Democracy, Democratic Innovation, Impact Investing, Innovation, Institutional Investors, Investment

Democracy creeps into the investment world

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Since my career shift into the world of democratic innovation, I have concentrated on how technology was enabling governments to engage more actively with citizens, and thereby reinforce the idea and practise of genuine democracy.  What I have neglected, which is rather odd concerning my investment background, is the far-reaching extent to which technology can bring democracy into the enormous mutual fund sector.  This is happening by giving the owners of mutual funds (individual shareholders like you and me), the ability to vote their underlying shares in line with their personal wishes on proxy matters—rather than have them voted by the fund managers.

The Financial Times reported on Wednesday (18 September 2024) that Vanguard was experimenting with a system that would enable those individuals who owns shares in selected mutual funds to instruct the firm on how to vote their shares on key corporate matters.  In this experiment, not all investors took up those rights. The FT reported that “nearly ¼ of the 40,000 retail investors in the programme voted to support ESG shareholder proposals……… while 30% opted to vote in line with the recommendations of company boards”.  Intriguingly, the largest percentage decided to vote “in line with Vanguard’s recommendations”. 

This is an experiment, and I suspect that were it to continue and broaden, a greater percentage of fund owners would avail themselves of the right to indicate how they would vote in proxy matters. I have argued for years that the presumption that all investors care about is financial return is untrue and deprives the true asset owners of the right to express themselves on other criteria.

Sadly, I suspect the move was not solely motivated by Vanguard’s desire to empower fund owners.  Large fund groups like Vanguard and Black Rock have been paying an increasingly heavy price in the USA for being outspoken on ESG matters and voting the shares they hold for customers accordingly.  This has angered crusaders against “wokeism”, particularly from institutions in “red states”, and in a growing list of cases has led to investment mandates being withdrawn from the more ESG-active fund managers.

Nevertheless, such a move is to be welcomed and will over time enable us to have a much clearer sense of the extent to which investor priorities differ.  In the same way that some investors are more risk averse, and will sacrifice return for lower risk, there is a substantial portion of the investment community that will even accept lower risk-adjusted returns to bring about better social and environmental outcomes.  This is one aspect of impact investing, where investors make conscious trade-offs between the three dimensions of risk, return and impact (social, ethical or environmental).  An ever-growing body of evidence also demonstrates that no trade-off may be necessary in many cases—in other words, the ESG benefits come for free.

As profound as that shift in investment behaviour has been, I contend that another important shift will be an increasing amount of “beneficiary engagement” in the years to come.  Such beneficiary groups might consist of investors, customers, citizens, renters (as with Housing Associations), union members, or others.  The ability to use technology, sometimes with the assistance of AI, can and will enable institutions, corporations and governments to engage with these groups in more meaningful ways, and strengthen the democratic aspect of these bodies.

This will not ensure better decisions, as democracies can often make incredibly perverse choices.  However, decisions made through beneficiary engagement will possess far greater legitimacy—and legitimacy seems sorely lacking these days.

I started my career in mainstream finance and shifted into impact investing before returning to my lifelong passion of politics in early 2021. This blog reflects that return and is my way of sharing the impressions of someone journeying from “proper jobs” in the investment world back into education to study politics after four decades. For those interested in why I started this blog click here, and to read my declaration of known biases, click here. I welcome any comments

CEO pay, Corporations, Democracy, Democratic Innovation, Institutional Investors, Leadership, Politics

Democracy in corporate boardrooms

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In this blog I have written mostly about politics and how innovation could reinvigorate our democracies. I have neglected to apply this principle to the corporate and financial sector. This is actually odd because I spent most of my career in the financial sector not as a “politics student”, or advisor to organisations involved in democratic innovation (what I now do).

An interesting article by Stuart Kirk of the Financial Times (May 25, 2024, “It’s time to let shareholders choose the CEO”), raises the question of democracy within corporations. He challenges the current approach “where elected board members are responsible” for CEO selection. Investors, who own the company, “are never given a list of candidates and asked to vote”. Many of these shareholders own their stakes via mutual funds or pension funds and do not even have the right to vote–that right is executed by the fund manager on their behalf.

Kirk argues that opening up the process will broaden the list of prospects. He also contends this will put downward pressure on CEO compensation which has ballooned in the past decade. Against this contention the recent award of circa $50 billion in compensation to Elon Musk at Tesla is worth pondering. Thousands of retail shareholders were the most supportive of Musk’s package and it was the institutions who were most opposed. Thus, individual shareholders may act in ways that are surprising, and/or arguably counter to their own interests, but at least such decisions will have far greater democratic legitimacy. In the same vein, there is no guarantee that engaging citizens in the political process will achieve better decisions—but they would also have greater democratic legitimacy.

What makes me most uncomfortable about the process of CEO selection in public companies is what I would describe as the “conspiracy of the interested”. Boards appoint new board members—often in their own likeness.  The board-appointed CEO obviously has an interest in placing on the board those most likely to be supportive–and CEOs normally have considerable influence on selection. Boards remuneration committees decide how much the CEO should earn.  It is easy to see how this creates a system where compensation levels remain high, especially as board directors are often CEOs of other companies. Few board members have a genuine interest in depressing executive wages, contributing to the stratospheric rise in CEO relative pay. This all acts to the detriment of shareholder interests.

Kirk makes an excellent point with regard to the investment banking industry where “the internal candidate whose business or region is currently making the most money” gets the nod to become CEO”. As someone who used to follow the investment banking industry, I was amazed at how difficult it seemed to be for investment bank boards to distinguish between luck and competence in choosing a CEO, and how rarely they search outside the company.

