Inclusive Capitalism in the New Reality

By The Council for Inclusive Capitalism

August 13, 2025

The recent Council for Inclusive Capitalism meeting, co-hosted by Christine Lagarde and Mathias Cormann, made clear we are living in a “New Reality” shaped by new technologies, trade relations and regulatory shifts. I am so grateful to this gathering of investors, policymakers and private sector leaders for confronting the pressing question of our time: amid all this uncertainty, how can we navigate change in a way that’s positive for the world?

Global populations are sending a clear signal that they desire a system that fosters lasting economic growth and fairness. Now more than ever, we need values-based leadership, streamlined regulation, and structural reforms that expand opportunity. The meeting provided valuable direction to shape our work in areas like expanding the ownership economy and harnessing AI for societal benefit.

Encouragingly, there is growing evidence that inclusive practices and long-term thinking deliver results. Research from JUST Capital shows that companies prioritizing workers, customers, and communities have outperformed their benchmarks by more than 10%. Doing right by stakeholders isn’t just principled—it’s profitable. We are also seeing greater momentum behind efforts to scale strategies that enable everyone—especially low-income workers—to build wealth through worker ownership. These models can thrive in all economies—including emerging markets, as the Predistribution Initiative’s new playbook for Sub-Saharan Africa shows.

I invite you to reflect on how the insights and examples that follow might inform your own leadership—and how, together, we can help ensure this new era of capitalism is defined by dignity, fairness, and long-term value. As Madame Lagarde first said at the Conference on Inclusive Capitalism, “By making capitalism more inclusive, we make capitalism more effective … and more sustainable.”

Onward,
Lynn Forester de Rothschild

The Council at the World Economic Forum in Davos

Business Leaders Pose in front of Flags at 2025 Council for Inclusive Capitalism Steering Committee Meetings
Photo by Hervé Cortinat for Council for Inclusive Capitalism

In a time of historic transformation in markets, technology, and geopolitics, the Council for Inclusive Capitalism gathered global leaders in Paris to ask a fundamental question:

How can we ensure today’s volatility leads to more inclusive economies and stable societies?

Our 2025 Steering Committee meeting—co-hosted by President Christine Lagarde of the European Central Bank and Secretary-General Mathias Cormann of the OECD—brought together CEOs, policymakers, investors, and philanthropists from around the world to reflect on the changing economic landscape and the urgent need for action.

This insights piece captures highlights from the conversation.

As the global economy enters a New Reality, the Council’s role in advancing Inclusive Capitalism has never been more essential.

Read the full insights and learn how they will shape our ongoing work.

Welcome New Steering Committee Member

The Council welcomes Jaakko Kiander as our newest member of the Steering Committee, who joined Keva as Chief Executive Officer (CEO) in October 2021. Keva is Finland’s largest pension provider and administers the pensions of a total of 1.3 million public sector employees with investment assets totaling EUR 71.5 billion at year-end 2024.

Kiander is an economist with extensive experience in various roles related to occupational pensions and public finance. Before joining Keva, he worked as Director at The Finnish Centre for Pensions, the Senior Vice President of Ilmarinen Mutual Pension Insurance Company, Director of the Labour Institute for Economic Research, and Research Director at VATT Institute for Economic Research, among other positions. He holds a degree of Doctor of Social Sciences and is a docent at the University of Helsinki and the University of Eastern Finland.

Kiander is also Vice Chair of the Board of the University of Eastern Finland, the Chair of Council of the Finnish Brain Foundation, and a member of the boards of the OP Research Foundation and the Yrjö Jahnsson Foundation.

Steering Committee Background

Our Steering Committee is a select and diverse group of leaders from a variety of industries, regions, and backgrounds that provide vital leadership for the Council. Together, we established and endorsed Principles for Inclusive Capitalism that offer a vision for a future with greater equality of opportunity and outcomes, care for those who are unable to participate fully in the economy, and fairness across generations.

Council In Action

Unlocking Potential: Why Hiring People with Convictions Is Good for Business

Man sits at computer using Offploy's Disclosure Tool

What does inclusive capitalism look like in practice? For Offploy, it means challenging one of the last frontiers of workplace exclusion: the hiring of people with criminal convictions.

Each year, tens of thousands across the UK are shut out of employment—not because they lack talent, but because of stigma and outdated hiring policies. In this compelling piece, Rik Willis of Offploy CIC makes the case for inclusive hiring as a smart, values-driven business strategy that can reduce reoffending, strengthen teams, and deliver real social impact.

Offploy has developed two free tools to help employers lead with purpose:

The Disclosure Toolkit: a user-friendly platform that helps employers and applicants navigate complex criminal record disclosure laws.
The Inclusive Employment Scorecard: a self-assessment tool to evaluate organizational readiness for fair chance hiring.

This is inclusive capitalism in action—practical tools, purpose-driven leadership, and a call to widen the circle of opportunity.

Explore the full story and access the tools here.

The ROI of Doing Right: JUST Capital’s Long-View Lessons

line chart showing performance of JULCD vs Russell 1000

In 2025 JUST Capital marked 10 years of tracking how America’s largest companies treat their workers, customers, communities, and the environment. Their data shows that doing right by stakeholders can also deliver results: the JUST U.S. Large Cap Diversified Index has outperformed the Russell 1000 by over 10% since inception (As of December 31, 2024).

At a time when some companies are scaling back workforce and DEI commitments, this sends a clear signal: inclusive practices are not just moral imperatives — they’re market-smart.

Explore JUST Capital research and reports

Resource Highlight

This playbook from the Predistribution Initiative offers a practical roadmap for advancing economic dignity, business resilience, and long-term value through employee ownership in regions where inequality is high and traditional capital exits are limited.

With real-world case studies, it’s not just a concept—it’s a toolkit for action.

Explore Resource

As part of its broader effort to build a more inclusive investment ecosystem, the Predistribution Initiative is developing a new practitioner-led platform with the Ownership Lens Investing Movement (OLIM). OLIM will establish working groups, accelerate collaboration, and serve as a shared resource hub to scale investment in shared ownership.

Learn more here

Inclusive Capitalism in the News

Our members are driving meaningful change across industries, geographies, and systems. Here’s a snapshot of their leadership:

Deeper Reading

Integrated Decision-Making Framework
Capitals Coalition

Capitals Coalition, which recently merged with the International Foundation for Valuing Impacts, has launched a new asset valuation framework to integrate decision-making across the long-term value of impacts on capital – from natural and financial capital to social and human capital. Their new Integrated Decision-Making Framework is a valuable tool for helping accounting and management evolve to reflect what matters most. Companies interested in piloting elements of the Decision-Making Framework to their practices can express interest at CapitalsCoalition.org.

2025 Executive Paywatch Report
AFL-CIO

AFL-CIO’s latest analysis shows S&P 500 CEOs earned 285 times more than their median workers in 2024, up from 268 to 1 the year before. The report explores how executive pay continues to soar while worker wages stagnate—and how policy decisions on taxation and regulation are deepening the divide.

Corporate Actions as Moral Issues
Elisabeth Kempf, Oliver Spalt, Zwetelina Iliewa

This research finds that the public views many corporate actions—like layoffs and CEO pay hikes—as moral issues, not just financial ones. Surveying over 2,000 Americans, the authors show that people are willing to forgo profits to uphold values, especially those with a strong sense of moral universalism. The takeaway: aligning business decisions with widely held moral concerns builds trust and reinforces stakeholder capitalism.