Socially Responsible Investing

The term socially responsible investing (SRI) describes the practice of using social, ethical, and/or environmental criteria to inform investment decisions. SRI generally takes three forms: investment screening, shareholder activism, and community economic development. SRI constitutes a relatively small portion of overall investment activity but is gaining popularity. For example, there are growing numbers of SRI mutual funds and some companies have started to provide detailed social reports to the public. While much of the SRI movement can be categorized as progressive or liberal, it spans the entire political and religious spectrum.

Screening investments is the most popular form of SRI. Two types of screens help investors choose companies to include in their portfolios. Using negative screens, investors avoid companies based on practices or products that do not meet particular ethical criteria. Positive screens identify companies that are consistent with investors' concerns. Because the research required for screening is time consuming, many investors rely on mutual funds to screen their portfolios.

Through shareholder activism, investors use their ownership of a company to leverage socially responsible changes. Shareholder activism includes developing social audits and distributing them to corporate management, writing letters of concern or praise about corporate practices, and filing or voting on shareholder resolutions. The first SRI shareholder resolution challenged the use of napalm and Agent Orange produced by Dow Chemical in 1969.

Investors interested in community economic development support financial institutions that lend to individuals who would not otherwise have the means to buy a home or start a business. Microlending programs and community development institutions (loan funds, banks, and credit unions) have created an alternative economic system that allows flexible lending and addresses the needs of poor communities, such as training on saving money and business skills. The first community development bank, the South Shore Bank of Chicago, was established in 1973 to stabilize nearby neighborhoods that had begun to deteriorate with white flight and the exodus of businesses in the area.

Though its roots can be traced back centuries, SRI is a relatively young movement. It first became an organized discipline in the United States in the early 1970s. Of particular importance to the growth of SRI was the anti-apartheid movement and the call for corporations to leave South Africa by the Anglican Communion and other churches. This collaboration eventually led to the development of the Interfaith Center on Corporate Responsibility (ICCR), an organization that has played a central and active role in many shareholder resolutions since 1972. Since the first SRI mutual fund, Pax World Fund, was established in 1971, several others now exist providing investors with a range of opportunities, including a growing international SRI market.