The most amazing case of this I saw at close quarters at Lehman Brothers, a firm I knew well (Disclosure: as an analyst and subsequently as Lehman’s Head of Equities in Europe in the 1990s). Richard Fuld emerged from the fixed income side of the business, which had enjoyed record years during the bull market–unsurprisingly he was selected to run Lehman Brothers, systematically displacing any rivals. In my opinion, despite the success in fixed income, he was not a good choice as an investment bank CEO. Fuld, led the firm into a spectacular bankruptcy in 2008, nearly bringing down the global financial system with it. He is reported to have been paid $500 million during his career at Lehman Brothers, according to James Sterngold of CBS News (April 29, 2010, “How much did Lehman CEO make?”), while the taxpayer bill to rescue Wall Street was $700 billion. There is no guarantee Lehman investors would have behaved differently, but the extraordinary preference for internal candidates, which Kirk criticises, is an issue with the current system.

Furthermore, one can argue that Musk created an enormously valuable company and deserves rich rewards. But Lehman Brothers was founded in 1850–is it really fair that at firms with reputations (and franchise value) have been established over decades or centuries, that today’s CEOs gobble up so much of the value created. Perhaps incompetents get fired when their luck runs out but often with generous “golden parachutes”. Heads I win, tails I win–this a huge problem.

It is hard to imagine how one might set about fixing this problem, or even to feel confident that more democratic decision-making would improve outcomes. But as in the political sphere, it seems hard to argue that the current situation is working so well that it could not benefit from experimentation. One answer could be for the fund managers to enable shareholders to vote their shares, so that the institution’s vote reflects the views of beneficial owners. From a technical standpoint this seems eminently doable, but probably few shareholders would bother to vote. But it would be a start and on important issues one suspects the turnout could be much higher. In any event, more democracy seems worth a try—in the boardroom and in politics.

I started my career in mainstream finance and shifted into impact investing before returning to my lifelong passion of politics in early 2021. This blog reflects that return and is my way of sharing the impressions of someone journeying from “proper jobs” in the investment world back into education to study politics after four decades. For those interested in why I started this blog click here, and to read my declaration of known biases, click here. I welcome any comments

B Corporation, Corporations, Democracy, Democratic Innovation, Impact Investing, Institutional Investors, Social Entrepreneurship, Uncategorized

Democratic Innovation and Impact Investment are Similar–Why This Matters

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My master’s degree (UCL, 2023) was in Democracy and Comparative Politics, and my dissertation focused on democratic innovation.  In writing it, I noticed an explosion in academic literature regarding innovations in democracy, in particular since 2010[1]. For a relative newcomer to the field, the passion and volume of academic work offered hope that the continuous global decline in support for democracy[2] might be halted or even reversed.  At its core, simplifying considerably, were the concepts of citizen engagement and deliberation. The first would reinvigorate democracy and bring greater legitimacy to political decision-making. The second involved initially providing participants with information and objective expertise, who could then openly discuss and debate issues in the facilitated pursuit of a consensus, which would formulate policies that possessed greater legitimacy AND were objectively better than those which result from current legislative processes.

Immersing myself in this hopeful world was exhilarating.  Not only was there a growing abundance of academic literature, but thousands of real-life cases were taking place all over the world[3] and important political leaders seemed committed to the ideals of innovation in our democracies[4].  My excitement waned however as I returned to the real world (from the “groves of academe”).  Hardly anyone I knew was aware of any of these democratic innovations and in our day-to-day lives whatever innovations had been implemented seemed to have had very little impact.

This reminded me of my experience in the impact investment world which began roughly 25 years ago. Pioneers (less so academics in that case) were publishing reports about this emerging world of social enterprise and investment (it was called that before Americans insisted on the shift in nomenclature to “impact investing” in 2007) and the arguments in support.  Also, a host of new mission-oriented companies (think Body Shop or Ben and Jerry’s) emerged which added “doing good” to doing well.  I can remember vividly this sense of frustration that an obviously good idea which was destined to improve the way in which our financial markets and commercial enterprises operated was pretty much ignored. Again, the average “man in the street” had absolutely no awareness of the shift and in terms of genuine impact, it was microscopic.  Despite the noble efforts of these committed pioneers, and the seemingly obvious benefits that such a shift would engender, the commercial and investment world were not changing.

What I do recall vividly is the frustration of these pioneers as they presented compelling, passionate and extremely well-intentioned arguments in favour of incorporating impact into the world of investing, to no avail.  They were met with comments like, “lovely idea, we will get back to you”.  Investing institutions feared that bringing impact into the equation would diminish returns.  Large corporations worried that taking non-financial factors into account would threaten profitability. 

I was reminded of this when reading the equivalently passionate academic pieces extolling the virtues of citizen engagement and deliberative democracy, and the mounting frustration at how little was actually changing in the political realm.  What I saw then and now was that wagging your finger at the people who benefit from the status quo and telling them what they “should” do and demanding change because “it’s obviously the right thing to do” very rarely result in any notable progress.  At best, you will get “lovely idea, we will get back to you”.

Since that time the impact investment world has grown by leaps and bounds.  From non-existence in the early 2000s, the sector has mushroomed to $1.164 trillion in 2022[5] according to the Global Impact Investment Network’s latest published report.  This sum is growing at 10-20% per annum, much faster than the overall investment sector.  In the UK, Better Society (was “Big Society” until recently) Capital estimates that the value of UK social investments in 2022 was worth £9.4 billion, roughly 11 times (!) the level in 2011.  Large companies who sneered at the idea of impact in the early part of this century has restructured to take impact into account, which has been well-received by customers and employees alike—some (8,653 at last count) have even become “B Corporations”[6].

I contend that critical to this was a shift in the language of the pioneers, as they attempted to persuade large institutions and corporations.  Instead of finger-wagging or preaching, the emphasis was placed on how it was in the selfish interest of these large organisations to undertake the shift. For example, large investment firms became convinced that impact assets under management would grow rapidly (this has clearly proven to be the case), and that in addition the fees for managing these assets would be higher, the money would be “stickier” (less likely to leave the institution once it arrived then mainstream investments) and that investment returns would not suffer.  Corporations saw the benefit in customer and staff engagement. 

