Editing Leon Sullivan (section)

== The Sullivan Principles ==

Sullivan's appointment to General Motors' board of directors in 1971 made him the first African American to serve on the board of a major American corporation. His position provided the platform from which he would address corporate involvement in apartheid-era South Africa, his 1977 promulgation of the Sullivan Principles establishing standards for companies operating there. The principles required non-segregation, equal pay, and training programs that violated apartheid's requirements while maintaining corporate presence.<ref name="sullivan"/>

His principles represented middle ground between those who demanded complete divestment from South Africa and those who argued that engagement could promote change. His hope that corporate conduct could undermine apartheid from within eventually gave way to recognition that the regime's intransigence required more complete pressure. His 1987 call for corporate withdrawal acknowledged that the Sullivan Principles alone could not achieve the changes they were designed to promote.<ref name="massie"/>

His international influence extended beyond South Africa to job training programs that OIC established in Africa and elsewhere. His vision of economic development as essential to both individual advancement and community transformation informed programs whose scale his Philadelphia origins could not have predicted. The combination of ministerial leadership, economic development, and international influence made him one of the most significant African American leaders of his era.<ref name="sullivan"/>