Green bond

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

A Green bond (also known as climate bond) is a fixed-income financial instruments (bond) which is used to fund projects that have positive environmental and/or climate benefits. They follow the Green Bond Principles stated by the International Capital Market Association (ICMA), and the proceeds from the issuance of which are to be used for the pre-specified types of projects.

Like normal bonds, climate bonds can be issued by governments, multi-national banks or corporations and the issuing organization repays the bond and any interest. The main difference is that the funds will be used only for positive climate change or environmental projects. This allows investors to target their environmental, social, and corporate governance (ESG) goals by investing in them. They are similar to Sustainability Bonds but sustainability bonds also need to have a positive social outcome.

History

Climate bonds were first proposed in the 2000s, and have grown rapidly since then. As of 2016, the total volume of climate bonds was estimated at 160 billions of dollars; of which 70 billions were issued in 2016. The labelled volume of bonds issued in 2019 was US$255 billion. Climate and green bonds have now been issued by thousands of issuers around the world, including sovereigns, banks and companies of all sizes, and local governments.

Voters in the City of San Francisco approved a revenue bond authority in 2001, in the form of a city charter amendment (Section 9.107.8) known as the "solar bonds," to finance renewable energy and energy conservation measures on homes, businesses and government buildings. The campaign for solar bonds, Proposition H, was motivated by the need for the city to take meaningful action on climate change. The solar bond authority was being used as part of the city's renewable energy program, administered by the San Francisco Public Utilities Commission, CleanPowerSF.

The European Investment Bank issued an equity index-linked bond in 2007, which became the first fixed income product among socially responsible investments. This "Climate Awareness Bond" structure was used to fund renewable energy and energy efficiency projects. Afterwards, The World Bank became first in the world to issue a labelled "green bond" in 2008, which followed a conventional "plain vanilla" bond structure, contrary to the European Investment Bank's equity-linked Climate Awareness Bond.

The green bond market has subsequently increased rapidly in issuance. From 2015 to 2016, the Climate Bonds Initiative reports that there was a 92% increase in green bonds issuance to $92 billion, with different types of issuers starting to issue green bonds. Apple, for example, became the first tech company to issue a green bond in 2016, and Poland became the first sovereign country to issue a green bond at the end of 2016. In 2021, the European Investment Bank was the leading issuer of green and sustainability bonds among multilateral development banks, with sustainability funding reaching €11.5 billion equivalent.

As of at least 2017, China held the largest share (23%) of the green bond market.

In 2020, the UK's first ever local government green bond, for West Berkshire Council, closed after reaching its £1mn target five days early. Announced on Wednesday 14 October 2020, 22% of the funds raised came from West Berkshire residents, who invested an average of £3,500. The Community Municipal Investment attracted 640 investors in total. In September 2021, the UK's inaugural "green gilt" sale drew over £100bn from investors, making it the highest ever for a UK government bond sale.

In Canada, The Community Bond, an innovation in social finance that allows benevolent organizations to issues bonds outside of traditional regulatory oversight, is being used as a "Green Bond" by environmental groups like Solarshare to build community owned solar farms, ZooShare to finance a biogas plant, and Hallbar.org as means to finance energy saving home upgrades and LEED certified building construction.

In 2022, the European Investment Bank issued EUR 19.9 billion in Climate and Sustainability Awareness Bonds, and increased its climate and sustainability funding portion of overall investment from 21% in 2021 to 45% in 2022. On 21 December 2024, the European Union Green Bonds Regulation comes into force, allowing the issue of "European Green Bond" (or "EuGB") by companies, regional or local authorities and EEA supra-nationals.

Description

Climate bonds are issued in order to raise finance for climate change solutions: climate change mitigation or adaptation related projects or programs. These might be greenhouse gas emission reduction projects ranging from clean energy to energy efficiency, or climate change adaptation projects ranging from building Nile delta flood defences or helping the Great Barrier Reef adapt to warming waters.

Like normal bonds, climate bonds can be issued by governments, multi-national banks or corporations. The issuing entity guarantees to repay the bond over a certain period of time, plus either a fixed or variable rate of return.

Most climate bonds are asset-backed, or ringfenced, with investors being promised that all funds raised will only go to specified climate-related programs or assets, such as renewable energy plants or climate mitigation focused funding programs.

In their UNEP paper on investors and climate change, Mackenzie and Ascui differentiate a climate bond from a green bond: "(A climate bond is) an extension of the green bond concept. Green bonds are issued [...] in order to raise the finance for an environmental project. Climate bonds [are] issued [...] to raise finance for investments in emission reduction or climate change adaptation."

The London-based Climate Bonds Initiative provides the world's first Certification program for climate bonds. This has been used as a model for various countries to set up their own green bond listing guidelines.

Climate bonds are theme bonds, similar in principle to a railway bond of the 19th century, the war bonds of the early 20th century or the highway bond of the 1960s. Theme bonds are designed to:

• Allow institutional capital - pension, government, insurance and sovereign wealth funds - to invest in areas seen as politically important to their stakeholders that have the same credit risk and returns profile as standards bonds.
• Provide a means for governments to direct funding to climate change mitigation. For example, this might be done by choosing to privilege qualifying bonds with preferential tax treatments.
• Send a political signal to other stakeholders.

Otherwise, for operational purposes, theme bonds largely function as conventional debt instruments. They are risk-weighted and credit rated in the usual way based on the creditworthiness of the issuer, and tradable, market conditions permitting, in international secondary bond markets. These instruments can theoretically be issued at all levels of the fixed income market, from sovereigns to corporate.

Benefits of green bonds

The growth of bond markets provides increasing opportunities to finance the implementation of the Sustainable Development Goals, Nationally Determined Contributions and other green growth projects. A UN conference held on the Sustainable Development Goals in 2021 emphasized the importance of sustainable bonds, and stated that of the approximately €300 trillion of financial assets on the markets, only 1% would be needed to achieve the SDGs. Green bonds are becoming an increasingly prevalent form of green finance, particularly for clean and sustainable infrastructure development and their large funding needs. They offer a vehicle to both access finance from the capital markets and deliver green impacts that can be verified against standards. In developing countries, green bonds are already financing critical projects, including renewable energy, urban mass transit systems and water distribution.

Green bonds mobilised over $93 billion in 2016 to projects and assets with positive environmental impacts.

Of total global bond issuance, however, this is still around just 1%.

