The Harvard-To-Prison Pipeline Report The Harvard Prison Divestment Campaign October 2019 The Harvard-To-Prison Pipeline Acknowledgments Thanks to all the members who worked on the report, including: Jarrett Drake, Xitlalli Alvarez, Joanna Anyanwu, Anna Nathanson, Amanda Chan, Paul Clarke, Zoe Hopkins, Amber Ashley James, Ismail Buffins, Pat Tomaino, and Joe Pinto. A huge thank you and shout out to Caroline Filice Smith for designing this A Report By beautiful report, especially in a time The Harvard crunch, and to Sarah Kantrowitz for her Prison Divestment design input and advice. We could not Campaign have created such a wonderful research October product without your time and talent. 2019 00 | EXECUTIVE SUMMARY The Harvard Prison Divestment Cam- beyond private prison operators. We paign is a reparatory justice initiative show how Harvard can and must be that seeks to sever Harvard’s financial the first university to divest fully from ties to the prison-industrial complex the prison-industrial complex. (PIC). We are a group of committed students and community leaders who, We Demand that Harvard: following the guidance of formerly in- 1 Publicly disclose and release endow- carcerated and presently incarcerated ment holdings in all funds with stock in organizers, seek the abolition of prisons companies whose existence depends and the carceral state.1 In this report on the prison-industrial complex. we take a deep dive into the definition 2 Provide an authenticated copy of and scope of the PIC, outline Harvard’s endowment holdings to the Harvard financial entanglements with its struc- community in the interests of transpar- tures based on available information, ency, prior to divestment and regularly and elevate the efficacy and urgency of thereafter. divestment. 3 Apportion a significant percentage of divested funds towards companies, or- What We Know ganizations, and initiatives in Cambridge This report demonstrates that Harvard, and Boston that are led by people di- the harvard-to-prison pipeline report has at least $3 million worth of holdings rectly impacted by the prison-industrial in the PIC across a variety of sectors. complex. Establish an accountability We also highlight the devastating ef- structure for the appropriate redistri- fects of the businesses in each of these bution of funds, with timed mandates sectors, including but extending far and oversight accorded to people and communities who have been the cen- tral victims of mass incarceration. We demand that the 4 Launch a cross-school, campus-wide Harvard Management initiative to research and teach cre- ative ways to eliminate structural social 1 Company immediately The carceral state is harms that do not rely on prisons and po- popularly conceived divest Harvard’s lice. Develop funded academic projects as a punitive form of governance. That is, a holdings from the (e.g. scholarships, centers, institutes, nation-state that relies, departments, and concentrations) that most often (though corporate entities not exclusively) on employ formerly incarcerated people, punishment through and businesses we organizers, and scholars. End discrimi- confinement, surveillance and other systems of enumerate in this nation against and create opportunities discipline and control of for current and formerly incarcerated racialized, classed and document. gendered subjects. persons. Analytics and Surveillance $ 1,645,674 Bail Bonds $ 30,500 Banks $ 863,723 Construction $ 9,776 the harvard-to-prison pipeline report Death Management $ 31,010 Food and Commissary $ 24,440 Money Transfer $ 5,814 Prison Labor $ 13,164 Private Prison Operators $ 24,528 Telecoms $ 16,502 Probation $ 19,968 Transportation $ 1,222 Weaponry $ 70,416 Section 2.1. industrial complex. See invested inthe prison- $3 million Harvard has A breakdown of the Left the harvard-to-prison pipeline report Contents 01.1/ The Prison Industrial Complex P.01 a definition 01.2/ why abolition? P.04 01.3/ harvard, slavery, and eugenics P.07 02.1/ P.13 The Numbers the harvard-to-prison pipeline report the $3 million invested in the prison-industrial complex 02.2/ industry profiles P.17 03.1/ Reflections on the Human P.31 Costs of Incarceration from those impacted by harvard's investment in the prison-industrial complex 04.1/ The Efficacy of Divestment P.37 a time-tested form of political action 04.2/ a plan for divestment P.39 04.3/ repair and reinvestment P.46 05.1/ Conclusion P.49 harvard's legacy 06.1/ Sources P.51 01 | FROM PRISONS TO ABOLITION What is the Despite the popular misunderstand- Prison-Industrial Complex? ing, the prison-industrial complex does the harvard-to-prison pipeline report We follow educator and organiz- not only include private prison oper- er Rachel Herzing’s definition1 of the ators like CoreCivic, GEO