Sustainable finance: A new paradigm

We argue that our current approach to shareholder wealth maximization is no longer a valid guide to creation of sustainable wealth: An emphasis on short-term results has had the unintended consequence of forcing many firms to externalize their social and environmental costs. An unwavering faith in markets' ability to efficiently uncover long-term value implications of short-term results has created many unacceptable outcomes. Given the social and environmental challenges ahead, such practices and their unacceptable outcomes cannot be sustained. Therefore, a shift in paradigm is called for. We propose a sustainable value creation framework, within which all social and environmental costs and benefits are to be explicitly accounted for.

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