According to a report by the Climate and Development Knowledge Network and PricewaterhouseCoopers, a green bond market has three key benefits to a country and its environmental goals and commitments.

• It increases the finance available for green projects, therefore incentivising an increase in their number. Today, green bonds mainly finance projects within renewable energy, energy efficiency, low-carbon transport, sustainable water, and waste and pollution.
• It is a viable vehicle for enabling the increasing pool of sustainable investors to access environmental projects. Bonds are an instrument and an approach with which foreign investors are familiar, so these institutions need little new understanding or capacity. Investors are also interested in placing money where the environmental impact achieved is highest per unit of currency, and emerging and developing economies have the potential to offer this where lower project costs exist.
• It can be a catalyst for further development of the domestic capital market and financial system more broadly beyond environmentally related projects.

Demand for green bonds

The Business and Sustainable Development Commission describes at least US$12 trillion in market opportunities for business from sustainable business models.

The United Nations estimates an annual funding gap of $2.5 trillion is needed for the achievement of the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs), and of this, US$1 trillion is needed annually for clean energy alone. A large number and broad range of projects and assets that contribute to achieving the 17 SDGs need this funding for their development and operations.

One of the SDGs where 'green finance' has been successfully mobilised is on clean energy and climate action. The Paris Agreement on climate change entered into force in November 2016, after 196 countries committed to reducing greenhouse gas emissions. Significant quantities of finance are now needed to convert country commitments (Nationally Determined Contributions, NDCs) to implementation and a low-carbon, climate-resilient economy.

Despite recent increases in volumes of climate finance, a significant funding gap will arise unless new sources and channels of finance are mobilised.

Existing international public finance dedicated to climate change is unable to achieve the rapid change required in meeting the finance gap alone. Furthermore, public sector balance sheets do not have the capacity to fund the amounts needed, and so an estimated 80–90% of funding will need to come from the private sector.

Bank balance sheets can take only a proportion of the private finance needed so the capital markets have to be leveraged, along with other sources such as insurance and peer-to-peer.

According to Guide: New markets for green bonds, the demand for green bonds has grown quickly on the investor side, with asset owners and managers diversifying their investment portfolios and seeking positive impact beyond financial return. In the light of the global commitment to shift to a green and low-carbon economy, the green bond market has the potential to grow substantially, while attracting more diverse issuers and investors. The number of green bonds continue growing daily.

Emerging and frontier markets are building the markets, financing facilities, and investment-grade debt and equity products for climate bonds and green investments more aggressively than most Western, developed economies.

Green bond reporting

The issuance of green bonds has led to considerable debate due to the lack of uniform rules governing them. Two primary voluntary regulatory standards govern the issuance of green bonds: the privately established Green Bond Principles (GBP) by the International Capital Market Association (ICMA) and the publicly organized Green Bond Standard (GBS) by the European Union. Both frameworks aim to achieve standardization within the green bond market, providing a uniform standard for varying stakeholder groups.

Despite the increased push for standardization, disparities persist in the issuance of green bonds, their post-reporting practices, and their alignment with issuer climate targets. Many issuers fall short in establishing long-term climate goals, frequently limiting their targets to a 10-year horizon. As a result, one key study found that green bonds predominantly serve short-term objectives, offering limited support for achieving long-term climate goals. Additionally, there is a lack of detailed breakdowns regarding how the capital raised through green bonds is allocated to specific projects, highlighting the need for enhanced transparency and reporting practices.

Criticism and controversies

The green bond market has attracted international criticism with some questioning the green credentials of certain bonds. This criticism pertains both to the projects that are funded, as well as the sustainability credentials of the issuers. In May 2017, the Climate Bonds Initiative refused to list a "green" bond issued by Repsol. The bonds proceeds would be allocated to initiatives meant to improve the efficiency of the company's oil and gas production operations. The non-governmental organization argued that even though the projects would reduce CO₂ emissions, the company's sustainability strategy did not go far enough from an environmental perspective to classify it as green. This criticism was extended to Vigeo Eiris, the company that reviewed the Repsol bond's green credentials. In 2016, Vigeo Eiris was involved in another green bond controversy. They were targeted by Western Sahara Resource Watch, a non-governmental organization backed by a Norwegian trade union, after it reviewed a green bond that would fund the production of solar projects by a Moroccan government agency in the illegally occupied territory of Western Sahara.

More generally, the academic community and market participants have identified the susceptibility of voluntary green-labelling to greenwashing and adverse selection as a function of the perceived lack of regulatory oversight and the inherent, albeit anecdotal, capital arbitrage opportunity presented to some issuers through the green pricing premium, or "greenium". In the primary market, this premium can exhibit varying spreads, ranging from -85 to +213 basis points, while the secondary market typically observes a more conservative average "greenium" of -1 to -9 basis points.

Enemy of the people

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Enemy_of_the_people

Hostis publicus: In the year 49 BCE, the Roman Senate declared Julius Caesar the enemy of the people of Rome

The terms enemy of the people and enemy of the nation are designations for the political opponents and for the social-class opponents of the power group within a larger social unit, who, thus identified, can be subjected to political repression. In political praxis, the term enemy of the people implies that political opposition to the ruling power group renders the people in opposition into enemies acting against the interests of the greater social unit, e.g. the political party, society, the nation, etc.

In the 20th century, the politics of the Soviet Union (1922–1991) much featured the term enemy of the people to discredit any opposition, especially during the régime of Stalin (r. 1924–1953), when it was often applied to Trotsky. In the 21st century, the former U.S. president Donald Trump (r. 2017–2021) regularly used the enemy of the people term against critical politicians and journalists.

Like the term enemy of the state, the term enemy of the people originated and derives from the Latin: hostis publicus, a public enemy of the Roman Empire. In literature, the term enemy of the people features in the title of the stageplay An Enemy of the People (1882), by Henrik Ibsen, and is a theme in the stageplay Coriolanus (1605), by William Shakespeare.

Origins

Rome: the Republic and the Empire

The expression enemy of the people dates to Imperial Rome. The Senate declared Emperor Nero a hostis publicus in 68 CE. Its direct translation is "public enemy". Whereas "public" is currently used in English to describe something related to collectivity at large, with an implication towards government or the State, the Latin word "publicus" could, in addition to that meaning, also refer directly to people, making it the equivalent of the genitive of populus ("people"), populi ("popular" or "of the people"). Thus, "public enemy" and "enemy of the people" are, etymologically, near synonyms.

