{"id":872,"date":"2013-01-23T21:40:18","date_gmt":"2013-01-23T21:40:18","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/gofossilfree.org\/?p=872"},"modified":"2013-01-23T21:40:18","modified_gmt":"2013-01-23T21:40:18","slug":"qa-with-bill-mckibben-on-corporate-engagement","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/gofossilfree.org\/usa\/qa-with-bill-mckibben-on-corporate-engagement\/","title":{"rendered":"Q&A with Bill McKibben on corporate engagement"},"content":{"rendered":"

Here’s a great piece on shareholder engagement from Responsible Investor:<\/em><\/p>\n

Responsible Investor Interview:\u00a0350.org<\/a>\u2019s Bill McKibben on why engagement isn\u2019t an option<\/strong><\/p>\n

by<\/em>\u00a0Katie Gilbert<\/strong>\u00a0| January 22nd, 2013<\/div>\n
<\/div>\n
In spearheading a movement calling for the widespread divestment of fossil fuels, author and environmental activist Bill McKibben has sparked a discussion that gained speed and media prominence much more quickly than even he imagined. Still, his argument that the best way to fight climate change is by pressuring institutions like colleges and universities to divest their coal, oil and gas stocks has been met with plenty of detractors. Since McKibben and\u00a0350.org<\/a>, the environmental advocacy group that he leads, launched their 21-city \u201cDo the Math\u201d tour in early November to spread the word about divestment to campuses across the U.S., their message has grown legs and taken off at a full sprint. Now, not quite three months later, McKibben and students at 210 American colleges and universities are lobbying their endowment boards to divest from fossil fuels. Unity College, a small institution in Maine, announced in November that it would adopt a new policy to minimize investments in coal, oil and gas stocks. Vermont\u2019s Middlebury College vowed to begin the process of divestment. The administration at Hampshire College in Massachusetts approved a new policy that would clear fossil fuel stocks from the portfolio. At Harvard, where 72 percent of students voted in favor of divestment (in an election that drew half the student body), the administration announced in mid-December the formation of a new \u201csocial choice fund,\u201d to be managed separately from the endowment. In late December, Seattle Mayor Mike McGinn formally requested that the city\u2019s pension funds start winding down all investment in fossil fuels. Several critics have voiced doubts that the movement will lead to anything close to its intended effect, citing issues like the question of whether broad divestment will even be felt by the country\u2019s fossil fuel giants; the argument around whether engagement is preferable over immediate divestment; and the point that creating an enemy out of the fossil fuel industry could well be counterproductive. When I spoke with Bill McKibben recently, he told me about the common misconceptions surrounding his movement, creative alternatives to fossil fuel investments, and why endowment boards should be thanking\u00a0350.org<\/a>\u2019s campaigners, rather than ignoring them.<\/div>\n

Of all the ways one could organize a movement to protest fossil fuels, why is a call for divestment from these companies the way to go?<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n

That\u2019s a very good question. It\u2019s not the first and most obvious thing one would do. The most obvious thing one would do is go to Washington and explain that the worst thing in the world that\u2019s ever happened is happening, and that it is time to take action. In fact, that\u2019s precisely what scientists and economists have been doing since the late 1980s. So far, it\u2019s gotten absolutely nowhere. We\u2019ve had an unblemished, 25-year bipartisan record of accomplishing nothing. The reason is, I think, that the power of the fossil fuel industry is so great that they have been able to blunt every attempt to do anything. They\u2019re the biggest lobbyists, they\u2019re the biggest campaign contributors. These are giants. They don\u2019t apply logic, they don\u2019t apply reason; they just apply power. And so, among many other things, divestment is an effort to weaken their power some. To go directly after them and explain to people that they\u2019ve become the villains in this fight. It grew out of this article I wrote for Rolling Stone last summer\u2014a piece that became their most widely shared story ever, I think. It explained the new math of climate change. The fossil fuel industry has five times as much carbon in its reserves as even the most conservative government on earth thinks would be safe to burn. But they\u2019re going to burn it, and they\u2019re looking for more all the time. They\u2019re an outlaw industry, outlaws against the laws of physics. So this is a last-ditch effort to get people to realize what it is they\u2019re doing and to get people to stand up to it before they completely tank the planet.\u00a0<\/p>\n

You started with college and university endowments and religious institutions\u2014why?<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n

The first reason is that colleges are where we first learned about climate change. It\u2019s in their labs where the work was done that uncovered this problem. Second, colleges have made it clear that they\u2019re very interested in sustainability. If you go to the webpage of any college in the country, there\u2019s a whole section about how they\u2019re greening the campus, building new buildings that are energy efficient, building bike paths, bringing in zip cars, whatever it is. That\u2019s very good, and if you\u2019re greening the campus, logically I\u2019d think you\u2019d want to green the portfolio too.<\/p>\n

Do you plan to put pressure on a wider range of institutions as this gains steam?<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n