I believe a similar shift is needed in the area of democratic innovation.  My dissertation therefore focused on trying to identify the factors that might convince politicians and civil servants to undertake exercises in democratic innovation because it was in their interest to do so.  As part of my work, I surveyed dozens of democracy technology companies across Western Europe and asked what they perceived to be the factors that do entice politicians to undertake democratic innovation. To be fair, these companies noted that some politicians were willing to do things simply because it was “the right thing to do”.  But this was a small minority.  The bulk of the politicians and civil servants were more effectively persuaded when the arguments focused upon factors of tangible interest. I grouped these factors into “7 Cs”—for example, cost savings or compliance (to national or international requirements).   

The dissertation was obviously written for academic purposes, so is tediously dull, but if readers of this blog wish to have a copy please just e-mail me at rod@schwartzuk.com and I would be happy to send it.  I do so not to bore more readers with my academic prose, but in order to try to persuade those who care about the adoption of democratic innovations, focused on citizen engagement and deliberation, to concentrate on factors which are in the selfish interests of politicians and the civil servants who serve them. This may feel like a compromise to purists, but I would argue that getting politicians to do things which improve the functioning of our democracies is more important than the elegance of academic logic deployed in the course of this persuasion.

 Rodney Schwartz, London, 11 May 2024

I started my career in mainstream finance and shifted into impact investing before returning to my lifelong passion of politics in early 2021.  This blog reflects that return and is my way of sharing the impressions of someone journeying from “proper jobs” in the investment world back into education to study politics after four decades.  For those interested in why I started this blog click here, and to read my declaration of known biases, click here.  I welcome any comments.

[1] Elstub, S. & Escobar, O. (2019) “Handbook of Democratic Innovation and Governance”, Elstub S. & Escobar, O. (eds.). Northampton: Edward Elgar Publishing.

[2] V-Dem (2023) “Democracy Report 2023: Defiance in the face of autocratization”, Gothenburg: University of Gothenburg, V-Dem Institute.

[3] Participedia identified 2,228 cases as of 4 May 2024 (https://participedia.net/)

[4] https://www.theguardian.com/cities/2014/oct/08/parisians-have-say-city-first-20m-participatory-budget  downloaded 4/5/24 at 16:14

[5] https://thegiin.org/assets/2022-Market%20Sizing%20Report-Final.pdf   downloaded 4/5/24 at 16:47

[6] https://www.bcorporation.net/en-us/  downloaded 11/05/24 at 16:02

Entrepreneurship, Income Redistribution, Leadership, Politics, wage growth

Issue Entrepreneurship and the ‘Sleeping Giant’ of Income Redistribution

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I was listening to BBC Radio 4 News in March (22/3/23) and was particularly interested in an interview of Sushil Wadhwani, who runs his own asset management firm, and for three years was a member of the Monetary Policy Committee of the Bank of England.  His CV is that of a mainstream fund manager.  In the interview he mentioned his surprise that corporate profit margins had remained so high despite the cost of living crisis.  Serendipitously the Financial Times published a chart on its front page that day on corporate profit margins in the United States which I have copied below. What is very clear is that in these hard times not everyone is suffering.

It seems to me, and to many of those I speak with, absolutely astonishing that this disparity is allowed to continue. With inflation pushing so many households into poverty, it feels bizarre that there has been no major party clamouring for an adjustment which eases the burden on those who are struggling and increases the demands on those who appeared to be doing well through increased taxation. 

I often wonder why few of the opposition parties appear willing to tackle this head on. There is obviously a strong moral case for shifting the burden away from those who have been forced into food banks and making difficult “eating versus heating” decisions over the past six months, and onto those “with the broadest shoulders”. Furthermore, there is also a strong economic case. In a country like the UK, which is suffering severely from anaemic economic growth, it is obvious that tilting the tax system in a way which put more disposable income in the hands of the bottom third of earners, at the expense of the top third of earners would increase economic growth. This stems from the fact that the marginal propensity to consume for those at the bottom must be nearly 100% (they will spend all marginal income on essentials and perhaps repaying debt) whereas extra income for the wealthiest in our society is not spent on consumption but rather in pouring more capital into financial assets.

The only reason a cynic like me can think of is that opposition parties, like the government, receive their campaign funding from the wealthy who are typically antagonistic towards the redistribution of income.  Also, talk of redistributing income has the feel of a “third rail” issue for politicians—touch it and you go up in smoke.  I am no longer certain this is the case.

I have been studying “orphan issues” like this for my master’s degree at UCL. These are just sitting there waiting for “issue entrepreneurs” to pick them up and run with them, as they seek the support of the electorate.  This concept of “issue entrepreneurship” seems to have been developed by theorists Sara Hobolt and Catherine de Vries in a 2015 article (“Issue Entrepreneurship and Multiparty Competition”).  In it they introduced the concept but also identify the circumstances under which political parties may or may not grab hold of such issues.  There are two primary points they make, the first is that “political parties are more likely to become issue entrepreneurs when they are losers on the dominant dimension of contestation”, and that these “parties will choose which issue to promote on the basis of their internal cohesion and proximity to the mean voter on that same issue”.  It remains to be seen if these propositions are correct and if the current opposition parties are willing to take the risk.

In prior research, written in 2007 by Cees Van der Eijk and Mark Franklin, (“Potential for Contestation on European Matters at National Elections in Europe”) the authors identified the issue of EU integration as a potential “sleeping giant”, ready to dramatically shift political behaviour in Europe.  This issue had lain dormant for some time but was seized upon by Eurosceptic and far-right parties, with notable success.

