Interesting to see how many climate action enterprises get their funding from Generation Investment Management through its grant-making arm, Generation Foundation, executing a strategy that "seeks … to maintain the [capital markets] on which we depend [for our own personal wealth and social standing in society]". COP28 tells us we need to be "transitioning away from fossil fuels in a just, orderly and equitable manner". The capital markets cannot finance that transition. They are created by design to finance Growth through Creative Destruction (which was right for the circumstances then prevailing back in the 19th Century, when those capital markets were first being made popular in their modern form). Transition is not Growth. Destruction is not orderly. Or equitable. Or just. We need an innovation in finance BEFORE we can innovate the new transition away from fossil fuels that COP28 concluded we need; an innovation created by design to finance transition in a just, orderly and equitable manner. We need climate activists to be amplifying this narrative calling for the innovation of a new finance. If our climate activists are all being funded by the old finance, which is funding them as part of its strategy of maintaining the hegemony of that old finance that got us into the trouble we are in, and cannot get us out of it, how committed will those activists be to calling for the innovation of a new finance that will take the place of the old finance that is funding them? “It is difficult to get a [hu]man to understand something, when [their] salary depends on [them] not understanding it.” ― Upton Sinclair,
Our strategy seeks to mobilise investors and businesses to maintain the systems on which we depend. To do that we must address the key risks to those systems – climate change, nature loss and inequality – at their root cause. The world is not on track to meet societal needs like the Paris Agreement or the Sustainable Development Goals. While finance alone cannot do this, stewards of capital must play a leading role to limit warming to 1.5 degrees, reverse nature-loss and end inequality. Urgent action is needed to transform the economic system to one that is set up to achieve these targets. Take a look at some of our excellent partners below and learn more at genfound.org. 350.org Carbon Tracker Climate Arc Climate Governance Initiative Conservation International Data2X, United Nations Foundation Earth4All Equimundo: Center for Masculinities and Social Justice Global Commons Alliance Greyston Bakery IFRS Foundation Microinsurance Network International Sustainability Standards Board (ISSB) Microinsurance Network Net Zero Lawyers Alliance Rights CoLab Shift Project The Club of Rome The Shareholder Commons U.S. Impact Investing Alliance WBCSD – World Business Council for Sustainable Development World Benchmarking Alliance