Yes, cities and states, religious denominations\u2014these are other places that have big pools of money. The city of Seattle divested because they spend tens of millions of dollars trying to figure out how to keep the sea from rising so high that it overwhelms their city. So why on earth would they be invested in fossil fuels? For religious institutions, the fossil fuel industry is running Genesis backward. They\u2019re setting up the conditions that scientists say will lead to the extinction of half the things that the good lord put on this earth! So these are obvious places to bring on board in this fight.<\/p>\n

Why isn\u2019t engagement an option?<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n

What is important to understand is this is very different from the usual investment scenario. Most of the time, if we have a problem with a corporation, it\u2019s because there\u2019s a flaw in their business plan. We put pressure on them, and write shareholder resolutions, and then they do the right thing eventually. The problem here is that the business plan is the flaw with the fossil fuel industry. Their business plan is to alter the chemical composition of the atmosphere in ways that the scientific community for many years has understood to be fatal to our prospects as a civilization. So we need to not try to change them a little bit, we need to change them in very big ways. The only way forward is that the fossil fuel industry decides to become the energy industry. If they go full-bore into sun and wind and things. But that won\u2019t happen until we change the rules of the game and put a price on carbon and the damage it does to the atmosphere. And we can\u2019t do that until we\u2019ve reduced the power of the fossil fuel industry in Washington.<\/p>\n

Describe to me what a positive chain of events would look like\u2014more and more endowments divest, and energy companies take some sort of action? Or are you mainly counting on government to take action? In other words, how do you hope to see this play out?<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n

Here\u2019s what I think won\u2019t happen: I don\u2019t think we have it in our power to bankrupt Exxon. They\u2019re the richest people on earth. They made more money last year than any company in the history of money! And they were followed closely by Chevron, BP, Shell and Conoco.<\/p>\n

But I do think we have the power\u2014I hope\u2014to do to them what people were able to do to R.J. Reynolds and Philip Morris. To make people understand that these guys are rogue companies. What the cigarette companies were doing one person at a time, they\u2019re doing one planet at a time. If we can spread that message far and wide, if we can catalyze a kind of revulsion of their plans for our future at, say, college boards around the country, they we have made a dent in their power. You know, two-thirds of the most important people in the country sit on the board of one college or another. We need to have this in their faces.<\/p>\n

That seems to be a common misconception about this movement\u2014that you\u2019re looking for some sort of economic outcome. But you\u2019re really looking for a political one, right?<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n

Exactly right, in the same way that the divestment movement against the Apartheid government of South Africa eventually worked its success politically more than financially. If we can put enough pressure on them, we can weaken their position somewhat in Washington and in other capitals around the world and they\u2019ll be willing at least to negotiate, which they haven\u2019t been to this point.<\/p>\n

What does Washington need to do?<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n

They need to put a price on carbon if we\u2019re ever going to get out of this trap we\u2019re in.<\/p>\n

Harvard set up a \u201csocial choice fund\u201d after its student body voted to divest from fossil fuels. Does that social choice fund feel like any sort of victory to you?<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n

Not really. As a Harvard alum, let me say I think the essential problem is not assuaging the guilty consciences of Harvard donors. The essential problem is slowing the rise of temperatures on this planet. I don\u2019t see it as a huge concession. We need them to take action that reflects the tremendous work that\u2019s been done in Harvard\u2019s science labs over the last 20 years, where we\u2019ve learned much of the story of climate change.<\/p>\n

What are your best responses to an institution that\u2019s considering divesting but is afraid of giving up the returns that fossil fuel investments offer?<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n

I think there are two responses: One, make sure you understand that the reason you get returns on that fossil fuel stock is in essence because they\u2019re cheating. Unlike everyone else in the world, they don\u2019t have to pay to put out their trash. They get to put carbon into the atmosphere for free. Two, understand that these campaigners are giving you a leg up. They\u2019re showing you where the next bubble is before it bursts. Look, sooner or later, in the wake of some horrible hurricane or drought, governments are going to take steps to demand that fossil fuel companies keep their carbon underground, and when they do, the price of those stocks is going to go way down.<\/p>\n

Do you have discussions with endowments and other institutions about alternative investments to fossil fuels?<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n

To some degree. The most interesting work I\u2019ve seen is from the Responsible Endowments Coalition. It demonstrates that there\u2019s low-hanging fruit at most colleges, and if they take some of this fossil fuel money and instead invest it in changes to the energy systems of their campus, the return on investment would be enormous. I think the average return on investment was 28% for changing all the light bulbs, updating the heating systems, and so on. It doesn\u2019t seem like the same thing as making money on the stock market, but of course it\u2019s exactly the same thing.<\/p>\n

How do you see the divestment movement developing into 2013 and beyond?<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n

I don\u2019t really know! It\u2019s a tide that\u2019s forming really fast, and I don\u2019t know how to ride it. Two months ago, there were five or ten colleges that were working on this, now there are 210. It\u2019s going to be hard just to keep up with the pace of it, but my guess is that students will come up with an endless number of interesting ways to make this case. And I\u2019ll be very excited to watch that happen.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

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