Societe Generale

France
Banks, Diversified Financials

Corprate Bias Ratings

Risk Level:

Rating - Danger
High Risk

Societe Generale is an international bank and financial services company headquartered in La Defense, France. Societe Generale provides protections against political viewpoint discrimination, and the company has not publicly terminated business relationships due to religious beliefs. However, Societe Generale incorporates ESG into all of its business operations, is a member of the Glasgow Net Zero Alliance, and is cutting funding to oil, gas, and coal. Societe Generale has pledged to vet vendors for LGBTQ policies. Societe Generale has implemented unconscious bias training for employees and supported LGBTQ advocacy. Societe Generale has not funded ideological groups hostile to freedom of expression and maintains a position of political neutrality in its contributions. For these reasons, Societe Generale receives a High Risk rating.

Criteria
Risk Level
Rationale
Corporate Weaponization
Criteria

Has denied service to customers, suppliers, or vendors due to their political views or religious beliefs OR corporately boycotts, divests, or sanctions regions, people groups, or industries.

Risk Level
Rationale

Societe Generale is cutting funding to oil, gas, and coal, and it is a part of the Net Zero Banking Alliance, among other climate initiatives (1). According to its website, “Societe Generale was the first bank to systematically integrate ESG criteria in its fundamental analysis, valuations and recommendations on equities…” (2)(3). Societe Generale received a score of 100 on the Corporate Equality Index from the Human Rights Campaign. Among other requirements, this means Societe Generale pledges to vet its vendors for LGBTQ policies (4)(5).

Criteria

Charitable giving (including employee matching programs) policies or practices discriminate against charitable organizations based on views or religious beliefs.

Risk Level
Rationale

Societe Generale does not appear to discriminate against religious organizations in its charitable giving (1).

Criteria

Employment policies fail to protect against discrimination based on political affiliation/views and/or religion.

Risk Level
Rationale

Societe Generale protects its employees against viewpoint discrimination (1).

Corporate Governance and Public Policy
Criteria

Uses corporate reputation to support ideological causes and/or organizations hostile to freedom of expression.

Risk Level
Rationale

Societe Generale writes that corporate social responsibility is at the “heart” of its strategy, bragging about being the first bank to comprehensively include ESG into its business operations, and the bank has encouraged other financial institutions to further emphasize ESG practices (1)(2)(3). Societe Generale has implemented unconscious bias training into its HR strategy (4). Societe Generale also signed a charter published by L’Autre Cercle, a French LGBTQ advocacy group (5). Societe Generale is part of the Net Zero Asset Managers initiative, committed to carbon neutrality in its investments by 2050 (6).

Criteria

Uses corporate funds to advance ideological causes, organizations, or policies hostile to freedom of expression.

Risk Level
Rationale

Societe Generale does not use corporate funds to advance ideological causes, organizations, or policies (1).

Criteria

Uses corporate political contributions for ideological, non-business purposes.

Risk Level
Rationale

Societe Generale maintains a policy of political neutrality, and its advocacy spending involves membership fees for trade associations such as the French Banking Federation and the Institute of International Finace (1).

All links were last accessed and all information was updated on:
November 28, 2023

Company reports are intended for educational use only. Full Disclaimer

Generate Reports
Clear
Toast

This website stores cookies on your computer. These cookies are used to collect information about how you interact with our website and allow us to remember you. We use this information in order to improve and customize your browsing experience and for analytics and metrics about our visitors both on this website and other media. To find out more about the cookies we use, see our Privacy Policy.

Accept