The UN-supported Principles for Responsible Investment initiative has led to around a third of the world’s financial assets being managed with a commitment to invest in a way that considers environmental, social or governance (ESG) criteria. The responsible investment trend has increased dramatically since the global financial crisis, yet understanding of this field remains at an early stage. This handbook provides an atlas of current practice in the field of responsible investment. With a large global team of expert contributors, the book explores the impact of responsible investment on key financial actors ranging from mainstream asset managers to religious organizations. Offering students and researchers a comprehensive introduction to current scholarship and international structures in the expanding discipline of responsible investment, this handbook is vital reading across the fields of finance, economics and accounting.

This text shows that citizens can change the globalized world in the direction of many common values by being a socially conscious investor. The authors argue that in fact globalization is helping create a shared concern for many issues around the planet.

Over recent years there has been rapid consumer-led growth in investing in socially responsible companies to the extent that it has had an influence on corporate policies. New regulations recognise the public interest by requiring all pension funds to declare their ethical policy. Investors can no longer just consider the financial aspects of a company before investing but also have to consider the complex world of ethical investments. Should the ethical policy take precedence over the financial aspects? Should policies be inclusive or exclusive? What percentage of a company's income has to come from unacceptable sources before the source is excluded? Should any exclusion policy also extend to those involved in selling or transporting goods deemed unacceptable? This is the first book to look at socially responsible investment from the perspective of the institutional investor, who will be led through the complex dilemmas of socially responsible investment with practical examples and advice.

Private equity-backed companies are ubiquitous and economically significant. Consequently, the corporate governance of these companies matters to all of us, and – not surprisingly – is coming under increasing scrutiny. Simon Witney, a practicing private equity lawyer, positions private equity portfolio companies within existing academic theory and examines the laws that apply to them in the UK. He analyses the actual governance frameworks that are put in place and identifies problems created by the legal rules – as well as the market's solutions to them. This book not only explains why these governance mechanisms are established, but also what they are expected to achieve. Witney suggests that private equity owners have both the incentives and the capability to focus on responsible investment practices. Good governance, he argues, is a critical success factor for the private equity industry.

This book provides evidence on the relevance of environmental and social factors in decision making. It discusses the Gold Standard Frameworks for integrating extra-financial risks into the philosophy, culture, strategies, products and value chain management procedures of investment and banking and highlights the current emergence of global administrative law. New emerging topics like positive impact investing and finance, climate friendly markets, human rights, the enhanced role of fiduciary duties and shared values are approached with a lot of examples for practical application. Steps towards a new banking culture, a new climate for double loop learning and sustainable financial innovation are outlined and the additional benefits of robust stakeholder engagement explained. The anthology paves the way from robust impact and risk management to positive impact creation and a new investment culture. As well, challenges for the implementation and ways to overcome them are broadly discussed. The book is rooted in the fact that institutions and investors which fail to professionally integrate the management of extra-financial risk into their whole lending and investment chain and fail to move to positive impact creation may well loose positions and mandates and finally the trust of their clients, partners and stakeholders. The contributing authors of this anthology are internationally renowned experts in the field of ESG and impact investing. The compendium brings together practitioners and academics to allow a confluence of thoughts, concepts and viewpoints. This huge variety of perspectives and approaches makes this volume a comprehensive compendium on responsible investment and banking.

The SRI phenomenon is said to be entering the mainstream of financial intermediation. From a fairly marginal practice promoted or campaigned for by NGO’s and at odds with financial practice and orthodoxy it grew into well formulated policy adopted by a wide range of investors. Academic literature on SRI has also boomed on the assumption that mainstreaming is taking place. However, little thinking has been carried out on questions specifically arising from this alleged ‘mainstreaming’. This book, addressed to those with a scholarly or practitioner’s interest in SRI, starts filling this neglected dimension. Today, one cannot ignore the difficulties of main stream financing. The financial spheres are trembling globally in one of the worst crises since the 1930’s. As a response to the crisis, the intermediation of ‘financial responsibility’ will undoubtedly be the subject of new regulation and scrutinizing. This book looks into what these turbulences will imply for SRI. In view of these circumstances, one might or even should, ask oneself whether the phenomenon was not an empty fad during the exuberant high of financial euphoria that came abruptly to an end with current financial crises. To put it rather sec: are financial intermediaries that promote ‘sustainability’ credible, while it is obvious that some developments in financial intermediation -predictably, as some say- were unsustainable? Is this an opportunity for enhancing SRI because of the strength and superiority it has developed or will it disappear due to a return to financial myopia? This book is the first to question the future of SRI in such a radical way.

The authors have done an excellent job explaining the development and practice of Socially Responsible Investment (SRI). Under the recent recognition of Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) in Asia and its strong emphasis by US and European corporations, this book provides important guidance to students and professionals who are interested in the effects and implications of SRI. This book is truly informative and should be on the reading list of all fund managers and CFOs of international corporations which are serious about CSR. Louis T.W. Cheng, Hong Kong Polytechnic University Individual investors and corporate heads have the responsibility to keep abreast of major changes in the marketplace. Socially responsible investment is one of those changes. Fung, Law and Yau provide, in a single source, a great opportunity to get up to date on an area that will be a force for years to come. I encourage any thoughtful investor or manager to read this book. Thomas Schneeweis, University of Massachusetts Amherst, US Socially responsible investment (SRI) is becoming increasingly popular and can be potentially rewarding to all parties concerned. This book discusses the opportunities, challenges, and practices of SRI in a global financial environment in a consistent and integrated framework of risk management. It also covers a wide variety of environmental, social, and corporate governance (ESG) issues related to various participants, such as values-based retail, institutional investors, corporations, banks, supranational agencies, and non-governmental organizations. Readers are provided with the perspectives of SRI from various players in the financial community from values-based investors to fiduciaries to supranational agencies. The authors analyse the incorporation of ESG issues into investment practices within a regulatory, legal, reputational, and operational risk management framework. Academics, corporate executives, government regulators and policymakers, bankers, and non-governmental organizations involved with sustainable development will find much of interest in this book.