insights. We appreciate it.

Charlie Eaton:

Thanks.