The Principles for Responsible Investment (PRI) is an international network of investors that commit to six voluntary principles for taking environmental, social and governance (ESG) issues into account in their investment decisions and ownership practices. It is described as "United Nations-supported": the principles were developed by a group of large institutional investors at the invitation of UN Secretary-General Kofi Annan, with the UN Environment Programme Finance Initiative and the United Nations Global Compact (UNGC), and launched in April 2006 at the New York Stock Exchange.
The PRI is now an independent, UK-registered not-for-profit organisation funded mainly by signatory fees. Its signatories are asset owners, such as pension funds, insurers and endowments, investment managers and service providers. The PRI reported about 5,300 signatories in early 2025, the large majority of them investment managers. It co-founded Climate Action 100+ and co-convenes the Net-Zero Asset Owner Alliance (NZAOA).
The PRI in plain terms
Think of a neighbourhood association of landlords who agree on a short code: check the wiring before buying a building, talk to tenants about problems instead of ignoring them, and report each year on what they did. Nobody is forced to sell a building, and each landlord decides how far to go, but members have to write down what they are doing and others can read it.
The PRI is that code for investors. Signing does not require a fund to avoid any particular industry. It commits the investor to considering ESG issues, being an active owner, and reporting publicly on how it is getting on.
The six principles
Signatories commit, where consistent with their fiduciary responsibilities, to the following:
- Incorporate ESG issues into investment analysis and decision-making processes.
- Be active owners and incorporate ESG issues into ownership policies and practices.
- Seek appropriate disclosure on ESG issues by the entities in which they invest.
- Promote acceptance and implementation of the principles within the investment industry.
- Work together to enhance their effectiveness in implementing the principles.
- Report on their activities and progress towards implementing the principles.
The first two principles correspond to what are now called ESG integration and investment stewardship, including corporate engagement and proxy voting. The third has supported frameworks such as the Task Force on Climate-related Financial Disclosures (TCFD) and the SASB standards.
Reporting and accountability
Signatories must report annually through the PRI Reporting Framework, which asks how they apply ESG considerations across asset classes such as listed equities, fixed income, private equity, real estate and infrastructure. Parts of each report are published as transparency reports, and signatories receive assessment scores. Under minimum requirements introduced in 2018, signatories that fail to meet minimum requirements, such as having a firm-wide responsible investment policy covering most assets under management and senior-level oversight, can be delisted after a period of engagement.
The PRI also runs collaborative engagement platforms, where signatories jointly approach companies on topics such as climate change, human rights, tax practices and deforestation, and publishes research and policy work. Its "A Legal Framework for Impact" project and earlier work on fiduciary duty argued that considering ESG factors is consistent with, and sometimes required by, investors' legal duties.
Role in the market
Signing the PRI is often treated as a baseline signal of commitment to sustainable investing. Asset owners increasingly ask managers whether they are signatories when awarding mandates, and many investment advisers cite membership in marketing and fund documents. The PRI's annual "PRI in Person" conference and its regional networks bring together asset owners, managers and policymakers. Its signatories collectively manage a large share of global professionally managed assets, though the PRI does not control how they invest.
Criticism and limitations
Because the principles are broad and the PRI does not set performance requirements, critics argue that signing can be a low-cost label rather than evidence of different behaviour, and that some signatories' voting records and portfolios look much like those of non-signatories. Academic studies have reached mixed conclusions on whether signatories improve ESG outcomes. In the United States, some state officials and members of Congress have criticised investor coalitions, including the PRI and Climate Action 100+, arguing that collective climate commitments may conflict with fiduciary duty or antitrust law; a few US managers have left or reduced their involvement in climate groups since 2022. Others criticise the PRI from the opposite side for being too slow to require concrete commitments, such as net-zero targets or fossil-fuel exclusions. The PRI has responded by tightening minimum requirements and updating its strategy, while keeping the principles themselves unchanged since 2006.