French Revolution

The words ennemi du peuple were used extensively during the French Revolution. On 25 December 1793 Robespierre stated: "The revolutionary government owes to the good citizen all the protection of the nation; it owes nothing to the Enemies of the People but death". The Law of 22 Prairial in 1794 extended the remit of the Revolutionary Tribunal to punish "enemies of the people", with some political crimes punishable by death, including "spreading false news to divide or trouble the people".

Marxist–Leninist states

Soviet Union

The Soviet Union made extensive use of the term vrag naroda (Russian: враг народа), literally meaning enemy of the people. The term was first used in a speech by Felix Dzerzhinsky, the first chairman of the Cheka, after the October Revolution. The Petrograd Military Revolutionary Committee printed lists of "enemies of the people", and Vladimir Lenin invoked it in his decree of 28 November 1917:

...all leaders of the Constitutional Democratic Party, a party filled with enemies of the people, are hereby to be considered outlaws, and are to be arrested immediately and brought before the revolutionary court.

Other similar terms were in use as well:

• enemy of the labourers (враг трудящихся, vrag trudyashchikhsya)
• enemy of the proletariat (враг пролетариата, vrag proletariata)
• class enemy (классовый враг, klassovyi vrag), etc.

The term "enemy of the people" was used in the 1936 Constitution of the Soviet Union, in Article 131 about public property: "Persons who encroach on public, socialist property are enemies of the people."

The term "enemy of the workers" was formalized in the Article 58 (RSFSR Penal Code), and similar articles in the codes of the other Soviet Republics.

At various times these terms were applied, in particular, to Tsar Nicholas II and the Imperial family, aristocrats, the bourgeoisie, clerics, business entrepreneurs, anarchists, kulaks, monarchists, Mensheviks, Esers, Bundists, Trotskyists, Bukharinists, the "old Bolsheviks", the army and police, emigrants, saboteurs, wreckers (вредители, "vrediteli"), "social parasites" (тунеядцы, "tuneyadtsy"), Kavezhedists (people who administered and serviced the Chinese Eastern Railway, abbreviated KVZhD, particularly the Russian population of Harbin, China), and those considered bourgeois nationalists (notably Russian, Ukrainian, Belarusian, Armenian, Lithuanian, Latvian, and Estonian nationalists, as well as Zionists and the Basmachi movement).

After 1927, Article 20 of the Common Part of the penal code that listed possible "measures of social defence" had the following item 20a: "declaration to be an enemy of the workers with deprivation of the union republic citizenship and hence of the USSR citizenship, with obligatory expulsion from its territory". Nevertheless, most "enemies of the people" suffered labor camps, rather than expulsion.

Rejection of the phrase

On 25 February 1956, Nikita Khrushchev delivered a speech to the Communist Party in which he identified Stalin as the author of the phrase and distanced himself from it, saying that it made debate impossible. "This term automatically made it unnecessary that the ideological errors of a man or men engaged in a controversy be proven," Khrushchev said. "It made possible the use of the cruelest repression, violating all norms of [...] legality, against anyone who in any way disagreed with Stalin, against those who were only suspected of hostile intent, against those who had bad reputations ... The formula ‘enemy of the people’ was specifically introduced for the purpose of physically annihilating such individuals."

Resurgence

For decades afterwards, the phrase "was so omnipresent, freighted and devastating in its use under Stalin that nobody [in Russia] wanted to touch it. ... except in reference to history and in jokes", according to William Taubman in his biography of Khrushchev.

However, the term returned to Russian public discourse in the late 2000s with a number of nationalist and pro-government politicians (most notably Ramzan Kadyrov) calling for restoration of the Soviet approach to the "enemies of the people" defined as all non-system opposition.

On 28 December 2022, Dmitry Medvedev, Deputy Secretary of the Security Council of Russia, said that Russians who fled Russia after the invasion of Ukraine and are opposed to the war should be labeled "enemies of society" and barred from returning to Russia.

Cambodia and China

According to Philip Short, an author of biographies of Mao Zedong and Cambodia's Khmer Rouge leader Pol Pot, in domestic political struggles Chinese and Cambodian communists rarely if ever used the phrase "enemy of the people" as they were very nationalistic and saw it as an alien import.

In 1957, in the speech and in the essay On the Correct Handling of Contradictions Among the People, Mao said that: "At the present stage, the period of building socialism, the classes, strata and social groups which favour, support and work for the cause of socialist construction all come within the category of the people, while the social forces and groups which resist the socialist revolution and are hostile to or sabotage socialist construction are all enemies of the people."

Albania

Enemy of the people (Alb: Armiku i popullit) in Albania were the enemy typology of the Communist Albanian government used to denounce political or class opponents. The term is today considered totalitarian, derogatory and hostile. There are still some politicians who use the term on political opponents with the intention of dehumanization.

After the communist takeover, many who were labeled with this term were executed or imprisoned. Enver Hoxha declared religious leaders, landowners, disloyal party officials, clerics and clan leaders as "enemies of the people". This is said to have led to the death of 6,000 people. Thousands were sentenced to death. From 1945 to 1992, around 5,000 men and women were executed and close to 100,000 were sent to prison as they were labeled enemies of the people. Many who were targeted held important leadership positions in the party and state structures of the regime. Hoxha also used the term against the Soviet Union and the US when he spoke: "as to ’Albania being only one mouthful’, watch out, gentlemen, for socialist Albania is a hard bone that will stick in your throat and choke you!". On 1 June 1945, The Albanian Central Commission for the Discovery of Crimes, of War Criminals and Enemies of the People requested the International Commission for the Discovery of Crimes and War Criminals to hand over a number of Albanian war criminals found in concentration camps in Italy such as Bari, Lecce, Salerno and others. In 1954, Hoxha condemned the American and British liberation of Albania calling them "enemies of the people". In the 1960s, many Albanian migrants returned from Austria and Italy after having fled in the 1940s, and despite having been promised not to be punished, were immediately arrested as "enemies of the people". In 1990, Ismail Kadare applied for political asylum in France, which was granted, resulting in him being condemned by Albanian officials as an "enemy of the people".

Nazi Germany

Regarding the Nazi plan to relocate all Jews to Madagascar, the Nazi tabloid Der Stürmer wrote that "The Jews don't want to go to Madagascar – They cannot bear the climate. Jews are pests and disseminators of diseases. In whatever country they settle and spread themselves out, they produce the same effects as are produced in the human body by germs. ... In former times sane people and sane leaders of the peoples made short shrift of enemies of the people. They had them either expelled or killed."