I wonder if the UK Labour party has an entrepreneurial bone in their political body………….   

(PS—this post was written weeks ago, but I forgot to hit “send”.)

Rodney Schwartz

London, UK—23 April 2023

I started my career in mainstream finance and shifted into impact investing before returning to my lifelong passion of politics in early 2021. This blog reflects that return and is my way of sharing the impressions of someone journeying from “proper jobs” in the investment world back into education to study politics after four decades. For those interested in why I started this blog click here, and to read my declaration of known biases, click here. I welcome any comments

Uncategorized

“Peak-End Rule”: Voter Perceptions are Skewed by Recency

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I try very hard not to bore readers with too many of the dozens of articles that I, as a master’s student, should read each week. Nevertheless, I feel obliged to share some insights from a 2014 article by Andrew Healy and Gabriel Lenz (“Substituting the End for the Whole: Why Voters Respond Primarily to the Election- Year Economy”) because it is highly relevant, especially as we approach key election in 2024 in the UK and USA.  In this impressive analysis, informed in part by the work of Nobel Prize winning economist/psychologist Daniel Kahneman, the authors demonstrate convincingly that US voters consistently overweight economic performance in the fourth year of a presidential term when deciding on how to vote for an incumbent President.

What is especially interesting is that when voters are asked how they wish to assess a President they consistently claim that they would like to do so based upon the cumulative results of the full four year Presidential term. However, when it comes to voting, they historically and significantly overweight economic performance of the fourth year.  In part, this reflects faulty memories and the fact that going back and assessing the full term’s results requires intellectual work, which many voters seem unwilling to do. Instead, voters appear to unintentionally deploy a heuristic; how the economy feels as they are voting at the end of the term. The unfortunate result of this is that Presidents who may be competent economic managers over their full terms are less favoured than are clever politicians who figure out how to successfully manipulate the economy to suit the electoral calendar. This can mean that longer term national economic prospects are damaged in pursuit of a false economic uplift to suit an incumbent president (or Prime Minister, for that matter).

A good example is how voters perceived Presidents Carter and Clinton.  US GDP growth was stronger over Carter’s full term, but weak in year 4, and he was booted out of office (although there were other factors).  Cumulative GDP growth under Clinton was weaker, but his strong performance in the fourth year helped to give him a second term, the research suggests.

Apparently such a phenomena is observable in many other aspects of life. The article refers to examples of experiments undertaken in the area of gambling, vacations, TV advertisements, and colonoscopies, among other areas.  The authors specifically cited an example where individuals are asked to stick their hands in 14 degrees centigrade water for 15 seconds, and then do the same for 90 seconds.  Without letting them know they gradually raised the temperature in the final 15 seconds from 14 to 15 degrees. When they were asked afterwards which ordeal they would like to repeat, a disproportionate number wished to have the second experiment, even though they will have to endured 30 seconds of 14 degree water as opposed to 15 in the first example, and three times as much cold water overall. However, the milder temperature right at the end biases their decision-making process. Theorists like Kahneman and others call this the “Peak-End Rule”, where the feeling at the end of an experience dominates the individual’s overall impression.

This is all great stuff and highly amusing but is really a serious issue for our democracy. The results are so significant that it means that there is an extraordinary incentive for politicians to jeopardise the long term interests of the country in order to get the right economic result as an election approaches. I suspect this will be true for Joe Biden in 2024 and my hunch is that Rishi Sunak, the Prime Minister of  the United Kingdom, will have a hard time resisting the temptation to announce a raft of vote winning measures (my bet is for tax cuts) at the end of his term in 2024. Healy and Lenz suggest that the best way to address this is for governments to make sure that people are fully informed about the cumulative impact of their regimes and that this will ensure voters take the full term of their governments into account. This is an extraordinarily naive suggestion and I place the probability of this UK Government doing that at precisely 0%–same for the Democrats in the USA.

If the UK Labour opposition has any sense, and sometimes I doubt that they do, they will start to bang the drums now about the unaffordable electoral bribes which are surely coming down the pipe.  We have seen the first instalment of these in the budget just announced which lavished upon the top 1% of earners significant and generous pension benefits—this at a time when the bottom 80% are struggling to make ends meet.  I doubt the Tories will adhere to the “fiscal discipline” they normally shout about, and which is one of the justifications for paltry public sector wage growth.   

If oppositions do not point out this is an issue to voters, and do so early enough to prepare them for the bribery that will undoubtedly follow, they only have themselves to blame.  But it is not only they who lose, but all of us who suffer from the damaging long term consequences of the Peak-End Rule and the perverse incentives it creates for politicians.

London, UK—17 March 2023

I started my career in mainstream finance and shifted into impact investing before returning to my lifelong passion of politics in early 2021. This blog reflects that return and is my way of sharing the impressions of someone journeying from “proper jobs” in the investment world back into education to study politics after four decades. For those interested in why I started this blog click here, and to read my declaration of known biases, click here. I welcome any comments

Consistency, Education, Leadership, Politics

On the Need for Consistency and the Avoidance of “U-Turns” in British Politics

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In recent weeks I have devoted several blog posts to my disappointments in studying for a master’s degree at UCL in London. I now fear that I am presenting a misleadingly negative picture of an experience which has been relatively positive, whether if it is despite or because of the university. There are some real joys in my learning experience—allow me to share just one.

