Valued: A participatory ethnography of the gender lens investing movement

Research in socially responsible investing (SRI), corporate social responsibility (CSR), environmental, social, and governance (ESG) factors, and social impact investing focuses on how social issues are introduced into finance after an organization, institution or investor has accepted the integration of the social issue (post-acceptance perspective). However, advocates start the introduction of these issues into finance decades before a post-acceptance perspective can be studied. Through a case study of investing in women or gender lens investing, this study explores the process, motivations and resistance experienced by advocates introducing social issues into finance. A multi-method approach was used to triangulate findings through participatory ethnography, desk research, attendance at public conferences, roles in intimate gatherings of advocates, participation in projects, and a series of 42 formal interviews with advocates, both men and women, in Australia, Canada, the UK, and the US. Findings show that the process for introducing social issues into finance from an early advocate perspective is challenging, non-linear, fraught with resistance, and requires an understanding and acceptance of different frames of reference and subgroups amongst individual advocates. In the case of investing in women it was found that individuals advocate from three distinct frames of reference: a development champion perspective focused on measures, impacts and counts; an integrated financial risk perspective focused on financial indices and alpha returns; and a visionary value perspective focused on experimentation, innovation, paradigm-shifts, and seeing value or worth in things previously undervalued or not valued. Study findings provide an understanding of the motivations and process that is used by early advocates to introduce social issues into finance and provides a framework for future research of gender lens investing (or the introduction of gender issues into finance).