United States in the 1960s

In the United States during the 1960s, organizations such as the Black Panther Party and Students for a Democratic Society were known to use the term. In one inter-party dispute in February 1971, for example, Black Panther leader Huey P. Newton denounced two other Panthers as "enemies of the people" for allegedly putting party leaders and members in jeopardy.

Usage in the 2010s

United Kingdom

Main article: Enemies of the People (headline)

During the aftermath of the referendum on membership of the European Union, the Daily Mail was criticized for a headline describing judges (in the Miller case) as "Enemies of the People" for ruling that the process for leaving the European Union (i.e. the triggering of Article 50) would require the consent of the British Parliament. The May administration had hoped to use the powers of the royal prerogative to bypass parliamentary approval. The paper issued character assassinations of all the judges involved in the ruling (Lord Chief Justice Lord Thomas, Sir Terence Etherton, and Lord Justice Sales), and received more than 1,000 complaints to the Independent Press Standards Organisation. The Secretary of State for Justice, Liz Truss, issued a three-line statement defending the independence and impartiality of the judiciary, which some saw as inadequate due to the delayed response and failure to condemn the attacks.

Donald Trump

See also: 2018 threats against the Boston Globe and List of nicknames used by Donald Trump

Donald J. Trump
@realDonaldTrump

The FAKE NEWS media (failing @nytimes, @NBCNews, @ABC, @CBS, @CNN) is not my enemy, it is the enemy of the American People!

18 February 2017

Donald Trump at the Conservative Political Action Conference in 2017

In 2012, longtime Democratic pollster Patrick Caddell gave a speech at a conference sponsored by Accuracy in Media, a conservative watchdog group, in which he called the media “the enemy of the American people.” In 2013, Caddell signed on as a contractor for Robert Mercer. On 17 February 2017, hours after meeting Caddell while touring a Boeing aircraft plant in North Charleston, South Carolina, President of the United States Donald Trump declared on Twitter that The New York Times, NBC News, ABC, CBS, and CNN were "fake news" and "the enemy of the American People". Trump repeated the assertion on 24 February at the Conservative Political Action Conference, saying, "A few days ago I called the fake news the enemy of the people and they are. They are the enemy of the people." At a 25 June 2018 rally in South Carolina, Trump singled out journalists as "fake newsers" and again called them "the enemy of the people". Some commentators tried to link these comments to a mass shooting at the offices of a newspaper publisher in Annapolis, Maryland, that took place only days later, on 28 June, but the incident turned out not to be related. During his term, Trump prevented two CNN White House correspondents, Kaitlan Collins and Jim Acosta, from attending certain events.

On 19 July 2018, following the critical reaction to his meeting with Russian President Vladimir Putin on 15 July 2018 in Helsinki, Finland, Trump tweeted "The Summit with Russia was a great success, except with the real enemy of the people, the Fake News Media." The New York Times noted Trump's use of this phrase during his "moments of peak criticism" and use of the term by Nazi and Soviet propaganda.

On 2 August 2018, after Trump tweeted "FAKE NEWS media... is the enemy of the American People", multiple international institutions such as the United Nations and the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights criticized Trump for his attacks on the free press. On 16 August 2018, the United States Senate, in a symbolic rebuke to Trump, passed by unanimous consent a resolution affirming that the media is not "the enemy of the people" and reaffirming "the vital and indispensable role the free press serves."

From his inauguration on 20 January 2017 through 15 October 2019, Trump used Twitter to call the news media the "enemy of the people" 36 times. In August 2019, when journalist Jonathan Karl asked him if he feared that his supporters would interpret this as a justification for violence, Trump replied: "I hope they take my words to heart. I believe the press is the enemy of the people." In response to the recount process of the 2020 United States presidential election in Georgia, which certified Joe Biden as the winner of the state, Trump called Georgia Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger an "enemy of the people".

Redemption movement

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Redemption_movement

The redemption movement is an element of the pseudolaw movement, mainly active in the United States and Canada, that promotes fraudulent debt and tax payment schemes. The movement is also called redemptionism. Redemption promoters allege that a secret fund is created for every citizen at birth and that a procedure exists to "redeem" or reclaim this fund to pay bills. Common redemption schemes include acceptance for value (A4V), Treasury Direct Accounts (TDA) and secured party creditor "kits," collections of pseudolegal tactics sold to participants despite a complete lack of any actual legal basis. Such tactics are sometimes called "money for nothing" schemes, as they propose to extract money from the government by using secret methods. The name of the A4V scheme in particular has become synonymous with the movement as a whole.

Although the movement has maintained a following since the 1990s, its theories are false and meritless. Those who participate in redemption schemes, and especially those who promote them to other people, can face criminal charges and imprisonment. Several government institutions, including the FBI, have issued warnings about the fraudulent character of redemption schemes.

The ideas of the redemption movement should not be confused with the actual legal right of redemption, under which a debtor may buy back property that has been levied or foreclosed, either by paying the balance of the debt or by matching the price at which the property sells.

The redemption movement overlaps with the sovereign citizen movement, with several influential sovereign citizens promoting redemption schemes and ideas. Part of its concepts were also adopted by the Canadian-born freeman on the land movement and by various other pseudolaw "gurus", movements and litigants.

History

See also: Sovereign citizen movement, Radical right (United States), Pseudolaw, and Tax protester history in the United States

The redemption movement is an offshoot of the Posse Comitatus, an American far right organization which was established in 1969 by leaders of the white supremacist Christian Identity sect. The Posse's beliefs were rooted in antisemitism and they saw income tax, debt-based currency and debt collection as tools of Jewish control of the United States. It found an audience among farmers who were hit by an agricultural recession during the 1970s and 1980s.

One such supporter was Roger Elvick, a former North Dakota farmer who had lost his farm in a business deal. He became the national spokesman for the Committee of States, a Posse successor organization that engaged in open rebellion against tax authorities. According to the Anti-Defamation League, Elvick was associated with the Aryan Nations during the 1980s. Elvick sold a book, The Redemption Package, that encouraged people to claim large refunds and information rewards from the Internal Revenue Service (IRS) and then pay their debts with "sight drafts" (worthless checks) issued by his own company, Common Title Bond & Trust. Elvick was convicted and imprisoned for his activities, as were several of his accomplices.

Debt cancellation schemes and prosecutions which were similar to Elvick's continued through the 1990s, including Family Farm Preservation and the Montana Freemen. Elvick resumed his activities after his release in 1997, giving seminars around the country, and the use of redemption schemes surged.

