The Committee on Socially Responsible Investment and Partnership: Will this be yet another failure in PSU leadership?

On Friday May 31, 2024, President Cudd sent an email to the campus community announcing the formation of a Committee on Socially Responsible Investment and Partnership, to begin work at the start of Fall quarter 2024. While the email never explicitly mentions Palestine, Israel, or the BDS (Boycott, Divestment, Sanctions) Movement, it does reference the President’s joint statement with ASPSU (in response to their call to divest), as well as a continued pause on accepting new gifts from Boeing.

The May 31st email frames this new committee as an alternative to the public debate/forum that the President’s office had been announcing for months earlier this year in response to unrest about the university’s financial ties to the Israeli state. What is not communicated in the email is that the public forum was a failed initiative, becoming increasingly undemocratic in feel behind the scenes, as the university opted to replace the announced live public debate with a controlled one-way zoom event, and the president reduced her initially proposed role as a full participant in the debate, to only giving the opening and closing remarks. This led to one debate participant pulling out over concerns that the forum was being “operationalized for what appears to be a public relations spectacle— a simulacrum of social justice on Zoom with no actual debate or engagement” (it is worth noting here that a PR consultant and member of the foundation board was being cc’ed on the proposed changes to the forum structure).

The forum is part of a pattern of failed initiatives that have lacked a transparent follow through over the past year, including the “Task Force for Building Community and Fighting Hate”  (as per the President’s email of Jan. 9, 2024), which was framed as a “a committee to examine and address our campus environment around issues of antisemitism and anti-Arab hate” (President’s email Dec 4, 2023). Although that task force (which at some point was quietly renamed the “Building Community Through Dialogue and Fighting Anti-semitism, anti-Palestinian and anti-Arab Bias at PSU Task Force”) concluded its work at the beginning of June, the campus community has yet to receive a report on their findings and recommendations. The Task Force was composed of four subcommittees, all but one of which concluded their work at the end of Spring term, although no reports or updates have been made to the community. Participants report a high level of dysfunction and lack of meaningful direction throughout the process, resulting in a significant drop in task force membership and an ongoing lack of clarity about the purpose of the task force.

Here are a few recommendations for the President’s newest committee initiative that emerge from studying these failed initiatives of Winter and Spring 2024:

1. Involve Arab (including Palestinian and Muslim) faculty/staff/students from the outset of the process. Give them central roles in forming and giving input on the composition of the committee.

One of the issues with the task force was that members who believe that any critique of Israeli state violence constitutes antisemitic speech were already firmly positioned in the group when Arab faculty were invited to participate. These included Mark Rosenbaum, donor and board member, ensconced as co-chair of the committee on “Interfaith Dialogue” and Bob Horenstein, leader of the local Jewish Federation, as a key voice on the task force. Horenstein, who is not part of the PSU community, and was instrumental in the defunding of the Oregon Food Bank, has consistently had the ear of President Cudd to speak on behalf of all Jewish community members. These participants would clearly shape, if not dominate, the way in which Palestinian resistance was framed. This led to a situation that felt skewed and in some cases unsafe for Palestinian and other Arab PSU community members to participate in the Task Force, as well as for some Jewish faculty who were asked to be involved.

2. Be transparent with the community about how the committee is formed, when it will meet, what work it is doing, its recommendations, and so on.

As mentioned above, changes to the format, location, and so on of the proposed town hall debate were made behind the scenes without transparency. Additionally, we are yet to receive information on the task force, their work, and what definitions of antisemitism and hate speech they were working with in understanding campus dynamics.

Please read to the end, if you’d like to take action and email the President requesting more transparency for the Committee on Socially Responsible Investment.

3. Begin with defining key terms.

As noted above, the President’s refusal to be clear on what constitutes hate speech or whether she agrees with problematic definitions of antisemitism, which prevent the critique of Israeli state violence, makes addressing these issues virtually impossible. For the Committee on Socially Responsible Investment and Partnership to function properly, they must have an understanding that the situation in Palestine is one of ongoing colonial occupation, apartheid, and genocide and that it behooves us ethically to heed the call as a university to put non-violent, economic pressure on the state of Israel to end this situation.

If we don’t start with a clear definition of terms and a transparent process, including the formation of the Committee, then this committee will be yet another in a list of failures to address the moral call to advance socially responsible investments and partnerships.

What can you do?

Concerned PSU community members can write to President Cudd and (if you’re faculty) CC your faculty senate representatives to request transparency over the summer and fall months with respect to how the committee is being formed, who is on it, and how it is progressing.

PSU Faculty and Staff Press Release on Anti-Palestinian Posters on Campus

A student first noticed a poster that read “gen-o-cide (noun) when Palestinians lose another war they started” on July 7, 2024. The following day, the same poster was found in two locations in Cramer Hall along with a poster that read “Why would we be worried from terror-supporting Muslim Nazis and their supporters at PSU? This is Portland State University NOT Palestine State in Gaza…Don’t play the victim card we saw you on October 7, 2023. Rape, Gang Rape, Murder – these are your true moral values. And PSU library…”

Throughout the month of July and into August, posters were consistently found in the same locations throughout Cramer Hall on at least nine days. Concerned students, staff, and faculty have been removing the hateful posters, which are then promptly re-posted. In addition to removing the posters, faculty, staff, and students have reported the posters to university administration through several avenues, including the Office of Global Diversity & Inclusion’s Discrimination/Harassment complaint form, by email to President Ann Cudd, VP of Global Diversity & Inclusion Ame Lambert, and Interim Provost and Vice President for Academic Affairs Shelly Chabon, and through the school’s Title VI office. These reports included the time, date, and location of the posters with photographic support.…. (read full press release)

Read the The Oregonians’ Julia Silverman’s article Faculty raise alarm about Islamophobic posters popping up at Portland State

Reminder: For students facing PSU Code of Conduct violations- FSJP faculty and staff have a student support team that can attend your conduct meetings (you are allowed up to two advisors) as well as prep with you before your meeting.

Contact us: [email protected]