Ethical Investments

What is ethical investing?  Is such a notion even plausible?  How can one effectively yearn for profit while maintaining a reasonable level of social responsibility?

Such questions have recently arisen amidst the most severe economic and financial collapse since The Great Depression.  By examining ethical investing in context of the current global marketplace and the macro level causes to the unfettered growth and subsequent disintegration of the world’s financial systems, it is apparent that the need for ethical investing and decision making has never been so grave.

Ethical investing is by no means a new term.  Nor has it arisen as a result of the 2008 Credit Crisis and seldom referred to economic depression.  Ethical investing however, has taken a different tone; one more global and universal than it has ever been.

Finding and evaluating investments or companies based on certain criteria found to be considered ethical is no longer the cornerstone of ethical investing.  The notion must be on a larger scale.  It must include the decision making process of individual investors and corporate CEOs, hedge funds managers and small business owners, global politicians and grassroot movement leaders.

Ethical investing must include accountability and transparency.  Decisions must be made with long term growth and sustainability in mind, without succumbing to greed and the prospects of short term gains.

While there are many outlets and avenues to ethically invest (we will explicate on this in later articles), the root pillars of accountability, transparency and sustainability, must be in place before one can even begin to examine ethical investments.

In coming articles Du La Bab will attempt to elucidate on how the three pillars of ethical investing went missing by using empirical examples from the recent economic collapse, as well as inform readers on methods to find and educate themselves of ethical investments.

Jordan Barrocas