Even some HRAAA members agree that, in manyways, their efforts failed.
"We didn't accomplish what we wanted toaccomplish," says former HRAAA executive directorRobert P. Wolff '54, a professor of Afro-Americanstudies and philosophy at the University ofMassachusetts.
Still, the alumni are convinced that they leftHarvard with a lasting legacy of their influence.
For one thing, they say, their success insponsoring electable overseer candidates causedthe University to change the process by whichnominations to the board are accepted.
More importantly, however, the alumni activistssay they taught the University a lesson inmorality that extends beyond the case of SouthAfrica.
"We raised the issue that a university'sbusiness decisions should be judged by standardscommensurate with the philosophy it teaches in theclassroom," says Donald M. Solomon, a 1973graduate of the Law School who served as HRAAA'sexecutive director in 1989 and 1990.
"HRAAA was very successful in keeping the issueof overall social responsibility on the agenda fortens of thousands of Harvard alumni who receivedour publications or saw our candidates' statementson the overseers ballots," Solomon says. "The factthat our position didn't prevail with theadministration is secondary to the fact that thedebate simply would not have occurred without ourinitiative and participation."
Steiner disputes that assessment.
"It's hard to say that Harvard was unaware ofthe issue," he says. "Social responsibility oninvesting had been an issue at the University formore than two decades [before HRAAA was formed]."
The questions about Harvard's past are notlikely to be resolved anytime soon, even thoughboth sides agree that the issue of apartheid isessentially mute. Indeed, some alumni say, thedebate that raged so intensely for so many yearsis far from over. Rather, they suggest, it islikely to continue, as the University maps out itsfuture policy toward a new South Africa.
Ironically, many of the HRAAA members who wereso adamant that the University divest itselfentirely of South Africa-related investments arenow calling upon Harvard to provide financialsupport for the fragile democracy that isdeveloping.
"It's definitely the end of one phase and thebeginning of another," says Robert B. Zevin, anHRAAA member who ran unsuccessfully for the Boardof Overseers in 1989. "Many of us who were urgingdivestment up until this point will now be askinginstitutions like Harvard to consider positivesteps they can take to support economic andpolitical democracy in South Africa."
And HRAAA members like Wolff are pushingfurther, calling on Harvard to establishintellectual links with historically Blackuniversities in South Africa.
"Harvard could play a very important role insupporting higher education in South Africa," saysWolff, who is developing a program at theUniversity of Massachusetts to conductsimultaneous classes with students in the UnitedStates and South Africa using telephone andcomputer hook-ups. "That's something Harvard canafford to do without any effort."
But Wolff and Zevin say that, given recenthistory, they don't expect the University to jumpat their suggestions.
"Harvard, having dragged its heels to thispoint, is likely to drag its heels in the nextstage," says Zevin.
It is that feeling--a feeling of disappointmentand frustration borne of years of conflict betweenalumni with a moral cause and administrators withfinancial responsibilities--that even the end ofapartheid can't easily overcome.
"Over a long period of time, Harvard had theopportunity to take a position of moral andintellectual leadership and it failed to do so,"says Wolff.