By the late 1990s, the belief in the existence of a secret bank account, attached to each individual and containing large sums of money, had become a fixture of redemption schemes. The origin of this idea is not clear, but elements of it appeared in Lodi v. Lodi (1981, Shasta County, California). In that case, plaintiff Oreste Lodi sued "Oreste Lodi, Beneficiary", produced a birth certificate as evidence that the defendant controlled his estate, and served his complaint upon the IRS. The Shasta County Superior Court dismissed plaintiff Lodi's case for failure to state a claim. An appeals court upheld the dismissal, agreeing that "Plaintiff's birth certificate did not create a charitable trust" and that the case was a "slam-dunk frivolous complaint".

Around 1999, Elvick conceived the strawman theory, which states that legal and financial claims brought against an individual are really claims against a fictitious legal person or "strawman". The theory builds on and ties together several pseudolegal concepts alleging that government authority is illegitimate, as well as monetary and banking conspiracy theories, and also incorporates the belief in a secret government-controlled bank account. The strawman, Elvick alleged, was in possession of the secret account, but the individual was its rightful owner and could petition for access.

The theory also gives a specific role to the Uniform Commercial Code, which provides an interstate standard for documents such as driver's licenses or for bank accounts. As sovereign citizens believe the UCC to be a codification of the illegitimate commercial law ruling the United States, adherents to the strawman theory see this as evidence that the associated laws and financial obligations do not apply to them, but instead to the "strawman".

The state of Ohio charged Elvick with corrupt business activity in 2003, and he returned to prison after being sentenced to four years.

Elvick's concepts and schemes and variations thereof have since remained a mainstay of the pseudolaw environment. They have been used and adapted in the United States, Canada and other English-speaking countries, by many tax protesters or conspiracy theorists, and more broadly by people seeking a remedy for their financial stresses or willing to fight what they perceive as government oppression. In some variations of the strawman theory, one's alleged secret fund is called a "Cestui Que Vie Trust".

Purported redemption methods

See also: Strawman theory and Tax protester conspiracy arguments

The details of redemption schemes vary, but they typically rest on the same assumptions: (1) a distinction between a living individual and a corresponding legal person or "strawman", (2) valuable property associated with the legal person, but rightfully belonging to the individual, and (3) a supposed procedure by which the individual can claim the property to pay debts. Promoters justify these assumptions with elaborate historical tales. The most common explanation claims that the United States went bankrupt when it abandoned the gold standard in 1933 and started using its citizens as collateral so that it could borrow money.

Supposed procedures for using the nonexistent "strawman" funds include:

• Filing a UCC-1 financing statement or UCC-3 amended statement against the strawman
• Passing a birth certificate or other official document as if it were a bond
• Submitting documents to the Secretary of the Treasury
• Asserting copyright on a name
• Paying bills with self-printed or promoter-printed checks known as bills of exchange or sight drafts
• Charging bills to a "Treasury Direct Account" identified by a Social Security number
• Returning bills, collection letters and court notices with "Accepted for Value" or "Taken for Value" and other language stamped or written across them
• Reporting the funds as tax withheld via Form 1099-OID to offset tax liability
• Corresponding with red ink

Promoters may suggest that others have had great success in eliminating their debts through these methods, and put the blame on participants when they do not get the same results.

Official responses

The United States government has successfully prosecuted and convicted a number of redemption scheme participants. The convictions include forgery, providing false information, passing fictitious financial instruments, defrauding the United States, counterfeiting, impeding administration, filing false tax returns, money laundering and wire fraud.

Aside from the risk of criminal charges, redemption processes also fail to discharge debts. In a frequently cited 2007 foreclosure case, a debtor attempted to pay her home mortgage with a redemption "bill of exchange" at the suggestion of promoter Barton Buhtz. A United States District Court concluded that "the legal authorities Plaintiff cites and the facts she alleges suggest that she did not tender payment, but rather a worthless piece of paper. Other courts addressing claims nearly identical to Plaintiff's have found likewise."

To caution people away from redemption schemes, several U.S. agencies have issued warnings against them. Both the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) and the TreasuryDirect web site have posted statements that redemption schemes are fraudulent. The Inspector General of the Treasury, the Federal Trade Commission, and various Federal Reserve Banks have warned that the Treasury and the Federal Reserve Banks do not maintain draft accounts for individuals and will not honor any individual drafts.

The IRS has announced that attributing tax liability to a "strawman" is a frivolous position that can result in a $5,000 administrative penalty. It included the Form 1099-OID variation of the redemption scheme in its "Dirty Dozen" list of prominent tax scams every year from 2009 to 2019. The Comptroller of the Currency has noted that, in addition to being fraudulent and ineffective, redemption schemes can be used for identity theft. Outside the United States, the Reserve Bank of New Zealand responded to a 2017 information request by stating that birth certificates are not investment securities and that redemption processes are scams.

Promoters

Roger Elvick

The originator of the movement, Roger Elvick was found guilty in June 1991 by a federal jury in Hawaii of conspiracy to impede justice in connection with federal tax filings under 18 U.S.C. § 371. He was fined $100,000, and was sentenced to five years in federal prison and three years of supervised release. While incarcerated he was further convicted in another conspiracy. He served his time and was released from the federal prison system on December 8, 1997.

Upon release from prison, Elvick restarted the scheme and resumed holding Redemption seminars. In August 2003, he was indicted in Ohio on multiple felony counts. During preliminary hearings, Elvick denied his identity and argued that the court had no jurisdiction over him or his strawman. The court ruled him mentally unfit to stand trial and committed him to a correctional psychiatric facility. There, he was diagnosed with an "unclassified mental disorder" and underwent nine months of treatment before facing trial. Elvick eventually pleaded guilty; in April 2005, he was convicted of forgery, extortion and corrupt business activity and sentenced to four years.

Eldon Warman

In the late 1990s, several concepts of the movement, as well as sovereign citizen ideology, were introduced into Canada by Eldon Warman, a follower of Elvick who adapted the theories to better suit a Canadian context and promoted through seminars and his Detax Canada website. However, he did not use the "redemption" and "A4V" concepts themselves. Warman, who died in 2017, was emulated by several other Canadian "gurus" within the so-called "Detaxer" movement. Though the Detaxer movement eventually went into decline, it influenced the freeman on the land movement, which made little conceptual innovation but found success through the use of social media, also reframing Detaxer ideas for a more left-leaning audience. The freeman on the land movement later expanded to other Commonwealth countries.

