Resolution on Targeted Divestment from Sudan
Background
Although the Jewish community generally seeks to avoid the use of politically motivated boycotts and other economic measures, exceptions for targeted divestment are made in those exceptional cases when discourse has failed to bring an end to the most egregious practices. The crisis in Darfur is an extreme case whereby a government is responsible for a genocidal campaign against part of its own population by supporting and encouraging the brutality of the Janjaweed militia. This campaign has resulted in the displacement of two and half million people out of Darfur's total population of 6 million, who have fled from their homes into internal camps and other squalid places of refuge, as well as the flight of 300,000 more refugees to neighboring Chad and the deaths of more than 400,000 from violence, disease, and other conditions related to forced displacement and insufficient access to humanitarian assistance.
A resolution supporting targeted divestment from Sudan was recently approved by the Jewish Council for Public Affairs meeting in plenum in February 2007. Many JCPA activists were concerned about passing a divestment resolution given JCPA’s 2003 resolution, which opposed the use of politically motivated boycotts and other economic measures in general unless all other means of resolving the situation had been exhausted. There is always concern that the divestment issue will be used as a pretext to support Israel divestment initiatives. However, the JCPA plenum determined that Khartoum has been largely impervious to political pressure, and that, given the severity of the problem and the failure of other efforts, divestment is an appropriate tool at this time. This position was further solidified when the JCPA resolution received encouragement at the plenum from Amb. Sallai Meridor, Israel’s ambassador to the United States, who agreed that there are circumstances for which divestment is a proper response.
A number of states, such as California, Illinois, Oregon, New Jersey, Maine, and Connecticut have passed legislation calling for state funds to be divested from Sudan, and a campaign is underway in more than 75 states, cities, and universities, calling for a targeted divestment of funds from companies doing business with the Sudanese government.
Targeted divestment is the removal of investments in companies that are directly or indirectly helping the Sudanese government to perpetuate genocide. Since the ultimate intent of Sudan divestment is to protect the victims of genocide, it is important to tailor divestment to have maximal impact on the government of Sudan's behavior and minimal harm to innocent Sudanese (and to the financial health of institutional portfolios in the US). Divestment would therefore be targeted to those companies that have a business relationship with the government or a government-created project, impart minimal benefit to the country's underprivileged, and have implemented no significant corporate governance policy regarding the Darfur situation. Such targeted divestment implicitly excludes companies involved in agriculture, production and distribution of consumer goods, or engaged solely in the provision of goods and services intended to relieve human suffering or to promote welfare, health, religious and spiritual activities, and education.
Resolution
WHEREAS The United Synagogue of Conservative Judaism is deeply concerned by the ongoing tragedy in Darfur, which the U.S. Congress, State Department, and President, as well as other world leaders, have recognized as genocide;
WHEREAS the crisis in Darfur is an extreme case whereby a government is responsible for a genocidal campaign against part of its own population by supporting and encouraging the brutality of the Janjaweed militia resulting in the displacement of two and half million people out of Darfur's total population of 6 million, who have fled from their homes into internal camps and other squalid places of refuge, as well as the flight of 300,000 more refugees to neighboring Chad and the deaths of more than 400,000 from violence, disease, and other conditions related to forced displacement and insufficient access to humanitarian assistance;
WHEREAS a number of states, such as California, Illinois, Oregon, New Jersey, Maine, and Connecticut have passed legislation calling for state funds to be divested from Sudan and a campaign is underway in more than 75 states, cities, and universities, calling for a targeted divestment of funds from companies doing business with the Sudanese government;
WHEREAS a resolution supporting targeted divestment from Sudan was recently approved by the Jewish Council for Public Affairs meeting in plenum;
WHEREAS the JCPA resolution received encouragement at the plenum from Amb. Sallai Meridor, Israel’s ambassador to the United States;
THEREFORE, BE IT RESOLVED THAT The United Synagogue of Conservative Judaism supports the campaign calling for a targeted divestment from Sudan as led by the Sudan Divestment Task Force, which has identified the companies that will be targeted.
BE IT FURTHER RESOLVED THAT The United Synagogue of Conservative Judaism calls upon its member congregations and its partner institutions and organizations in the Conservative Movement to participate in this effort by visiting the Divestment Task Force Website at www.sudandivestment.org/home.asp for detailed information about divestment and to work with local Jewish agencies, including local Federations and Community Relations Councils, to support divestment locally.
With witnesses to the Holocaust thankfully still living among us, it is incumbent that we do all that is in our power to stop this generation's genocide so that we may actually live to witness, "never again."
