The Opportunity Index

INTRODUCTION

THE CITY OF LONDON IS the UK's financial district. It's often referred to as the Square Mile because it covers an area roughly 1.12 square miles or 2.90km².¹ Glass-covered modern buildings are occupied by banks, asset managers, accountants, insurers, and lawyers, cogs in a machine that generates approximately 22% of the UK's GDP.² Among these new buildings are churches, sculptures, and plaques, which signpost the City of London's rich history, but it's incredibly easy to miss them. Busy executives rush from one meeting to another, and on the odd occasion they have some respite from the demands of corporate life, their attention is consumed by mobile phones, even as the hideous figures known as Grotesques on Gracechurch Street gaze down upon them.³ There is one sculpture which, ashamedly, I must have walked past a dozen times before I paid it any heed. On September 4, 2008, Archbishop Desmond Tutu unveiled a monument that commemorates the abolition of the transatlantic slave trade in 1807. The artwork consists of a group of granite columns protruding out of the ground. Entitled Gilt of Cain, it is a collaboration between sculptor Michael Visocchi and poet Lemn Sissay.⁴ Extracts from Sissay's poem “Gilt of Cain” are engraved into the stone.

Cash flow runs deep but spirit deeper

You ask Am I my brothers keeper?

I answer by nature by spirit by rightful laws

My name, my brother, Wilberforce.

It's tempting to focus on the fact that the poem and sculpture address ...