We had been learning about what causes European citizens to vote for far-right parties—obviously, a matter of topical interest.  One aspect of the analysis engaged in by theorists is to discern whether cultural views or perceived economic predicament were a better explanatory factor in judging the likelihood of individuals to vote this way. I had read a piece by Thomas Kurer and Briitta van Staalduinen (“Disappointed Expectations: Downward Mobility and Electoral Change.” American Political Science Review, 2022).  The authors described a concept called “status discordance”, which took into account a person’s reasonable life expectations based upon their original family situation and compared it to the reality of their economic achievement. For many decades in the West it had been taken for granted that each new generation will be better off than that of their parents.  This presumption has been severely undermined by economic realities.  Kurer and van Staalduinen contend that the greater the extent of this status discordance, the more aggrieved people will feel due to the economic gap in the realities of their lives and the more likely they are to vote for right wing parties (or, one might think, any extreme or non-mainstream party).  The statistical analysis they undertook seemed a bit complex to me, but in the end I became utterly convinced by their argument.

This certainty lasted about 20 minutes, when I followed it up by reading a piece by Yotam Margalit, who made precisely the opposite claim (“Economic Insecurity and Causes of Populism, Reconsidered.” Journal of European Perspectives, 2019). He critiqued (not Kurer and van Staalduinen individually), but their point of view that economic factors were dominant in the decision to support right wing parties.  For Margalit, this concentration on economic factors missed the importance of cultural ones, which he believed were ultimately the true causal factors, which are sometimes hidden due to the research methods used.

His piece was too long to describe at length, but he cited several studies which showed relatively weak relationships to economic factors once cultural factors were isolated.  Margalit argued that, “People may also view economics-based arguments against immigration as more socially acceptable than ones couched in cultural terms and thus may overreport the former as the justification for their stance.”  He gave an example from a 2010 study by Alexander Janus which tried to separate these factors by dividing a sample randomly into two groups.  He asked one group to read three pretty neutral statements and then asked if they agreed with the total number of statements (but without having to agree/disagree with each).  He then added a fourth statement (“Cutting off immigration to the United States”) and asked the second randomly chosen group if they agreed with all four.  The percentage agreeing dropped from 61% to 42%.  By hiding a statement which might be socially undesirable to object to amidst three others, Janus was able to identify the percentage likely to be opposed to immigration in a way that would pose no “social risks” to the respondent.  This is just one example of many used to by Margalit to make his point.  Although I began the article feeling very sceptical, by the end I was convinced, and my opinion had changed by 180 degrees!

Which position is factually correct is irrelevant to the point I wish to make. Instead, what I have learned is the utter joy of changing ones view on a dime when presented with countervailing evidence one finds compelling. At its best, academia provides pathways and methods to seek “the truth” and the freedom to shift about in pursuit of it.

I used to believe that philosophical consistency was of great value. What I have learned during the course of my study and in the example I have shared above is that there is something special about an environment that ought to and does permit this ideological wandering. At a much earlier point in my life I argued passionately concerning the intrinsic value of intellectual consistency. I was chided by a woman who quoted Emerson to me.  She said, “A foolish consistency is the hobgoblin of little minds, adored by little statesmen and philosophers and divines.”  She was right and I laughed out loud—and never forgot that line!  I have thoroughly enjoyed the intellectual knockabout and the constant shifting of views that my educational experience affords.  Long may it continue.

However, I was listening to the radio over the weekend, hearing about the sad saga of Tory ex-Health Secretary Matt Hancock, whose private WhatsApp messages have now been publicly disclosed. So much of this story is pathetic, humorous, disturbing, engrossing, or worrying, depending upon your point of view.  For readers who are not from the UK and have not been watching this story, I am pretty sure it’s not worth going into the gory details. Suffice it to say that a minister acted badly and got caught out—nothing new, really—a bit of sex, arrogance and wide-ranging incompetence.  The radio commentator had made one important point that UK government ministers seem to find it incredibly difficult to reverse a policy once it has been decided upon, even in the face of new information which suggests the policy may have been wrong. This is especially troubling during a pandemic when lives can be saved or lost based on policy responses to accurate evidence. 

But something in the UK make U-Turns particularly challenging manoeuvres.  Maybe it’s the influence of the press, or the enormous egos of some of our appalling leaders who have been “Peter Principled” right into the Cabinet.  I suggest Matt Hancock would have been far better off getting a masters degree than jetting off to participate in “I’m a Celebrity….Get me out of Here!”  But that would make for poor TV.

Rodney Schwartz

London, UK—5 March 2023

I started my career in mainstream finance and shifted into impact investing before returning to my lifelong passion of politics in early 2021. This blog reflects that return and is my way of sharing the impressions of someone journeying from “proper jobs” in the investment world back into education to study politics after four decades. For those interested in why I started this blog click here, and to read my declaration of known biases, click here. I welcome any comments

Democracy, Education, Leadership, Politics

“Hierarchism” at University and in Politics–and How we Really Learn

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When I started my master’s degree in Democracy and Comparative Politics at UCL I wasn’t quite sure what to expect.  Would I be leaning about Plato and Aristotle, or Hobbes and Marx?  In fact, it’s Weber and Rawls where our studies seem to begin.  However, I find that many of my political lessons do not come from books written by any of the great theorists, but rather in observing how universities operate and how that mirrors government treatment of citizens.  Let me explain.

As I sit here today on 28 February, I am awaiting the results of an exam handed in on 11 January. I have had a steady stream of apologetic emails assuring me that the grades are to be available imminently–hmmmmm.  I recollect this also occurred with the mid-terms for the same class.  In fact, we did not receive the results until after the end of term!  Thus, one had no chance to learn from the exam, or to gain an understanding of concepts one failed to absorb in preparation for the mid-term exam.

It is also infuriating that the final exam was handed out in the middle of the Christmas break on 3 January (classes resumed on the 9th), and we were expected to hand in our exam papers by 14:00 on the 11th. Hopes that exams be handed out at the end of term were thwarted as it would have meant that professors would be marking over their Christmas break, which was understandably unacceptable. However, the idea that students should be expected to do an exam during their Christmas break seemed perfectly reasonable.

