Synopses & Reviews
Praise for Impact Investing
"My experience with eBay demonstrated that you can do well by doing good. Impact Investing explores this important idea and provides many examples of the social impact that a for-profit business can ignite." Pierre Omidyar, founder and chairman, eBay; founding partner, Omidyar Network
"An informative and perceptive insight into the world of impact investment." Ronald Cohen, cofounder, Apax Partners; chairman, the Portland Trust and Bridges Ventures
"In business schools around the world, impact investing is hot. For all those young professionals and their teachers, Bugg-Levine and Emerson, pioneers of the field, have written a great introduction to the realities of using markets to address society's problems." Michael Chu, professor, Harvard Business School; cofounder, IGNIA Fund
"An insightful, compelling, and highly readable road map for investors and their wealth managers seeking to achieve blended value. As global thought leaders in impact investing, Bugg-Levine and Emerson share their perspectives and real-life examples of investors and investments achieving a combination of financial and social/environmental returns. It's a must-read for anyone interested in how investment can tackle the world's toughest problems." Ron D. Cordes, cochairman, Genworth Financial Wealth Management; coauthor, The Art of Investing and Portfolio Management
"Impact investing just might be the game-changer we need in the quest to end poverty. Building on the forces of socially responsible investment, microfinance, and many others, impact investing shows that we can solve many of the world's social problems while making attractive financial returns. This superb book is a clear and compelling guide to any reader who wants to be a part of this powerful new force in development. The book is fresh and accessible, with an eye for metaphor and self-deprecation that is rare and welcome among policy wonks."Elizabeth Littlefield, president and CEO, Overseas Private Investment Corporation; former CEO, CGAP
Synopsis
A ground-breaking book on the transformative power of impact investingThis is the first book to chart the catalytic path of this new industry, explaining how it is and can be a positive disruptive force. It shows how impact investing is a transformational vehicle for delivering "blended value" throughout the investment spectrum, giving a single name to a set of activities previously siloed in enclaves, revealing how they are linked within what is becoming a new field of investing. Written by two leaders in the growing field of impact investing, the book defines this emerging industry for participants on all sides of the funding equation (investors, funders and social entrepreneurs).
- Filled with illustrative examples of impact investing success stories
- Reveals how the field can expand in order to address the most critical social and environmental issues of our day
- Explores the wide-ranging applications of impact investing as well as entrepreneurial opportunities
The authors do not take a normative approach to argue how investors should behave like an investment guide might but show how entrepreneurial people and institutions are already offering an integrated alternative.
Synopsis
This groundbreaking book charts the path of a new industry, explaining how impact investing is and can be a positive disruptive force. Impact Investing affirms that it is possible and desirable to address social and environmental problems with investments that generate financial profits.
Antony Bugg-Levine and Jed Emerson reveal how impact investing is a transformational vehicle for delivering blended value through investment. The authorstwo leaders in the burgeoning field of impact investinggive a name to a set of activities previously siloed in enclaves and reveal how these activities are linked within what is becoming a new and dynamic field.
The authors don't take a normative approach to argue how investors should behave but instead show how entrepreneurial people and institutions are already offering an integrated alternative. Impact Investing defines this emerging industry for all the institutions and people it is affecting (investors, funders, social entrepreneurs, educators, policy makers, and marginalized communities) and showcases illustrative examples of challenges and successes. The book also explores the potential that impact investing holds to tackle the most critical social and environmental issues of our day on a scale never seen before.
Ultimately, Impact Investing offers a fundamentally optimistic vision. This unifying vision illuminates what can be achieved when we capture total blended value, when all our assets work in unison with our values and beliefs.
About the Author
Antony Bugg-Levine (New York, NY) has been named the CEO of Nonprofit Finance Fund, a position he will take up in October 2011. Most recently a Managing Director at the Rockefeller Foundation, he designed and led the Rockefeller Foundation's Impact Investing initiative. He convened the 2007 meeting that coined the phrase "impact investing" and is the Board chair of the Global Impact Investing Network. A former consultant with McKinsey & Co., he also teaches at Columbia Business School. A native of South Africa, he served in the late 1990s as the acting communications director at the South African Human Rights Commission.
Jed Emerson, originator of the term blended value, is executive vice president of ImpactAssets, a senior fellow with Heidelberg University's Center on Social Investing, and a senior advisor to the Sterling Group (Hong Kong). He was founding director of REDF, a founding board member of Pacific Community Ventures, and founding director of Larkin Street Services.
Table of Contents
Preface ix
Acknowledgments xxi
Part One
THE TERRAIN OF IMPACT INVESTING 1
1 A MightyWave 3
2 Impact Investing in International Development 19
3 Microfinance: Still the Best Brand in Development? 39
4 Impact Investing in Social Enterprises: Flourishing in the ‘‘Confusing Mess’’ 61
5 Where Is Impact Investing Headed? 85
Part Two
THE IMPLICATIONS OF IMPACT INVESTING 109
6 How Will We Regulate Impact Investing? 111
7 How Will We Cultivate Transformational Leadership? 141
8 How Will We Measure Blended Value? 163
9 How Will We Unlock Philanthropic Capital?
Total Foundation Asset Management 187
10 How Will We Move the Money? 217
11 How Will We See the Forest and the Trees? Creating the New Ecosystem of Impact Investing for Blended Value 251
Notes 263
Further Reading 269
The Authors 283
Disclosure 285
Index 287