Paper short abstract:

How do activists from social movements engage with financial actors and markets? Drawing on the notion of the “shareholder activist” in finance, I examine the work of activists more broadly to change corporate strategies and what this means for social movements in an era of financialization.

Paper long abstract:

“If finance is everywhere,” an activist explained, “it can be acted upon from anywhere.” This paper is about how activists from various social movements have engaged with financial actors and markets. The climate crisis, in particular, has shaped a large network of actors who have pushed corporations and funds to enact change relating to fossil fuels and climate emissions through divestment and investment strategies. Drawing on the traditional notion of the “shareholder activist” in finance—actors who hold substantial parts of a company’s shares to enact change from within—I ethnographically examine the work of activists more broadly to change shareholder strategies and what this means for social movements in an era of financialization.

This paper looks at the case of Rio Tinto, the Anglo-Australian mining giant in two instances of shareholder activism. First, the successful efforts of an activist group in tabling and passing a resolution on emissions at an Annual General Meeting. Second, the ousting of the senior management with pressure from leading shareholders following the destruction of a sacred Aboriginal site in the expansion of its mines. Through these two cases, I argue that we can expand the notion of “shareholder value” beyond that of financial value, to ethical and moral values. Such moves, however, raise the question of whether we now see the financialization of activism, and the entrenching of financialized values within social movements themselves.