Barton Buhtz

During the early 2000s redemption promoter Barton Buhtz, a former radio broadcaster who had previously worked for Family Radio and for KDNO, distributed bills of exchange to clients, telling them they could be used for debt payments. In October 2007 he was convicted on multiple counts of conspiring, aiding, and personally passing fictitious financial instruments, and sentenced to three years in prison. He was released in November 2012.

Sam Kennedy (Glenn Unger)

One key figure of the redemption movement has been Glenn Richard Unger, best known under the alias Sam Kennedy, who hosted the Take No Prisoners program on Republic Broadcasting Network in Round Rock, Texas. He was a founding member of the Guardians of the Free Republics. In a mass e-mail early in 2010, Unger vowed to use his show to present a "final remedy to the enslavement at the hands of corporations posing as legitimate government." He pointed to a plan to "end economic warfare and political terror by March 31, 2010." In two months, he said, "we can and WILL, BE FREE with your assistance."

In 2013, Unger was tried in the United States District Court for the Northern District of New York, in Albany, New York, on one count of attempting to interfere with the administration of the U.S. internal revenue laws, four counts of filing false claims for over $36 million in tax refunds, one count of tax evasion, and one count of uttering a fictitious obligation. Unger was convicted of multiple counts of tax fraud and served approximately five years of an eight-year prison sentence.

Winston Shrout

Winston Shrout, a former construction worker and prominent sovereign citizen and tax protester from Oregon, started practicing redemption schemes in 2000. By 2004, he was marketing the schemes under the name "Solutions in Commerce". Shrout built a following on social media to become a leading redemption promoter, holding seminars in the United Kingdom, Australia and New Zealand. During the same period he also attempted to pass billion and trillion-dollar "bills of exchange" on the IRS and various financial companies. Shrout supplemented his pseudolegal and pseudofinancial theories with claims about UFOs and paranormal issues. He created another website, "Exo-Commerce", which blended sovereign citizen and New Age concepts. At one point, he claimed to be an "Earth delegate to the interdimensional Galactic Round Table" and a "sixth-dimensional interplanetary diplomat" and to have disrupted international transactions by relocating the prime meridian with the assistance of the "Queen of the Fairies".

Shrout was indicted on 19 charges of passing fictitious instruments and failure to file federal income tax returns. He was convicted on all charges in April 2017, and was sentenced to ten years in prison. Shrout failed to surrender to authorities at the Federal Bureau of Prisons to begin his sentence and remained a fugitive until November 2019, when he was arrested in Arizona.

Heather Ann Tucci-Jarraf

Heather Ann Tucci-Jarraf, a licensed lawyer and former state prosecutor, became a member of the sovereign citizen movement. With several associates, she created a group called the One People’s Public Trust (OPPT) that claimed around 2012 to have "foreclosed" governments, corporations, and banks through US Uniform Commercial Code filings. She also said that the OPPT's subscribers would receive $10 billion in gold and could pay their debts by using "Courtesy Notice" documents. When the money was not delivered to their followers, the OPPT claimed that it was being held by aliens. After the failure of that original scheme, Tucci-Jarraf maintained an online following as a sovereign citizen "guru". She asserted that people could reclaim the funds from their alleged "secret savings account" by taking money from the Federal Reserve. The OPPT was also involved in developing "free energy technologies" in Morocco.

One of Tucci-Jarraf's followers, Randall Beane, devised an Internet fraud scheme aimed at extracting from the banking system tens of millions of dollars he believed were part of his secret account. Tucci-Jarraf was aware of Beane's fraud and gave him legal advice throughout. Beane managed to embezzle two million dollars from a bank before he and Tucci-Jarraf were arrested in July 2017. Upon arrest, Beane named Tucci-Jarraf as his lawyer before police determined that she was an accomplice. Tucci-Jarraf was arrested days later in Washington, D.C., after arriving unannounced at the White House's gate to demand a meeting with then-President Donald Trump. In January 2018, Beane was found guilty of wire fraud and bank fraud; together with Tucci-Jarraf, he was also found guilty of conspiracy to launder money. Beane was sentenced to 155 months in prison and Tucci-Jarraf to 57 months. Despite her imprisonment, Tucci-Jarraf's methodology was emulated by multiple people and she received many Internet donations. The OPPT is still active as of 2019: some of its ideology and methods have influenced the German Reichsbürger movement, as well as Italian sovereign citizens.

Corporate sociopolitical activism

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Corporate_sociopolitical_activism

Corporate sociopolitical activism (CSA) refers to a firm's public demonstration of support or opposition to a partisan sociopolitical issue. CSA has become increasingly prominent in recent years, as firms have taken stances on issues such as climate change, racial justice, reproductive rights, gun control, immigration, LGBTQ+ rights, and gender equality.

Woke capitalism, woke capital and stakeholder capitalism are terms used by some commentators to refer to a form of marketing, advertising and corporate structures that pertains to sociopolitical standpoints tied to social justice and activist causes. The term was coined by columnist Ross Douthat in "The Rise of Woke Capital", an article written for and published in The New York Times in 2018.

Firms may engage in CSA to appeal to purpose-driven ideals, as well as contribute to more strategic motives, in line with consumers' existing preferences for moral purchasing options. Indeed, a recent study found that 64% of global consumers choose to buy or boycott a given brand on the basis of its political leanings, a result suggesting the increasing importance of ethical consumerism practices.

In addition, the 2020 CMO Survey revealed that a growing proportion of marketing leaders find it acceptable to make changes to products and services in response to political issues (47.2%), have executives speak out on political issues (33.3%), and use marketing communications to speak out on political issues (27.8%). Further, brands engaged in an unprecedented level of activist behavior in response to consumers protesting racial injustice in 2020.

Firms have historically strayed from vocalizing stances on controversial sociopolitical matters, with the understanding that doing so could sever certain stakeholder relationships. However, modern cultural shifts have precipitated a “hyper-partisan” climate, leading to demand for firms to exercise purpose-driven efforts in the marketplace. As stated by Richard Edelman, chief executive officer (CEO) of Edelman, “Brands are now being pushed to go beyond their classic business interests to become advocates. It is a new relationship between a company and consumer, where a purchase is premised on the brand’s willingness to live its values, act with purpose, and, if necessary, make the leap into activism.”

