Commentary
How do you solve a problem like Environmental, Social, and Governance (ESG), the progressive investing movement that has now become entrenched across Wall Street?
Since 2015, ESG has been steadily integrated into the global financial markets to create a private sector funding vehicle for the United Nations-led climate and sustainable development programs. To achieve the U.N.’s 2030 environmental and social goals, it will require, in the words of Under-Secretary-General for Economic and Social Affairs Liu Zhenmin, “nothing short of a comprehensive transformation of the international financial and debt architecture.” This is the whole point of ESG.
In recent years, as public awareness of ESG has grown, so too has the opposition, prompting many sustainable finance champions to adopt a lower public profile. Since 2021, the number of skirmishes with corporate executives and boards during the annual shareholder meeting season has declined. Financial firms have now started to quietly withdraw from net-zero alliances due to legal liability concerns….