The term was first used in the 1980s, most commonly in the United States, to refer to the use of a concerted economic boycott designed to pressure the government of South Africa into abolishing its apartheid regime.
It is a social movement which urges everyone from individual investors to large endowed institutions to remove their investments (to divest) from publicly listed oil, gas and coal companies, with the intention of combating climate change by reducing the amount of greenhouse gases released into the atmosphere, and holding the oil, gas and coal companies responsible for their role in climate change.
Many conservatives opposed the disinvestment campaign, accusing its advocates of hypocrisy for not also proposing that the same sanctions be leveled on either the Soviet Union or the People's Republic of China.
Ronald Reagan, who was the President of the United States during the time the disinvestment movement was at its peak, also opposed it, instead favoring a policy of "constructive engagement" with the Pretoria regime.
These principles called for corporations doing business in South Africa to adhere to strict standards of non-discrimination in hiring and promotions, so as to set a positive example.
There was also a less well-publicized movement to apply the strategy of disinvestment to Northern Ireland, as some prominent Irish-American politicians sought to have state and local governments sell their stock in companies doing business in that part of the United Kingdom.
The effort to disinvest in Northern Ireland met with little success, but the United States Congress did pass (and then-President Bill Clinton signed) a law requiring American companies with interests there to implement most of the MacBride Principles in 1998.
[citation needed] Though in place long before the term "disinvestment" was coined, the United States embargo against Cuba meets many of the criteria for designation as such — and a provision more closely paralleling the disinvestment strategy aimed at South Africa was added in 1996, when the United States Congress passed the Helms-Burton Act, which penalized owners of foreign businesses which invested in former American firms that had been nationalized by Fidel Castro's government after the Cuban revolution of 1959.
[citation needed] The divestment of assets implicated in funding the government of Sudan, in acknowledgment of acts of terrorism and genocide perpetrated in the Darfur conflict.
[citation needed] Under this approach, sponsored by State Senator Jacqueline Collins, public pensions are prohibited from investing in any corporation or private equity firm that conducts business in Sudan, unless authorized to do so by the U.S. Government.
TikTok, also as a result of the invasion, also no longer allows new posts to be published in Russian territory, and YouTube does not allow Russian-backed channels to be monetised on the platform.
[18] Following this, the Advisory Committee on Investor Responsibility at Yale University committed to examine potential investments in Chinese companies tied to human rights abuses.
In 2007, several major international and Canadian oil companies threatened to withdraw investment from the province of Alberta because of a proposed increase in royalty rates.