A Good Proposal

The Corporation Subcommittee on Shareholder Responsibility (CSSR) will decide today on the University's response to a government initiative on corporate disclosure, which allows investors--including Harvard--to suggest areas in which corporations should have to publicly disclose more information on their activities than they have to now.

The CSSR will specifically consider a proposed response made last week by the Advisory Committee on Shareholder Responsibility (ACSR), which recommends that the University ask the government to require corporations to disclose summaries of their progress in hiring minorities and women; make available certain confidential reports to government on the environmental impact of their activities; and reveal all of their corporate political contributions.

The CSSR should, for the University, completely endorse these ACSR proposals. Under SEC regulations, the only legal justification for the reforms can be improved information for shareholders and potential shareholders about publicly-held corporations. Yet, as some ACSR members said last week, the social benefits of disclosure reform could affect not only investors, but Americans generally.

It more disclosure is required from corporations, they will be reinforced in their attempts--or moved to first attempts--to make improvements in their equal hiring, environmental, and political policies. This type of disclosure will submit corporations more, in an indirect was to public scrutiny. That the a step in the right direction, and should be supported by the University.