Another example, in another class, were the repeated promises that an important lecture would be made available through the online portal by a specific time. Of course this did not appear much later. I fully understand that shit happens, and that university professors are massively overworked (and underpaid), but what I find galling is the hard-assed insistence on students meeting firm deadlines at the same time as the university persistently fails to meet nearly every deadline it establishes for itself.  We are told that if we hand in exams even just one minute late there will be penalties. 

It is not only professors that continually miss deadlines, but the university itself.  Lectures, course outlines and necessary material are often not available until after the first classes of term begin, which is patently ridiculous.  I suspect this attitude of strict deadlines for those further down in the hierarchical system, and disregard for them at the top permeates downwards—as they say, “a fish rots from the head”.  I could go on and provide more examples, but I am sure you get the picture.

I have been reflecting on the question of “where else have I seen this behaviour in the world we inhabit?” I wonder……………   As many will recall, the Conservative government under Boris Johnson was strict with regard to COVID restrictions. Citizens who had the audacity to sit on a park bench as they took their daily walk at the height of the restrictions were quickly moved along by police and those found to have had group gatherings were punished. It is a matter of public record that while we were adhering to these restrictions those who governed over us were flaunting them with abandon. I presume that they believed it was important that restrictions were put in place in order to keep us healthy and to prevent hospitals overflowing with patients, but clearly they did not seem to worry about this for themselves.  Were they not worried?  Did not care?  In any event, the rules were only applicable to us but not to them!  I have decided to call this behaviour “hierarchism”, whereby those in power strictly enforce rules and regulations on those over which they have power without feeling any obligation to abide by these rules themselves.

This feels an important political lesson, but one I suspect the university has taught unintentionally. It’s about people in power using this power to procure benefits for themselves or make their lives easier  without any regard to those over whom they have power, further down the hierarchy. The irony in both cases is that it is actually students and citizens who are theoretically in charge. As students we are the customers of universities and are paying them to provide us with a service.  They work for us—it rarely feels that way. As citizens, politicians are nominally meant to be public servants, acting in our interest under authority delegated to them. Yet this theoretical model does not seem to work in practise.  Even if it did operate in Athens many centuries ago it certainly fails in the modern era.

Students exert pretty much zero power over the universities, despite being the customer.  Frankly even the professors seem relatively powerless and are often forced to undertake inane tasks for wages that are far too low.  But this is the nature of hierarchism—each tier dumps on the tier below.

My time as a student is limited, and this is true for most of us.  However, we are (unless you are Shamima Begum) forever citizens of our countries.  Democracy cannot operate effectively in an environment where citizens feel—and arguably are—powerless.  Yes, we have elections, but……….. Until we seriously address this, a vibrant healthy democracy cannot exist.  Perhaps in future blog posts I can explore this issue and analyse those governments which are at least taking a few steps in that direction.  In the meantime, I will just keep on learning, grateful to the university for the many lessons it is teaching me 😊

Rodney Schwartz

London, UK—28 February 2023

I started my career in mainstream finance and shifted into impact investing before returning to my lifelong passion of politics in early 2021. This blog reflects that return and is my way of sharing the impressions of someone journeying from “proper jobs” in the investment world back into education to study politics after four decades. For those interested in why I started this blog click here, and to read my declaration of known biases, click here. I welcome any comments.

Education, Learning, Uncategorized

Is Artificial Intelligence Going to Destroy Education?

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There has been much public comment recently regarding the artificial intelligence chatbot ChatGPT and its potential impact on education. In the Financial Times on 23 January, an article by Andrew Jack {1] cited a Wharton (University of Pennsylvania) Business School professor who noted that essays “written” by ChatGPT would probably secure a B or B- grade and thus outperform a number of his students. The professor noted that, “this has important implications for Business School education”. “Our whole enterprise in education is being challenged by this”, stated another professor from the (University of Michigan) Ross Business School, who described himself as “…… one of the alarmists”.


As a master’s student at UCL, issues such as these around “the point of education” have been sparking my interest, so I asked a professor I know what she thought about this development. She said that her colleagues largely echoed the University of Michigan professor’s fears. Others I spoke with also concurred. It seems a state of panic bordering on hysteria is settling in among academics, who see AI as having the potential to seriously undermine education—and this is not only in business schools or at the masters level.


To me this raises two important questions, the first is of a more philosophical nature. What actually is the point of education? What is education really for or about? If education is solely about getting good grades so that one can advance to the next level of education or receive a brilliant job offer, then these professors may very well be right. If grades are what matters in education, and any idiot who has access to the internet can get a B or B-, then things seem hopeless indeed.


But I have a rather different view concerning education, one that seems rather old-fashioned in this day and age, which is that education is about what we learn, how we interact with others in the process, how our understanding of the world and our place in it expands, how we challenge our biases and predispositions in pursuit of “truth”, a destination which is never reached, but to which we feel we are getting ever closer. The testing regimes in place at so many universities, in my opinion, act to the detriment of education and if ChatGPT is making a mockery of this regime, then it is doing society a public service.


I was on a call earlier this week with UCL student representatives and apart from the strikes the main subject was the grading regime, how that interacted with the holiday schedule, and how assignments need to be used to “encourage” students to attend lectures. The point was made that if grading exercises failed to cover some classes then students would simply not attend those classes, and therefore we needed to shift the examination schedules, to punish students who would skip some classes. To me this felt like the examination tail wagging the dog of learning. If students only attend classes in order to accumulate material on which they might be examined, we have really reached a very sorry state in British academia. If students want to skip classes that are not to be included in grading exercises, let them. It will be their loss, and their fees they will have wasted. And the knowledge they take into their future lives will be reduced.


