Ethical investment

Money is not neutral, it can be invested for ethical as well as for non-ethical purposes. The German Commission for Justice and Peace in different contexts has called for ethical investments which do some good and avoid evil.
The motivation for this were Exposure and Dialogue Programmes on microfinance institutions and on investments in microfinance programmes as well as studies on “banks for the poor”. Together with the Central Committee of German Catholics (ZdK), the Justice and Peace Commission has contributed to a manual for private and church investors on “ethical investment”.

In a discussion on 23 January 2013 about ethical investment in the Catholic Church – current status/new perspectives – experts talked, among other things, about possibilities to bundle active securities holdings within the church.

The group of experts on World Economy and Social Ethics carried out the study “Changing the world through investment? An aid to orientation on ethically-related investment“. It emphasizes the importance of active securities holdings in order to achieve a change in business practice towards more responsibility for compliance with social standards along the value chain.

Central Committee of German Catholics

Study of the Group of Experts