Covid-19 and Investor Stewardship: The Need for Responsible Ownership in a Time of Emergency

Institutional investors, who control the savings of millions of ordinary people, have a key role to play in ensuring that the companies in which they invest maintain high standards of governance and accountability. Investor stewardship - the responsible allocation of capital and purposeful engagement - has particular relevance here. The global coronavirus Covid-19 pandemic - and the response to it - has impacted businesses worldwide and revealed a series of short, medium- and long-term environmental, social and governance (ESG) risks. This project will examine how the Covid-19 outbreak has impacted stewardship activities in the UK and ask questions about the social function of institutional investors and their leadership in ESG practices. This project is part of a highly innovative, longer-term and larger-scale research project on shareholder power and accountability, which can be linked to British Academy interests in "The Future of the Corporation" or other such funding agencies.