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and look the other way is an exceptionally flawed argument. Regardless of who chooses
exactly where that money goes at any moment in time, it is still the Universitys money.
It is still under our control. We are still responsible for the harms it causes. As long as we
continue to invest our money and profit from it, we should consider the endowment under
our direct control, even if asset managers play an intermediary role. Thus President
Eisgruber is simply wrong in saying that our choice to continue to turn a blind eye to how
our investments impact the world is not an ethical issue.
Procedural Issues
There are a number of issues that arise from President Eisgrubers letter, his
communication with Andrew Golden, and the Resources Committees response that are
beyond the scope of the language of the PSII proposal, but which we would like to briefly
address as well since they have affected the deliberations on our proposal. President
Eisgruber believes that we are a fair and unbiased forum for teaching and research,
including on environmental issues. A more thorough look at where we get our research
funding might illuminate details that would suggest otherwise, including that our
environmental institutes receive quite a lot of funding from leading fossil fuel companies.
How we determine what constitutes a fair and unbiased forum should perhaps be a
question for greater University discussion, rather than something that is unilaterally
decided by the President. We would also like to note that Andrew Goldens memo to
President Eisgruber fails to articulate with any real clarity or formality how PRINCO
incorporates environmental concerns in the investment process. To their credit, his memo
does list a series of instances where these issues have been discussed, yet there is no
sense of any guiding policies nor any formal process through which PRINCO
incorporates environmental concerns. There remains too little transparency to make an
adequately informed decision about whether PRINCOs existing practices are
satisfactory.
Additionally, the procedures of the Resources Committee itself have come under
greater scrutiny and merit a much larger discussion. It has come to light, particularly after
the CPUC meeting at the end of the last academic year, that the committee does not
actually have much of a process for responding to students. In fact, it does not even vote
and chooses to operate under a loose definition of consensus. Since it deliberates and
decides on such contentious issues, it seems illogical and unfair to determine its
responses in a way that has no transparency whatsoever and expects all parties in a
committee of ten individuals to agree on all matters. Additionally, PSII found it
particularly concerning that the Resources Committee found it appropriate to say Our
committee is willing to support this effort as you may see appropriate in their letter to
President Eisgruber. The expectation of the student body when they bring a proposal to
this committee is that they are dealing with a body capable of making decisions
independently of the rest of the administration and that they serve as an advisory body
that does not necessarily have to agree with the President. In this particular instance, at
least, that does not appear to have been the case. This also poses a problem when, as with
PSII, students have a long and thoughtful discussion with the Resources Committee, but
not the Universitys president, yet his view on their proposal is viewed as the definitive
one. Such a process does not lead to a genuine dialogue between students and the
administration. Finally, the guidelines that the Resources Committee and students who
bring proposals to them operate under are not, as President Eisgruber believes, well
described on your website. In fact, they remain ill-defined, with no list of core values,
no explanation of what consensus or sustained campus interest look like, and no
definitive requirement that a standard of disassociation is necessary. The process by
which concerns about investment are brought to the administration should be reevaluated
at a broader campus level.
We hope that this will be the start of a much longer and broader campus discussion about
sustainable investment practices, and we hope to see a reversal of the Universitys
decision on this matter in the near future.
Sincerely,
Princeton Sustainable Investment Initiative