To Be More Equal Than Others

By: Neerja Caprihan

February 20 is World Day of Social Justice¹. Social Justice encompasses many facets under its umbrella in our current times. If you pause to recollect examples of injustice seen in whatever country you hail from or live in, you are likely to find several instances. There is injustice and inequality at so many levels –

• race and ethnicity
• gender
• age
• economic / income-oriented/ pay disparity
• environmental/ climate
• humanitarian includes refugee, food, health, violence, fair labor, identity, dignity – just about everything plaguing the modern world

The demand for social justice has been a rallying cry spanning ages as well as civilizations. Once human society evolved into tribes and communities that began functioning together as units of a larger system, hierarchies began to emerge. Social inequality has been an inevitable outcome of the processes of establishing ground rules for how societies needed to work. By assigning roles and responsibilities to members, and giving them the powers to exercise them, a structure was provided to a society. As a side effect, the cycle of creation of groups of haves and have-nots was set into motion. As the needs and desires of humans as well as states got bigger, so did the chasms between several classes. 

While this is admittedly an oversimplification of the causes of inequality faced by individuals across the world, the point is to realize that such problems are intrinsic to the evolution of humans and societies. As people and policies change, conditions are often ripe for governments, authorities and more fortunate groups to overlook or disempower certain cross sections of society. To stay on top of such dynamics, it is important for progressive societies to make conscious efforts on an ongoing basis to restore some semblance of rights to marginalized groups. However, when the goalposts move ever so often in a rapidly changing world, making sure all individuals get their rights is a tough, if not outright impossible, target to meet. 

Any lack of progress should not be due to lack of empathy, or effort in the first place. So it’s our job to keep striving towards the advancement of society, where everyone progresses with each other’s support and not at each other’s cost. Like in any home, duties in a civilized society should go invariably hand in hand with rights. 
What can the investing world do? Well, Interactive Advisors has got you covered. We have several social justice portfolios as part of our Socially Responsible offerings.

Data Source: Webpage at Interactive Advisors, as of February 20, 2025 ²

We believe investors are catalysts for change in the behavior and the companies they invest in. Our approach centers on investing in companies that operate businesses with socially desirable products and services as well as the incorporation of ESG factors into investment decision-making, thus incentivizing better practices from the companies.

Find the cause that is close to your heart, and opt to invest in line with it. For further inspiration, have a look at the complete list of IA SRI portfolios to choose the ones to invest in, with an open mind, and a big heart. Let us be more equal than others in this respect. 

PHOTO CREDIT: https://www.shutterstock.com/g/denayunebgt

VIA SHUTTERSTOCK

FOOTNOTES AND SOURCES

DISCLOSURES

Past performance is no guarantee of future results, and all investments, including those in this portfolio, involve the risk of loss, including loss of principal and a reduction in earnings.

The ESG variants of the Socially Responsible Investing portfolios use an Environmental, Social and Governance (“ESG”) investment strategy. Such a strategy could limit the types and number of investment opportunities available to this portfolio, lead the portfolio to underperform a portfolio without an ESG focus or with a distinct ESG focus, and result in the portfolio investing in securities or industry sectors that underperform the market as a whole or foregoing opportunities to invest in securities that might otherwise be advantageous to invest in. Interactive Advisors could also be unsuccessful in creating a portfolio investing in stocks of companies or ETFs made up of companies that exhibit positive or favorable ESG characteristics and the ETF manager (or the provider of the index the ETF seeks to track) may not succeed in selecting issuers that exhibit positive or favorable ESG characteristics in constructing the ETFs.

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