I have two responses to that. I don't think that investing in a limited partnership asset is fundamentally different from investing in a segregated investment pool. It's just another asset class.
My understanding of the prohibition on one level is a legalistic one having to do with the definition of “partnership law”, which says if you're engaged in a partnership structure you're carrying on a business. Foundations aren't allowed to carry on businesses as charities, so we're not allowed to invest in investment, in that kind of an investment structure. That's probably a question for lawyers; I think lawyers could argue about that. But my experience with those kinds of structures is that if you're a limited partner and investor in a limited partnership structure you are not carrying on a business, you don't have direction or control over that undertaking, you're simply an investor, the same way you would be in a large publicly traded company. So that's sort of the legal answer.
That second answer has to do with the fact that a lot of innovative new structures in the charitable world take the form of limited partnerships. So if a foundation wants to invest in something that's forward-looking, that's trying to do something in the world of social finance, the vehicle is often a limited partnership.
So I think there's an answer that has to do with law and range of asset classes and there's an answer having to do with enabling innovative structures within the charitable sector that will make more social finance feasible for investors.