The ‘Weapons, Climate Justice and Investing Ethically’ panel run by the Sydney Peace Foundation centred realities of financial entities being tethered to the aggravation of climate change, as well as investment in weapons manufacturing.
The panel was chaired by Melanie Morrison: Director of the Sydney Peace Foundation and speakers included Professor David Kinley, Chair in Human Rights at the University of Sydney Law School, Dr. Claire Parfitt, Lecturer in Political Economy, Dr. Richard Denniss, Executive Director of the Australia Institute, and Dr. Ihab Shalbak, from the School of Social and Political Sciences at USyd.
The Q&A style panel would have improved from more in-depth conversations surrounding Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions (BDS) movements, the push by students and activists for Sydney University to divest from Israeli weapons manufacturers, as well as the environmental toll inflicted by the emissions of these weapons. Questions to the panel were invited to be submitted beforehand, with a short Q&A session at the end.
The first question was posed to Dr Parfitt, who spoke to her book Ethical Capital.
Dr Parfitt noted “[we are] all enrolled into financial markets whether we like it or not,” and spoke to market-based politics referencing Mark Fisher’s Capitalist Realism.
She spoke to the increase in Environmental, Social, and Governance (ESG) issues, and superannuation funds amoral to geopolitical issues, stating that “there isn’t a financial imperative to divest from firms driving Israeli assault on Gaza and Lebanon.”
The second question was posed to Dr Denniss, sparking conversations about superannuation, and compulsory enrolment in super despite the unethical investments of superfunds.
“Imagine being forced to buy any other product,” Dr Denniss said, referring to super as “forceful spending.”
”It’s managed on your behalf by trustees who [purport to] know what’s best for you,’” despite consumers calling to divest from nuclear, coal, and weapons.
He cited research by the Australia Institute which found that out of the top 14 superfunds in Australia, 13 were invested in producing nuclear weapons.
The next question was posed to Professor David Kinley. Morrison raised that his book, Necessary Evil, diagnoses financial companies as an ‘evil we can’t live without’. Morrison asked if there were ways we could live without their influence, and the role of boycotts.
David assessed that the financial sector has “considered itself a special case,” being slow to acknowledge any environmental and social justice responsibilities as they are not the one to “dig the hole in the ground.”
He then noted the Australian Securities and Investments Commission (ASIC) review into greenwashing in the financial sector as landmark litigation brought against various banks.
Professor Kinley argued for a move towards implementing ‘Directors Duties’ in corporation law, which necessitates corporations to take responsibility for human rights infringements. He cited the Corporate Sustainability Due Diligence Directive in the EU as making strides to pass legislation enacting directors duties policy. Such policies would require corporations and directors to investigate who is financing them, and to interrogate investments which aggravate gross human rights violations, with the Australian Human Rights Commission reporting links of financial institutions to modern slavery.
“Exposure is one step toward making these entities more transparent,” Professor Kinley said.
The next question centred around the pattern of “certain groups [doing the] heavy lifting” of activism: “students, unions, particularly in relation to climate and encampments.” “How have we got to a place where these groups are doing the heavy lifting?” Morrison asked.
“It should be [that way],” said Parfitt, noting that it is “always people at the pointy end of injustice” who organise, and are staking a claim to decide what ethical means.
Dr Parfitt spoke to the importance of such forms of disruptive and political action: “I think the BDS campaign is a good example of that. It’s a campaign that aims to take targeted action to make the economic impacts [and] create pressure.”
Although financiers are deciding which investments are controversial, the people are able to decide what ethical means. Parfitt invoked the encampment as an example of student action resulting in the creation of a divestment working group, as an example of “disruptive, political action leading to research being undertaken.”
“I agree,” said Professor Kinley, “Civil action is incredibly powerful… litigation is also a powerful way to disrupt.”
Dr Denniss, in agreement, noted that super trustees were making ethical decisions in the absence of any scrutiny.
Morrison questioned Professor Kinley on the status of civil liberties at the university, with the advent of the Campus Access Policy. She noted the Sydney Law School’s open letter in opposition to the policy of which Kinley is a signatory. “As head of human rights law at USyd, how has [the university] gone down this path?”
Kinley called into question the viability of the policy, noting it was “under question if they’re going to get that through,” with the Campus Access Policy being subject to a formal review before July 2025. “Open discussion should be happening at universities,” he said. “I think the university is taking a wrong turn in deciding who can have a voice and who can not.”
Dr Claire also noted that the Campus Access Policy is “already being used against students for disciplinary action.”
Climate justice was the next topic for the panel, and redistributing the impacts of climate catastrophe.
Dr Denniss remarked that Australia had the capacity to take innovative steps for change if governments “take science seriously.”
“Australia is so rich [that] we dropped $360 billion on nuclear submarines. [Australia is] so rich that we could spend 14 billion on fossil fuel subsidies. If we could take any of that and share it with people who need it, climate justice would be cheap,” he said.
The next question was whether there were legal mechanisms to hold governments accountable for military emissions, and whether the panel could foresee any cases against Israel for environmental impact in military emissions.
Professor Kinley analogised this with the current climate litigation occuring in Europe. He noted that there have been actions in the EU against mining conglomerates like BHP, which could set out similarities to military emissions.
“I presume there will be ancillary litigation on that,” he said. However, he remarked that the primary litigation against Israel would pertain to “international war crimes.”
After a short audience Q&A, Dr. Shalbak made the closing remarks, asserting how the “missing link of action leads to a destructive future,” in the wake of an “unfair distribution of justice,” and the intergenerational injustices inflicted in Gaza.
