Ethical Funds

Abstract

Before analyzing the advantages of Ethical Funds, which are self-evident, at least for the ethicists, one should also weigh their risks. This book, in spite of its clear-cut ideas, tries to raise contradicting opinions and weigh their merits. We shall see in the case of the French company how the majority shareholders justify their actions by the need to save the jobs of hundreds of employees, and how the minority shareholders are perceived as speculators who try to fish in filthy water. In other cases, the entrepreneurs maintain that it is necessary to risk other people’s capital even at the risk of possible bankruptcy, in order to keep up with progress. The business world is blurred, ‘dirty’ and dangerous, and ‘those who cannot suffer the heat should not stay in the kitchen’. On the other hand, the ethical world is perceived as a sterile world; theoretical and impractical for modem business.

“In a too limpid water, there are no fishes.” (Zen Proverb)