Ban the Ban

Our Mission

This coalition came together to leverage the intersections of anti-occupation, prison abolition, and climate justice work. While the college nominally supports students’ right to protest and takes advantage of student activism to project its “socially conscious” self-image, the Board of Managers refuses to align its financial investments with student demands. Ban the Ban hopes to push past this historic impasse and hold the College’s investments accountable to ethical standards instead of purely financial criteria. As students attending this institution, we have a right to demand the ethical use of our endowment.

We envision a college post-ban. In this future, we imagine Swarthmore College as an institution that not only articulates its moral responsibilities, but acts upon them. We want all Swarthmore students today, and for years to come, to be able to establish their own divestment campaigns knowing that their college respects and is willing to collaborate with them. Our goal is to represent all future divestment campaigns and their supporters. We welcome the plurality of issues encompassed by divestment, and hope that this statement can spark ideas about how divestment relates to other issues students are passionate about and build strength from those overlaps.