The other, more practical, question is even more interesting. While it seems to be the case that ChatGPT enables students to submit essays without doing any work, it has long been true that students have had others (real people as opposed to chatbots) write their essays for them. A Forbes 2019 article noted that 7% of students admit to having others do their assignments for them [2] . I am sure the actual numbers are higher. Googling this on the internet turned up a large number of firms (it seems there is quite a sizable industry dedicated to assisting students in cheating) keen to undertake this work. The universities, of course, have known about this for some time, but somehow nobody has become an “alarmist” until now—one wonders why. I sit in class with students who cannot speak any English, yet my university allegedly has tested each of them to ensure they have sufficient language skills to participate, but it seems obvious that they have had substantial “help” in preparing their applications. I feel for these classmates as they struggle to cope in class, but at the same time, I also resent their inability to participate in group discussions. This is a real shame, because their co-nationals who can speak English greatly enrich our conversations and our collective experiences, offering insights about unfamiliar countries, and by sharing some very different world views.


This is not only a university phenomenon—such cheating is rampant at school as youngsters compete for places at prestigious universities (in the USA there is a famous case [3] where chicanery was involved in securing a place at a prestigious nursery school, but alas, the US is a bit extreme in this regard ). I know many parents who do much more than simply proof read the work of their children as part of A level exercises. Some write entire essays which get submitted as the student’s work. Others draft what are ironically called “personal statements” for their offspring, which comprise an important part of the applications for universities. “Everyone does it, you know, and it would be wrong for my child to be placed at a disadvantage,” they might well say. The British middle classes are uniquely adept at transforming what is essentially fraud into a justified and even noble act of balancing the scales. There is not a thought for the millions of young people who lack the means, or sophisticated/well-educated parents and are forced to do their own work.


I think part of the panic is reflected in the fact that it is not only the privileged who can cheat, (which I guess was deemed OK, as there was no sense of hysteria previously), but now everyone—even, GOD FORBID!!, the poor. My fear is that instead of jettisoning this wasteful, harmful (for the pressure it creates) and pointless examination regime, universities will ramp up checks, force students to sign even more statements, return to written supervised exams, and undertake a range of investigative exercises to clamp down on the possibility. I wish they wouldn’t bother. These cheaters will eventually be found out, either in universities in which they cannot keep up, or in jobs where there are found to be woefully inadequate. I do not think mummy or daddy are really doing them any favours—although I am sure they think they are.

My hope, which I do not imagine will be realised, is that we look for other ways to advance learning. The British education system is far too test-oriented—maybe the ChatGPT “affair” can crash this bankrupt regime? We live in hope.

Rodney Schwartz
London, UK—7 February 2023


I started my career in mainstream finance and shifted into impact investing before returning to my lifelong passion of politics in early 2021. This blog reflects that return and is my way of sharing the impressions of someone journeying from “proper jobs” in the investment world back into education to study politics after four decades. For those interested in why I started this blog click here, and to read my declaration of known biases, click here. I welcome any comments.

[1] https://www.ft.com/content/7229ba86-142a-49f6-9821-f55c07536b7c    downloaded 7/2/23 at 16:05

[2] https://www.forbes.com/sites/nataliewexler/2019/09/14/paying-others-to-write-college-essays-involves-more-cheating-than-meets-the-eye/?sh=728f67067662 downloaded 7/2/23 at 15:33

[3] https://www.nytimes.com/2002/11/14/business/wall-st-and-the-nursery-school-a-new-york-story.html  downloaded 7/2/23 16:14

Democratic Innovation, Education, Government Policy, Innovation

University Lecturer Strikes–and Perverse Incentives

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As a master’s student at UCL, I recently learned that there will be 18 days of strikes by professors over a variety of issues between now and 22 March.  For me personally, this means that out of the 12 classes I have remaining this term, 50% will probably be cancelled due to strikes. This does not take into account classes which will be cancelled as a result of rail strikes and professors’ inabilities to get to the classroom.  Before continuing, I should make clear that although I am saddened by the impact on my learning, I fully support the teachers in their strike.

Recently a petition has been circulating among the students which seeks reimbursement to students for classes that they will be missing (500+ signatures!). Although I support this effort as well, for someone like me who is at the tail end of my career and academic life, it has fewer consequences than those with many decades still ahead of them. I also feel a particular sense of rage on behalf of foreign students who have forked out something like £28,000 for their education and have seen its value in actual terms decline sharply as a result of the strikes. This also damages the image of UK universities abroad—but alas this is the sort of medium to long term consequence that often gets ignored. 

It is possible that a few universities may pay compensation to students, and some have done so previously, but the amounts will be trivial—I heard of one university which paid roughly £4 per hour missed.  On that basis, I will get £24 for the classes I miss–ridiculous.  You will guess that the £16k I am paying for my master’s degree, as a UK resident and citizen, is costing far more than £4 per hour!

However, this situation has led me to reflect on comparisons with the private sector, where I have spent most of my life. Most firms suffer as a consequence of strikes because during work stoppages they are unable to manufacture the products or services which generate revenues.  Thus the strikes adversely impact their profitability.  As students, we pay up front for education, and in the event of strike we suffer, as do lecturers, but there is no concomitant reduction in the university’s revenues, apart from minor compensation a few pay out. In fact—and this is the key perversity—universities benefit financially when teachers go on strike—their wage bill falls. Therefore unlike in the private sector the impact of strikes not only fails to punish the employer but actually benefits them. The biggest losers are the students and their professors.  Furthermore, the entire academic experience is diminished, something I have felt deeply.

