Honorary degree recipients are chosen based on a candidate’s overall and lifetime contributions and accomplishments. Harvard University is grateful for input into its processes, which we are always striving to strengthen and improve.
There have been questions this year about the views of one honorary degree recipient who seems to have supported academic boycotts. In granting an honorary degree, Harvard University is not endorsing the political views of the recipient.
Harvard University’s position on academic boycotts is clear. The University strongly opposes academic boycotts and has stated so publicly. As President Garber and his predecessors have said, any suggestion of targeting or boycotting a particular group because of disagreements over the policies pursued by their governments is antithetical to what we stand for as a university. The University strongly reaffirms that core principle.