Recognizing the need for a coordinated, grassroots movement to emerge against the militarization and nuclearization of the research that takes place at universities in the United States, the Youth Empowerment Initiative will be devoting itself in the spring and summer of 2006 to cultivating the framework for a national campaign to get academia out of the military-academic industrial complex. The name of this campaign, which we tentatively refer to as “Nuclear Free Universities,” is a work in progress.
As the Think Outside the Bomb network’s Principles of Unity statement notes:
“The nuclearization and militarization of our schools perpetuate systems of oppression on our campuses and threaten our civil liberties. Nuclear weapons research, development, testing and production only takes place with the obsequious support of our universities, whose research and development funding is overwhelmingly funneled through the Pentagon, multinational weapons manufacturers and their subsidiaries. This is a drain on human and financial resources and is antithetical to the values our educational institutions should be fostering, such as critical thinking, independent research and participatory democracy. Because generations have grown up without a holistic understanding of the serious problems wrought by the Nuclear Age, a balanced curriculum to address these issues must be integrated into public and private educational systems at all levels.”
Stay tuned to the Youth Empowerment Initiative Web site for more information on this campaign as it develops. In the meantime, we encourage you to check out these Web sites:
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