No fossil fuel money at gw.
The No Fossil Fuel Money campaign is a student-led effort to end the influence of the fossil fuel industry on the GW campus. For decades, the fossil fuel industry has spent billions of dollars to mislead the public about the science and solutions of climate change, in part by funding research in higher education. The fossil fuel industry and allied organizations are the architects of a crisis that threatens the lives and livelihoods of all people, especially in marginalized communities. To end this era of dangerous lies and deadly inaction, our institutions must reevaluate their relationship to those responsible for this crisis.
That is why we are calling on the GW administration and Board of Trustees to take public and concrete steps to end the influence of fossil fuels on campus.
We demand that the GW Board of Trustees:
Enact a ban on funding from the Slippery Six, the six companies and organizations subpoenaed by Congress for their role in the “Disinformation Campaign to Prevent Climate Action,” and from the top ten funders of the US climate change counter-movement, “a complex network of organizations that function to obstruct climate action.” These ten are the only funders who contributed at least 2% of all climate change counter-movement financing.
Adopt a plan to end reliance on funding from the full Carbon Underground 200, “the top global publicly-owned coal, oil, and gas reserves owners ranked by the carbon emissions embedded in their reserves.”
Investigate the Regulatory Studies Center for violations of academic freedom. In 2018, ten funding agreements for the Mercatus Center at George Mason University were released and showed clear violation of the norms of academic freedom by giving donors influence over hiring. Former RSC Director Susan Dudley was the Director of the Regulatory Studies Program at the Mercatus Center while some of these practices were ongoing. In addition, three of these ten norm-violating agreements were with the Koch Foundation, including one from 2009, the same year the RSC was founded. Other RSC donors have been found in violation of the principles of academic freedom in the past as well. It is reasonable to ask if RSC funding agreements with the Koch Foundation (or any donor) from the same era similarly violated the norms of academic freedom.
Establish a proactive institutional conflict of interest policy, such as the model policy outlined by UnKoch My Campus, and mandate university centers and departments disclose funding and terms of funding agreements as outlined in the Coalition for Ethics and Transparency’s letter.
Update the university community on the progress of the ESG commitments made in 2020 at least once a semester. The GW community has received exclusively vague notions of progress, with no figures or suggestions as to whom our endowment is being divested from. It is essential that the university be transparent about the details of divestment so the community remains updated and involved in the process.
The stakes are high, so we challenge you to raise higher.