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Last week Margot Seigle and I attended Confluence Philanthropy’s Democracy and Finance conference in Cambridge, Massachusetts. We were honored and delighted to be moderating a panel on Regenerative Finance. Panelists explored how investors can directly support community-controlled economic development through non-extractive finance.
Ed Whitfield, of Fund for Democratic Communities, talked about the history of wealth accumulation in this country and what reparations could look like. Aaron Tanaka, of Center for Economic Democracy and Boston Impact Initiative, spoke about concrete examples of non-extractive finance and how participatory budgeting can democratize local government spending. (Video and audio coming soon!)
Margot Seigle shared her own experiences as a regenerative investor redistributing her wealth. She also stood up in the community forum to question the dominant discourse of wealth accumulation. Chris Lindstrom spoke about the philosophical need to see ourselves as a part of the collective rather than just as individuals, and shift wealth accordingly.
Attending the conference was a wonderful learning experience for Margot and I–we met really interesting folks doing all kinds of impact investing all across the spectrum. There were a lot of keynotes and panels talking about maximizing your impact while maintaining market-rate returns. The panel on Regenerative Finance was a break from that framework, where we were able to reconsider where wealth comes from and how wealth can be returned to the communities it has been historically extracted from. Margot and I also asked lots of questions and were able to connect with dozens of powerful organizations working with institutions and wealth individuals to invest in a just transition and redistribute wealth to communities fighting for racial and economic justice.
As I said at the end of this comic–our experience at this impact investing conference is making me excited to build community and start cohorts of folks interested in organizing for wealth redistribution and radical investing in impact investing and socially-responsible investing spaces. Want to join us? Email kate@regenerativefinance.org.
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Love your cartoon rendition of an important yet tired conversation! I am passionate about regenerative principles for investment, philanthropy and business. With my 25 years moving money to mission, I am saddened to conclude endowed foundations are generally followers not leaders in building innovative solutions.
Language of change needs to speak inside and outside the box:
– ESG outperforms conventional investment decision making
– Wealth sharing can reduce investment risk & increases well-being
– We are in a period of radical innovations as big as the industrial revolution
– Today’s dinosaurs will go extinct and today’s elephants can innovate and prosper.
– Collaboration, regeneration, real solutions are business and moral imperatives for any community, company or individual that wants to thrive into the future.
I am bringing these ideas into business and finance; everyday; globally.
Great blog! Thank you!!! And thank you for your leadership at Confluence! These are THE tough questions that we need to think on.
Yay Kate!!!!!
Tell it!!!
The Emperor has no clothes!!!
Xo
MM
Absolutely the right questions. Thank you for writing here too.
Thanks for this hilarious and sobering report of you experience. Please don’t stop! Maybe send this cartoon to HuffPo?
Fantastic. Thanks so much for sharing this, Leslie and Kate!
What an inspiring story – I came across this blog entry while researching something else and am so happy that I was led here. This has my mind spinning in an amazing positive way. I then realized that I know of Kate from other impact investing circles – way to go Kate!!