For example, in the South Africa era some institutions adopted screening standards tied to the Sullivan Principles. As the Principles evolved over time, so too, did the institutions' working guidelines. At this writing, one general benchmark exists for socially screened equity portfolios, the Domini 400 Social Index which is discussed above. The more comprehensive the screens are or the more stringent a screen is, the less appropriate general benchmarks are for a screened portfolio. In an ideal world, an institution would be able to gage the performance of its managers against a universe of managers adopting the same style.
Various consultants maintain such data.
However, as yet no consultant tracks managers of socially screened accounts separately from others in their style categories. The development of databases on the performance of managers applying social screens will be difficult. In addition to the well-known problems of identifying who runs screened accounts, there is the problem of categorizing managers according to the screens they apply. An aggressive growth manager who applies a loose set of exclusionary screens probably cannot be compared fairly with a manager with a similar financial style but who applies rigorous exclusionary screens as well as environmental and product quality screens. Whether the comparison is unfair or not, at this moment no one has the capacity to establish peer groups for the different screening styles.