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May 21, 2004
Baker & McKenzie Paper Concludes Social Investing Consistent with Fiduciary Duty
by William Baue
The opinion of a major US corporate law firm sets the bar for the fiduciary case for SRI.
SocialFunds.com --
In November 2000, three lawyers from Baker & McKenzie, one of the largest law
firms in the US, presented a paper to the board of the California County Employee Retirement System
on the fiduciary duty to address social and environmental issues. They concluded that social and
environmental considerations fall within the purview of fiduciary responsibility of board members,
so long as they follow their legal mandate to maximize returns concomitantly.
"If the social investment's rate of return is
similar to the return on a similar type of investment that does not possess the social objective
sought, then it appears that public employee retirement system boards can make the social
investment," state authors Virginia Gibson, Bonnie Levitt, and Karine Cargo in the paper.
"Similarly, if the return on an investment is likely to be impaired, then the decision to divest
can be made even if consideration is given to non-economic social factors."
The paper
carries significant implications, in part because it comes not from the chorus of voices
predisposed to supporting socially responsible investing (SRI), but rather from an impartial
independent source.
"The paper is important because it comes from a reputable US law firm,
and it acknowledges the ability of fiduciaries to address social and environmental issues," said
Gil Yaron, director of law and policy for the Shareholder Association for Research and Education
(SHARE), a Vancouver-based nonprofit advisor of
Canadian pension funds.
Mr. Yaron is currently writing a series of papers for a project
coordinated through a union and university research alliance examining to what extent and how
Canadian pension funds can engage in SRI. The papers, which will be published over the next year,
will cite the Baker & McKenzie paper as an example of state-specific legal opinion in the US.
The paper was also cited in a 2002 report by the Oakland-based Rose Foundation for Communities and the
Environment entitled The Environmental Fiduciary: The Case for Incorporating Environmental
Factors into Investment Management Policies. The Rose Report uses the Baker & McKenzie paper
as a point of departure, extending the responsibility beyond the optional realm.
"In fact,
as a matter of preventative law, a fiduciary would be better positioned to defend a legal challenge
to an investment or investment management decision if he or she incorporated relevant environmental
information into the investment decision . . . " state Tim Little, Susannah Blake Goodman, and
Jonas Kron in the Rose report. "A failure to consider and act on environmentally related
information is not prudent in the financial sense of the word and should not be considered prudent
in the legal sense of the word."
The B&M paper goes into more detail about the so-called
Avon letters, a series
of opinions from the Department of Labor (DOL) establishing the legality of pension funds actively
voting proxies, holding SRI funds, and conducting shareowner action.
The paper also
cites an example when Texas Governor George W. Bush signed a 1997 law limiting state retirement
fund investment in companies that produce songs with lyrics that promote violence and criminal
behavior or degrade women.
"This legislation targeted a social objective with no
consideration for the return on investment, perhaps because the standards of fiduciary duties
differ from the California Constitution and its enabling legislation," state the authors.
Matthew Kiernan, the founder and CEO of sustainability research firm Innovest Strategic Value Advisors who has also cited the
B&M paper in his writings, knows of no instance where the legal or pension fund community has
advanced further on the B&M opinion.
"As a great believer in the awesome power of
intellectual and organizational inertia, I'm sorely tempted to hypothesize it's because the current
ideological and organizational infrastructure built around the status quo (ie, pension fund
trustees, investment staff, outside money managers, and pension fund consultants) has too much
invested in the way things are to be motivated to change," Dr. Kiernan told SocialFunds.com.
Mr. Yaron voices a similar, but more tempered, opinion.
"In the last couple of
years, there has been a chill in addressing environmental and social issues following market
declines, as pension funds focus on bottom line issues," Mr. Yaron told SocialFunds.com.
"Educating the pension community and interpreting the law articulately regarding social and
environmental issues is a slow process--nothing moves quickly in the world of pensions."
"I would make the argument that the fiduciary duty of loyalty and prudence obligates trustees
to at least take into consideration social and environmental issues," Mr. Yaron added. "Studies
are inconclusive whether there are long-term financial benefits or liabilities associated with
corporate environmental and social policies and practices, but clearly they can impact
returns in one way or another, so prudence and loyalty dictates that they be considered from a
financial and risk-based perspective.
©
SRI World Group, Inc. All Rights Reserved.
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