Corporate Wokeness Is Becoming a Deeply Sinister Threat to Our Freedom
by Richard Eldred, The Daily Sceptic:
Under the guise of Environmental, Social and Governance criteria, U.K. enterprises are subtly shifting their decision-making, blending fiscal concerns with societal and environmental agendas. In the Telegraph, Emma Webb and Thomas Harris caution that the economic ‘unpersoning’ of critical voices could soon quash dissent. Here’s an excerpt:
‘Environmental, Social and Governance’ (ESG) is fast becoming the most pernicious phrase you’ve never heard of. The underlying idea is that investors shouldn’t just care about the bottom line, but about corporate governance, social impact and environmental damage. It sounds harmless, but has become the latest vector for the woke subversion of our institutions.
ESG has now become embedded in kitemarking systems that rank companies according to their policies on issues like Net Zero and ‘Equality, Diversity and Inclusion’ (EDI). ESG scores can affect how much investment they receive, and so carry financial clout. Organisations from Coutts to the Church of England’s investment bodies have signed up to the UN Principles for Responsible Investment, which incorporate ESG considerations into investment practices.
It would be dangerously mistaken to imagine these are distant corporate ‘#BeKind’ policies that don’t affect us. The threat these practices pose to the market and individual freedoms have been compared to cartels and the Chinese Communist Party’s social credit system, in which those with a score too low cannot get a mortgage or travel on high-speed trains.
The Free Speech Union (FSU) reports that one in 20 of its cases are directly related to EDI training. For many, these cases have involved the loss of their livelihoods, and for others disruption to their financial lives. When you see de-banking banks talking about ‘purpose’ and ‘values’, or HR departments dragging an employee through the wringer for ‘wrongspeak’, if you follow the trail far enough, you will likely reach ESG.
This situation may soon get worse. It was reported last week that the organisation B Lab U.K. is lobbying for a change in the law to further embed these practices in British companies. The so-called ‘Better Business Act’ would amend section 172 of the Companies Act 2006 to give directors a duty to consider “people and the planet”, not just profit. As we’ve seen with ESG policies, what this means in practice is the importation of woke ideology.
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