Definition

CSA is a unique form of cause-related firm behavior defined broadly by two distinct characteristics: publicity and partisanship. Specifically, CSA involves a firm's public support of or opposition to a partisan sociopolitical issue. Such issues are described as “salient unresolved social matters on which societal and institutional opinion is split, thus potentially engendering acrimonious debate among groups.” Notably, while the controversy surrounding a given issue can change or be resolved, a firm's efforts may be considered CSA to the extent that they reflect engagement with an issue defined as partisan at a given point in time, politics, and culture. Further, the term “brand activism” has been used to describe similar efforts by individual brands (i.e., owned by firms) to vocalize public stances on sociopolitical issues; brand activism can, thus, be considered CSA delivered through a brand's voice.

Conceptual distinctions

CSA is comparable but distinct from two related firm activities: corporate social responsibility (CSR) and corporate political activity (CPA).

Corporate social responsibility

Main article: Corporate social responsibility

Conceptual distinctions among CSA, CSR, and CPA.

CSR involves firms’ contributions to widely favored societal goals (e.g., community resources, education, donations to disease prevention research) via philanthropic or charitable efforts, CSA pertains to a firm's engagement in causes for which there is no universally acceptable “correct” response. Further, CSA may involve a lower level of monetary investment (e.g., a press release, an open letter) compared to CSR; however, there is greater risk associated with CSA, due in part to the potential for backlash from various stakeholders.

Corporate political activity

CSA is distinct from CPA—a firm's efforts (e.g., campaign contributions, lobbying, donations to political action committees) to sway political processes and gain policy-related market advantages. While both types of firm activities reflect involvement in the political process, they differ in the extent to which they are publicized. CSA is often utilized as a public demonstration of a firm's core values and principles. Conversely, CPA is an often-discreet activity that is typically made public only through “accidental disclosure”.

Examples

Firms have increasingly taken activist stances on sociopolitical issues across a variety of domains.

Racial justice

Firms have spoken out about racial justice in a number of ways (e.g., affirming support for the Black Lives Matter movement, donating a portion of profits to civil rights organizations).

Among the most prominent examples of racial justice CSA came in September 2018 when Nike announced football player Colin Kaepernick as the spokesperson for its thirtieth anniversary advertisement campaign. Notably, Kaepernick stirred national debate in 2016 by kneeling during the National Anthem in protest of racial inequality and police brutality in the United States. In Nike's campaign, Kaepernick said, “Believe in something, even if it means sacrificing everything.” News agencies characterized this tagline as implicit support for Kaepernick's platform of racial justice advocacy.

While Nike's decision initially sparked consumer backlash, as well as a dip in stock price, the firm's value reached an all-time high only a week later. According to a Quinnipiac University poll, much of the persistent consumer support for the ad came from consumers between 18 and 34, two-thirds of whom approved of Nike's actions.

This case has been considered a critical turning point in the emergence of CSA as a prominent brand practice. Additional examples of racial justice CSA include the following:

• Home Depot CEO Craig Meaner said in a statement, "We are all confronting deep pain and anguish over the senseless killing of George Floyd, Ahmaud Arbery, and other unarmed Black men and women in our country. We cannot ignore that their deaths are part of a pattern of racism and reflect the harsh reality that as a nation we are much too far from fulfilling the promise of equal justice for all."
• Netflix promoted a new Black Lives Matter collection to U.S. subscribers, featuring a number of television and movie titles about racial injustice and the experience of Black Americans.
• Walmart announced that it will donate $100 million over five years to create a new center for racial equity.

LGBTQ+ rights

A Bud Light advertisement at an LGBT pride event

Firms have utilized both internal and external resources to take a stand on issues facing the LGBTQ+ community. For instance, many firms act as corporate sponsors of Pride parades internationally and assist in LGBTQ+ community-building efforts.

Published since 2002, the Human Rights Campaign has utilized its Corporate Equality Index (CEI) to measure the extent to which American businesses treat equitably their LGBTQ+ employees, customers, and investors. Criteria used to assess companies include, among others, a written policy of non-discrimination based on sexual orientation, gender identity, and gender expression; appropriate and respectful advertising to the LGBTQ+ community; and transgender-inclusive health benefits.

There has been an increase in the number of firms with a perfect CEI rating every year since the tool's inception. Such firms frequently release statements and press releases to express satisfaction at having been recognized for their diversity and inclusivity efforts.

Notably, many brands have also released Pride-related merchandise in recent years to signal support for LGBTQ+ rights, as well as position themselves as advocates for LGBTQ+ consumers.

• Converse released a collection of Pride-inspired low- and high-top sneakers featuring a rainbow flag with a brown and black stripe dedicated to queer people of color. Also included in this collection was a pair of sneakers adorned with the pink, light blue, and white colors of the transgender flag.
• Sephora's “We Love Pride” make-up collection featured a metallic red lipstick called “Love Is Love.” The brand donated a portion of sales to a variety of LGBTQ+ charities.
• Fossil released its second annual Pride Watch, featuring a bezel with all the colors of the rainbow flag. U.S. sales benefitted the Hetrick-Martin Institute, the nation's oldest and largest LGBTQ+ youth organization.

Climate change

While sustainable business practices have long been a component of firms’ CSR activities, some companies have taken an activist stance in recent years to address climate change policy more broadly.

For example, the brand Patagonia has established itself as a chief market-based environmental justice advocate. Its November 2011 “Don’t Buy This Jacket” spot in the New York Times served as both an advertisement for the firm's merchandise and an imperative for consumers to reduce their carbon footprint. The ad's message leveraged an anti-consumerist ideology to encourage the purchase of long-lasting outdoor apparel and deter the proliferation of the fast fashion industry.

• Amazon announced in 2019 that it would transition to 80% renewable energy usage by 2024, and then to zero emissions by 2030. The firm's CEO Jeff Bezos also launched the Bezos Earth Fund in February 2020, committing $10 billion to assist in “any effort that offers a real possibility to help preserve and protect the natural world.”
• Google announced in September 2020 that it is investing in manufacturing regions to create new carbon-free energy and help cities reduce their emissions.