This is not dissimilar to the health sector where striking nurses, ambulance workers and others suffer directly from their decision to withhold their labour. Sadly patients endure serious hardships and tragically some may die as a result. Whereas students like me might be disheartened or inconvenienced by the negative impact on our education, this is nothing in comparison to the loss of a loved one as a result of industrial action. Anger and fear are inevitable consequences and unfortunately, these are sometimes targeted at those who strike.  Students rarely get angry with teachers, but they are certainly cross with the university—but are they at fault?  I feel the real culprit in both the educational and health field are the Government, who seem to get away with this and hide behind the university or the health entities who bear the brunt of the ill will.  This Government also offers absurd excuses such as “preventing inflation” (see this previous post for a discussion of this issue). I do wish there was some way that they could suffer directly as a result of their policies, but the existing incentive system does not accommodate this.  Instead they benefit, in having a reduced payroll burden, when health and education professionals strike in desperation over how their real pay has declined. 

I study democratic innovation.  I too wish that we could come up with an innovative way to restructure the incentive system so that this perversity did not exist.  Any ideas?

I hope and pray that come the next election this government pay the heavy price for its behaviour. Sadly, it will be nothing like the price that many others are being forced to pay.

I started my career in mainstream finance and shifted into impact investing before returning to my lifelong passion of politics in early 2021. This blog reflects that return and is my way of sharing the impressions of someone journeying from “proper jobs” in the investment world back into education to study politics after four decades. For those interested in why I started this blog click here, and to read my declaration of known biases, click here.

Education, Government Policy

Empty Priorities, at University and in Government

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In 2022 I committed myself to the idea of restarting a regular blog, which is something I had done ever since I got involved in the field of impact investment, back in the early 2000s. I worked on this last summer and with enthusiasm posted 5 pieces, with every intention to carry on.  I was thwarted by two words…….”Quantitative Methods”.  This is the course at UCL which all political science students are required to take.  To say I found it challenging would be an understatement. For someone whose first and second degree came with hardly any experience with a computer, the idea of conducting statistical analysis in a programming language called R was daunting.

I had been prepared for this challenge.  Among the prior year cohort of students, the volume of complaints was so high that I dreaded the prospect—it felt like an impending execution.  Many students in the previous cohort felt the subject to be of such relatively narrow interest and applicability that they questioned its necessity as a required course.  With much trepidation, I launched myself into the class which began in October 2022. Although it was the only course I took that term I found it exhausting and felt myself unable to do much else in the meantime—it was intellectually draining. As excuses go it feels pathetic, but as an explanation it is an honest one.

The course was very difficult and experienced as such by me and many of the other students. The professor, Indraneel Sircar, was an extremely gifted lecturer and able to explain the most complex concepts it is simple and engaging way. In this regard we were blessed. Similarly, I found the 400-500 students on the class to be highly collegiate in their approach to one another. Students would regularly reach out to each other and I was overwhelmed by the helpfulness extended to me during the course—it was heart-warming. I also have to admit I began to see the Department’s wisdom in including this in the core curriculum. Modern day political science study is well-nigh impossible without a solid background in statistical analysis–thus unlike the prior cohort I came around to the university’s judgement that this was an essential pillar for a politics master’s degree.

What was severely absent was the support for students of all levels to integrate the concepts we had learned into our practical work. Professor Sircar tried his darndest, but the 50-minute weekly seminars (taught largely by others) were simply inadequate. The quality of the seminar leaders was mixed, and the instruction to “work independently at your desks and call me over if you have any questions” was a stunning demonstration of pedagogical laziness. By the time the instructor would get halfway around the room the session was up and any questions which existed would remain largely unanswered. With 15 to 20 students in the room, there are roughly 3-4 minutes per person.  It is inconceivable that that is sufficient time to assist people grappling with new and complicated concepts and exercises.  With a 30 minute commute each way, I was making a two hour commitment to a 50% chance of having one question answered.  One need not have statistical training to see this as a poor investment of time.

There is a modern-day political echo of this.  The practise of stating that something is of high importance without providing the resources to back it up is prevalent in modern Britain.  It reminded me of so many things we observe in the political realm.  Teachers face an ever growing pile of “governmental priorities” but are rarely given the resources to support those efforts. Professionals in the health sector are instructed, chided, insulted to meet targets set on high but rarely provided with the financial capacity to deliver.  Earlier this month Prime Minister Rishi Sunak announced plans for all UK students to study maths until the age of 18[1]. Whether or not this is a worthy endeavour I cannot say but I am certain that the funds to support this endeavour will not be made available or they will come out of an already stretched education budget which has declined significantly in real terms. The independent Institute for Fiscal Studies has reported that in the 10 years ended 2019/20 real spending per student has fallen by 9% in real terms.  It has declined from 5.6% of national income two 4.4% of national income over that period[2].  I have serious doubts that this will change regardless of Sunak’s proffered maths ambitions for British students.

Actions such as these at UCL and from the Conservative government I find especially infuriating. They latch onto an important issue or identify a serious problem, make pronouncements, but rarely if ever back these up with the necessary actions to support the initiatives. Frequently they might require sacrifices elsewhere, and whilst politicians delight in making unfunded commitments (and banking the political credit), they refrain from explaining trade-offs.  Such acts are cynical in the extreme.  And what is especially galling is that the people that pay the price are students, patients, teachers, health professionals, but rarely politicians who rack up credit for their substance-free soundbites.  In Sunak’s case it is particularly loathsome, because trailing by 20+ points in the opinions polls, he can rightly expect never to have to pay the price for the “commitments” he is making.

I started my career in mainstream finance and shifted into impact investing before returning to my lifelong passion of politics in early 2021. This blog reflects that return and is my way of sharing the impressions of someone journeying from “proper jobs” in the investment world back into education to study politics after four decades. For those interested in why I started this blog click here, and to read my declaration of known biases, click here. I welcome any comments.

[1] The Guardian, 3/1/23 downloaded 29/1/23. https://www.theguardian.com/education/2023/jan/03/rishi-sunak-to-propose-maths-for-all-pupils-up-to-age-18

[2] November 2021 IFS report.  https://ifs.org.uk/sites/default/files/output_url_files/R204-2021-Education-Spending-Report-1.pdf

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