Shareholder Initiatives
By investing in ethically-minded mutual funds, StakeHolders clients are participating in one of the most effective techniques for bringing about corporate change. The funds in which we invest initiate, co-sponsor, or lend their weight in support of shareholder resolutions.
Such resolutions address executive compensation, equal employment opportunity (based on gender, sexual orientation, religion, etc.), environmental stewardship, labor issues, indigenous rights, animal welfare — even genocide. Companies doing business with the government in the Sudan (which perpetrates the genocide in Darfur) have been featured prominently in such campaigns recently. In fact, a non-social fund in which we do not invest had the question on its 2009 ballot asking “Do you want the fund to divest from companies implicated in genocide?” — with the management of the fund recommending that they continue investing in these companies.
Using proxies (those ballots you get in the mail), minority shareholders organize to pressure the companies they own to adopt better practices. Each year, targeted campaigns are brought to bear on a particular arms investment, factory, river, labor issue, etc., that is affected by a company’s practices. In any given year, there are about 300-400 such initiatives nationally. In most cases, the mere threat of a proxy battle and the negative ramifications for public relations suffice to get desired concessions from the management.
