Engine No. 1 Shows Activist Hedge Funds Can Be Allies In Climate Activism Fight AOC Sustainability

By Mark DesJardine, Assistant Professor of Strategy and Sustainability, Penn State; and Tima Bansal, Canada Research Chair in Business Sustainability, Western University. First published on The Conversation.

One of the most expensive Wall Street shareholder battles on record could signal a big shift in how hedge funds and other investors view sustainability.

Exxon Mobil Corp. has been fending off a so-called proxy fight from a hedge fund known as Engine No. 1, which blames the energy giant’s poor performance in recent years on its failure to transition to a “decarbonizing world.” In a May 26, 2021 vote, Exxon shareholders approved at least two of the four board members Engine No. 1 nominated, dealing a major blow to the oil company. The vote is ongoing, and more of the hedge fund’s nominees may also soon be appointed.

While its focus has been on shareholder value, Engine No. 1 says it was also doing this to save the planet from the ravages of climate change. It has been pushing for a commitment from Exxon to carbon neutrality by 2050.

As business sustainability scholars, we can’t recall another time that an energy company’s shareholder – particularly a hedge fund – has been so effective and forceful in showing how a company’s failure to take on climate change has eroded shareholder value. That’s why we believe this vote marks a turning point for investors, who are well placed to nudge companies toward more sustainable business practices.

Update June 2, 2021: Exxon Board to Get a Third Activist Pushing Cleaner Energy

20 Global Activists Are Center Stage on British Vogue's September 2020 'Activism Now' Cover

Manchester United and England footballer Marcus Rashford joins Adwoa Aboah, model and leading mental heath activist, on the cover of British Vogue’s September issue.

Aboah traveled to Marcus’s garden in Manchester for their cover shot, by Misan Harriman, the BLM protest photographer who first picked up a camera three years ago.

Harriman set up his digital media business, What We Seee, in 2016 (subscribe to the newsletter), after a career in finance.

Now we see his images of Aboah and Rashford in a fold-out cover featuring 18 other global activists. and fellow photographers Texas Isaiah, Philip-Daniel Ducasse, Reginald Cunningham and Chrisean Rose.

In early June, Norwegian-born, British writer Afua Hirsch, who interviewed the activists featured in the September issue, emerged from London Underground’s Vauxhall station to the discovery of an entirely new vibe in the streets. Hirsch recollects in British Vogue the moment she joined a protest — holding hands with two small girls — against the broadcast-live murder by Minneapolis police of George Floyd: “ . . . as I stepped up on to that street, I felt an outpouring of raw, ancestral anger and outrage against racism on a scale I’ve never experienced before.”