Group, and prison-industrial complex as “the over- G4S. Rather, it encompasses a slew of lapping interests of government and state and non-state entities including industry that use surveillance, polic- federal, state, and local governments; ing, and imprisonment as solutions to weapons manufacturers; bail bonds- what are, in actuality, economic, social, men; analytics and surveillance and political ‘problems’.” In the US, it technology manufacturers; financiers; is a system that has ensnared almost pharmaceutical corporations; telecom- 2.3 million people2 in 1,719 state pris- munications companies; and police 1 Herzing, Rachel. "What Is ons, 109 federal prisons, 1,772 juvenile and guard unions. Notably, the prison the PIC?" Prison Culture. correctional facilities, 3,163 local jails, industrial complex also includes actors Published October 12, 2010. and 80 Indian Country jails as well as involved in the persecution of migrants, in military prisons, immigration deten- including Immigration and Customs 2 Sawyer, Wendy, and Peter tion facilities, civil commitment centers, Enforcement, Customs Border Patrol, Wagner. “Mass Incarcera- state psychiatric hospitals, and prisons and the National Guard. tion: The Whole Pie 2019.” Mass Incarceration: The in the U.S. territories. It also holds an Whole Pie 2019 | Prison additional 4.5 million people under cor- Policy Initiative. Published March 19, 2019. rectional control on probation or parole. 1 follow the dollar (how harvard profits from, and relies upon, the prison-industrial complex) Prisons a state government makes a contract with a private prison corporation to build and operate a prison Contracts this prison contract then generates many more contracts with a slew of state and non- state entities, including: bondsmen analytics companies surveillance tech manufacturers financiers weapons manufacturers pharmaceutical corporations telecommunications companies police and guard unions Shareholders investors in these companies profit from rising stock values e.g. the Harvard Endowment. Profits this money then gets used to finance Harvard’s operations, including: campus buildings student events salaries stipends scholarships & more investments 1 "the best prison is the one that doesn't exist." - Jarrett M. Drake 3 Why Abolition?1 01.2/ a vision for a just future The Harvard Prison Divestment Cam- reliant on prisons to stimulate its broken 1 paign is an abolitionist group seeking economy, create jobs, and superficial- Kushner, Rachel. “Is Prison to rid the world of cages and police. ly address social problems. Powerful Necessary? Ruth Wilson Gilmore Might Change Though abolishing the prison-industrial governments breathe out prisons and Your Mind.” The New York complex will not happen overnight, a powerful actors, like the President and Times, April 17, 2019. world without prisons is possible. But Fellows of Harvard, breathe in profits— 2 in order to manifest this world, we must all at the expense of Black, brown, and Prison Culture. “Prison Culture Transformative first end our culture of punishment and poor people. Justice.” Prison Culture. violence and instead, build a society RSS March 12, 2012. the harvard-to-prison pipeline report 2 rooted in transformative justice and The Harvard Prison Divestment Cam- 3 care. paign’s call for divestment from the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime. prison-industrial complex is motivated "Towards more humane Despite some well-intentioned calls by an unapologetic vision for abolition. prison systems." 3 Accessed September 29, for more “humane” prisons and more That is, we organize and agitate for a 2019. “community”4 policing, a world that world without human caging, confine- 4 uses cages and police to fix social is- ment and surveillance—for an end to all Lombardo, Crystal. “Pros sues5 will never be just and can never carceral institutions and punitive men- and Cons of Community Policing.” Vision Launch. fully heal the problems it creates. As talities and measures that uphold and Published June 6, 2016. activist Angela Y. Davis explained over justify our current, devastatingly unjust, 5 three decades ago, “Prisons do not system of social control. Principally, we You might ask: “But what disappear problems, they disappear take aim at racial capitalism. We believe about rapists? What about murderers?” The human beings. Homelessness, unem- that by investing in education, men- prison-industrial complex ployment, drug addiction, mental ill- tal health resources, and community does not help to curb rape, assault, or any other ness, and illiteracy are only a few of the violent crime. Those who problems that disappear from public are curious can find more resources at the African- view when the human beings contend- American