Micro-strategies of Contextualization Cross-national Transfer of Socially Responsible Investment



“She [the Founder/CEO of ARESE] always told us: ‘we cannot sell that [SRI] in the
name of ethics, we have to sell it as a financial product. This is a tool that will be put
to use. Our goal is to inform investors, not to convey ideological or moral
convictions’” (ARESE, Analyst B)

The previous employer of the founder/ CEO of ARESE was a native of the United States and
had been engaged in SRI consultancy in California since the 1980s. He confirmed this radical
transformation of SRI. Sceptical that positive screening could contribute much to the
promotion of social change, he expressed his divergent viewpoint and the importance of
national context in the following words:

“We had some arguments with [the future founder/CEO of ARESE] about the technical
aspects, the methodology and even the general logic [of social evaluation] .. ..The
problem comes from a very different view of what ‘social’ means in North America and
in continental Europe, and also from the total absence of a logic of affirmative action in
France” (Consultant A, former employer of the CEO of ARESE)

By rerouting SRI from negative screening to positive screening, the entrepreneurs made the
practice fit better with the institutional context of France.

Rerouting also enabled the Quebec transfer of SRI. To emphasize the feature of social
gains, the CEO selected a social purpose that already carried much value in Quebec society.
SRI would be another piece of evidence that the economy can be organized in a way that is
more humane than a liberal market economy. This rationale reflected the ‘Quebec model’ and
decades of efforts to gain institutional autonomy and independence from Canada. The CEO
saw in sustainable development an opportunity to demonstrate the viability of an alternative
production regime: “I want to make sure that the firms we finance represent a model of
sustainable development at all levels, as much social as environmental and economic.” This
rerouting connected SRI to dominant values, beliefs and practices in Quebec.

Stowing

Stowing consists in aligning the foreign business practice with a social movement or a current
trend in the host society. Social movements and new trends carry positive energy that benefits

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