What is meant by the term socially responsible lending/ investing?
I was told that the "socially responsible" investing community has clear definitions of what they mean by this term. According the Social Investment Forum website, socially responsible investing means: "Integrating personal values and societal concerns with investment decisions...SRI considers both the investor's financial needs and an investments impact on society. With SRI, you can put your money to work to build a better tomorrow while earning competitive returns today....How does it work? Three key SRI strategies have evolved over the years: Screening, Shareholder Advocacy, Community Investment and Social Venture Capital."
Screening means the investor assesses whether a company has a good enough record in areas like employee relations, environmental and social impact, human rights...What information do they use to make these decisions?
Shareholder advocacy means that an investor goes to shareholder meetings of a company and voices praise or concern over aspects of the company. They threaten to pull out their investment if the company refuses to address a concern (for instance, about the number of women and people of color on the Board, or about labor issues, or environmental abuses.)
Community investment means offering money, at low interest rates, to community groups (often via a community development financial institution which brokers such deals) who do work on things like land trusts, permanently affordable housing, small business loans to people who have low incomes.
How do I feel about this definition of socially responsible investing?It's not so bad. Community investing seems cool, as least from what I learned in my ICE research. I wonder what percent of a socially responsible mutual fund goes towards community investment.
Shareholder activism seems interesting --again, I wonder how much the socially responsible mutual funds engage in this. Do they ever pull out of a company? What impact has shareholder activism had?
Screening is the one that feels most vague to me --and that I feel most suspicious of. I mean, these screened companies may pay workers more than minimum wage and the company may not torture anyone or dump pollutants. But they are probably hierarchical and patriarchal and, well, do they produce anything that I really respect? They are surely using a lot of resources; people use a lot of energy to get to the workplace. It might help me to look at a list of companies in a socially responsible mutual fund to get a better sense of what companies are considered kosher.
Incidentally, I located a CDFI bank and a CDFI credit union in Massachusetts.
OneUnited Bank
133 Federal Street, 8th Floor
Boston, MA 02110-1703(617) 457-4415
South End Federal Credit Union
100 West Dedham St.
Boston, MA 02118-1601(617) 247-1673
Im still trying to locate a list of CDCUs in Massachusetts and the rest of the country --funny, there is no list on the National Community Development Credit Unions website, or at least not one I can find.
I was told that the "socially responsible" investing community has clear definitions of what they mean by this term. According the Social Investment Forum website, socially responsible investing means: "Integrating personal values and societal concerns with investment decisions...SRI considers both the investor's financial needs and an investments impact on society. With SRI, you can put your money to work to build a better tomorrow while earning competitive returns today....How does it work? Three key SRI strategies have evolved over the years: Screening, Shareholder Advocacy, Community Investment and Social Venture Capital."
Screening means the investor assesses whether a company has a good enough record in areas like employee relations, environmental and social impact, human rights...What information do they use to make these decisions?
Shareholder advocacy means that an investor goes to shareholder meetings of a company and voices praise or concern over aspects of the company. They threaten to pull out their investment if the company refuses to address a concern (for instance, about the number of women and people of color on the Board, or about labor issues, or environmental abuses.)
Community investment means offering money, at low interest rates, to community groups (often via a community development financial institution which brokers such deals) who do work on things like land trusts, permanently affordable housing, small business loans to people who have low incomes.
How do I feel about this definition of socially responsible investing?It's not so bad. Community investing seems cool, as least from what I learned in my ICE research. I wonder what percent of a socially responsible mutual fund goes towards community investment.
Shareholder activism seems interesting --again, I wonder how much the socially responsible mutual funds engage in this. Do they ever pull out of a company? What impact has shareholder activism had?
Screening is the one that feels most vague to me --and that I feel most suspicious of. I mean, these screened companies may pay workers more than minimum wage and the company may not torture anyone or dump pollutants. But they are probably hierarchical and patriarchal and, well, do they produce anything that I really respect? They are surely using a lot of resources; people use a lot of energy to get to the workplace. It might help me to look at a list of companies in a socially responsible mutual fund to get a better sense of what companies are considered kosher.
Incidentally, I located a CDFI bank and a CDFI credit union in Massachusetts.
OneUnited Bank
133 Federal Street, 8th Floor
Boston, MA 02110-1703(617) 457-4415
South End Federal Credit Union
100 West Dedham St.
Boston, MA 02118-1601(617) 247-1673
Im still trying to locate a list of CDCUs in Massachusetts and the rest of the country --funny, there is no list on the National Community Development Credit Unions website, or at least not one I can find.
posted by oat collective at 6:43 PM
4 Comments:
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