DIVESTING FROM APARTHEID
The movement for divestment from apartheid is not new in Minnesota. Today, we follow calls from the Boycott, Divestment, Sanctions (BDS) movement, largely modeled on the successes of the South African anti-apartheid movement. In 1985, Minnesotans demanded divestment until the SBI passed a resolution to divest from Apartheid South Africa.
In the resolution, any corporation found to be “operat[ing] in a manner which directly supports Apartheid”, which included providing “goods or services to … any … governmental agency responsible for the enforcement or maintenance of Apartheid”, “technology or facilities … that tend to make the Republic of South Africa less dependent on international trade and thus less susceptible to outside pressure for change”, and “... financial services to, the government of the Republic of South Africa”, or corporations that were otherwise “deemed by the SBI” to be “egregious for other reasons,” were on the chopping block and risked divestment so long as they continued to do business with the apartheid government.
The SBI’s criteria, along with the Sullivan Principles, laid the groundwork to begin divesting from South African apartheid.