Can corporate activism change the world?

On the 30th anniversary of #JustDoIt (can’t believe it was that long ago) Nike has once again captured attention with an ad campaign featuring NFL star Colin Kaepernick. Kaepernick, who famously started the protest movement to raise awareness about racial injustice in America by sitting down and then kneeling at the national anthem, incurred the wrath of detractors such as Donald Trump and the support of many others in a divided naton in equal measure.

The ad is doing the same; spectacularly dividing opinion from supporters who strongly believe that in the absence of governments who can act against social injustice, it’s the responsibility of brands to do so — and opponents who are burning their Nike’s on social media and cutting of the swoosh from shoes and socks.

Nike, a firm that used to be maligned and exposed for its poor performance when it comes to care of workers in its supply chain, is taking up a baton of social justice and using it to great effect within the capitalism system in which it operates.

What do I mean by that? Simple. Nike sells trainers, lots of them. It’s a business model designed for profit not social or environmental purpose. And yet here we see it actively stepping in to a raging debate about racial inequality. Whilst it may in the short term alienate some customers, this campaign will drive brand attention through the roof and undoubtedly sell a lot more trainers as those people seeking a forum for this kind of discussion support the brand for doing so by buying more.

And here’s the rub. A brand steps out to support a social issue. Using clever marketing it attracts attention. And sells more trainers. Which extracts more resources and creates more ‘stuff’. Using some recycled materials and lots that’s not. And creates more profit and jobs. But will eventually put more ‘stuff’ into landfill. In the UK alone last year it is estimated that 235million items of clothing went to landfill.

This is the capitalist philanthropic system at work. You’ve got to grow a big enough brand to be able to ‘do good’ at scale. To do that you have to sell a lot of stuff and generate shed loads of profit and considerable waste because few global organisations are yet fully circular. The vast majority of the profit goes to shareholders increasing wealth inequality, but a small amount of it goes back into doing good work. You have to first pollute to ‘afford’ to be purposeful and have impact.

Is this right or wrong? Nothing so binary I’m afraid. I believe strongly in brands stepping into purpose — social and environmental. I support any brand choosing to be courageous enough to take a stand on global issues of importance. We absolutely need more courageous activism from brands because we’re not getting that kind of leadership from other institutions. Its been a long time coming but there are finally some indications that people will direct their disposible income towards brands that focus on social and environmental good.

Nike can do this because it has a brand that is strong enough to take a small or big risk to its reputation, and because it almost always executes its marketing with brilliant aplomb.

But more than just a clever strapline, what I would really like to see from Nike is whether they want to do more than just stick their brand onto Kaepernick’s campaign, or really try to adopt and embed the values he represents.

What would it look like if rather than paying Kaepernick a big cheque to use his face, they brought him into their organisation to mentor management in active hope and resilience? What would it look like if Nike held public discussions about what, within its business, it would be prepared to sacrifice everything for? Because that would turn shareholder influence inside out!

Would it be worth sacrificing profits for 3 years to eradicate all plastic from the product line? Would it be worth sacrificing profits to globally collect all old Nike’s from around the world instead and design recycling facilities instead of them going into landfill?

We need activist brands. And even if Nike’s action doesn’t go far enough for some and too far for others, we need brands who command worldwide attention to keep trying to do the ‘right’ thing.

But what we really need is a fundamental overhaul of how businesses are designed, structured, incentivised, taxed, how leadership is remunerated, how investment is rewarded— to fully release the potential power of business to effect positive systemic change. So that we don’t have to build more gigantic companies making more gigantic piles of stuff in order to be able to sprinkle back a bit of good.