Gun control

A number of major firearms sellers have modified their gun sales policies, particularly as a response to mass shootings taking place in the U.S. Two such notable examples are the following:

• Ed Stack, CEO of Dick's Sporting Goods, announced in February 2018 that stores would end the sales of high-capacity magazines, as well as sales of guns to persons under the age of 21. The firm also took legal action by urging Congress to ban assault-style weapons, raise the minimum age to purchase a gun to 21, and outlaw sales of high-capacity magazines and bump stocks. The firm cited the Stoneman Douglas High School shooting in Parkland, Florida as an event that directly influenced its decisions.
• Walmart CEO Doug McMillon released a statement containing news of the firm's plans to discontinue sales of short-barrel rifle ammunition, handgun ammunition, and handguns. This statement also requested that customers no longer openly carry firearms into Walmart or Sam's Club stores, including those in states in which “open carry” practices are permitted. The firm cited the 2019 El Paso shooting, which took place in a Walmart store, as a critical incident shaping its decisions.

Other domains

Firms have engaged in CSA in a number of other domains. Below are select examples.

Reproductive health care

M.A.C. Cosmetics has worked with Planned Parenthood since 2008 and contributed over $2 million to the organization. According to John Demsey, executive group president of the brand's parent company Estée Lauder, “It is so important for people of all ages, all races and all genders to get the accurate information and care they need so they can live their best, healthiest lives, but we see that a lot of people aren’t seeking that information and care because of stigmas that disproportionately affect women, people of color and the LGBTQ community.”

Net Neutrality

Burger King advocated for Net Neutrality with a January 2018 ad that illustrated the concept of paid prioritization through hamburger sales—customers were told they would have to wait longer for their food, unless they were willing to pay a premium for immediate service.

Gender non-discrimination

Target issued a statement in September 2016 encouraging store employees and patrons to use the restroom or fitting room facility that corresponds with their gender identity.

Immigration

In January 2017, nearly 100 Silicon Valley firms filed an amicus brief against the Trump administration's anti-immigration policy directed at refugees, travelers, and visa holders originating from predominantly Muslim portions of the world.

Controversial symbols

NASCAR announced in July 2020 that it would ban the Confederate flag from all its racing venues.

Potential business benefits

Research has uncovered the broader financial implications of CSA on firm value including improving firm's attractiveness to a wider segment of investors and customers. On average, investors respond negatively to CSA, though there are a number of factors that may buffer or even reverse this relationship. Most notably, a firm's CSA elicits positive abnormal stock returns when there is high alignment between the firm's CSA and the values of its stakeholders (e.g., customers, employees, state legislators). In particular, researchers observed an increase in sales growth over the next quarter and year when CSA aligned with customer values.

In addition, a number of CSA characteristics have been shown to further heighten investor response: if the activism takes the form of an action, is announced by the CEO, is not justified by a business objective, and is announced alone (vs. in a coalition with other firms). Notably, managers may find it especially appropriate to engage in CSA if they are deeply committed to activism, and it aligns with their strategic objectives (i.e., acquiring a more liberal or conservative customer base).

Still, CSA requires strategic deliberation. CSA activities may signal to stakeholders that the firm is willing to engage in risky behaviors and even divert resources from profit-generating activities. Given the enduring nature of activism, it is often plausible for investors to believe CSA serves as a value-based indication of a firm's future decisions, particularly those related to purpose, reputation, and relationship management.

Criticisms and concerns

Critics have expressed concern about the degree to which CSA is helpful, either for advancing sociopolitical causes or as a firm activity more generally.

By the mid-2010s, forms of rhetoric that were later retroactively labelled as "woke" had entered mainstream media and were being used in marketing and advertising; campaigns associated with this trend have been generally perceived by consumers as insincere and inauthentic, and have provoked cultural backlashes.

Cultural scientists Akane Kanai and Rosalind Gill described woke capitalism as a then-"dramatically intensifying" trend in which public relations pertains to the concerns of historically marginalized groups (such as in terms of race, gender and religion), using them as mascots in advertisements with messages of empowerment. On the one hand, this creates an individualized and depoliticized idea of social justice, using depictions of social action to signify an increase in self-confidence; on the other hand, the omnipresent visibility in advertising of minorities can also amplify a backlash against their equality. For people in lower economic strata, the equality of these minorities thus becomes indispensable to the maintenance of capitalism, with the minorities being seen as responsible for the losses of the system.

Woke-washing

The term woke-washing was used in 2019 by Alan Jope, chief executive of Unilever, who warned that brands which failed to take verifiable action on their rhetoric could "further destroy trust in our industry". Helen Lewis held the opinion that cancel culture is the result of what she calls "the iron law of woke capitalism", and believes that it is used for inexpensive messaging as a substitute for genuine reform. Will Hutton wrote that he believed woke capitalism is "the only way forward", citing principles of corporate responsibility. Alternatively, Elizabeth Bruenig noted that while woke capitalism has been seen as an evolution of capitalism that can create unprecedented benefits for the public good, it remains a form of capitalism and hence cannot be celebrated without aligning with capitalist interests; similarly, Andrew V. Abela held the opinion that it does little to actually further progressive causes.

A common argument is that firms are profit-seeking and, thus, care more about image and reputation than the causes they address. Some have referred to firms’ political behavior as akin to "woke-washing", a pejorative term adapted from the similar concept of greenwashing. Woke-washing is a critique leveraged against firms thought to “appropriate the language of social activism into marketing material."

Critics have further argued that firms may utilize greater capital on the appearance of progressivism (i.e., through advertisements and promotional efforts) than on actual cause-related awareness or fundraising efforts. In such circumstances, activism has been criticized as a deceptive marketing tool for capturing demand among belief-driven consumers. Action-based follow-through could be important for fostering perceptions of authentic connection to supported sociopolitical causes. In a recent Harvard Business Review article, journalists Erin Dowell and Marlette Jackson said, “Empty company statements can seem to say that Black lives only matter to big business when there’s profit to be made.”

Others have argued whether firms should engage with sociopolitical issues at all. In particular, some critics have shunned the idea that market-based entities should influence or have a say in what is considered right and wrong.

Counter-movement

Main article: Go woke, go broke

Beginning to a major degree in the 2020s, members of the American right have perpetuated efforts to boycott companies which openly support "woke" causes. The phrase go woke go broke has been an umbrella catchphrase to denote companies subject to boycotts against companies for "going woke" or engaging in activities like promoting diversity, equity, and inclusion or in the case of Bud Light maker AB InBev, partnering with transgender influencers. Many companies subject to "go woke go broke" campaigns, including AB InBev, Target, and the Walt Disney Company have seen declines in revenue, profit, and/or stock value as of a result of "go woke go broke" campaigns, though some figures in business, such as Mark Cuban, have defended companies engaging in "wokeness" by arguing that engaging in social justice causes reflects companies caring about their customers.