Profile: Blair Palese is one of those hyper-networked people whose resume boggles the mind. How has one person done, and continues to do so much, in so many places, across so many different roles?
Today, Palese, American born but Australian by choice, is one of Australia’s leading progressive influencers, working both behind the scenes and in full public view through her intermeshing roles as director of philanthropy with Ethinvest, managing editor of Climate & Capital Media, and founder of the Climate Capital Forum.
What’s your elevator pitch for yourself?
I get up every morning and think of the most effective way to counter climate change. I have the great joy and pleasure of being employed at Ethinvest, which allows me to do more than just donate through our philanthropy but to look for ways to add value, such as gaps in what NGOs (non government organisations) are working on. At the moment, disinformation is an area I’m looking at. I have a great deal of freedom to do a lot of amazing projects and then move on to the next one.
That sounds like a dream role for you
Truly, it is. I’ve got a 40 year career of working with not-for-profits, governments, companies and all sorts of organisations. I’ve certainly learned a lot of things over the years, so I’m happy to pass that along for free and that can be useful.
What’s the worldview that you bring to your work?
As a lifelong cynical optimist, I do believe that we can have a better world that is sustainable and equitable, and that really means us looking after the environment and climate that we have, which, at the moment, we’re not doing. We need transformational change. So I’ve always been focused on finding the most impactful ways to bring about positive change.
Tell us about your origin story
I started working with Greenpeace as an envelope stuffer when I was about 21. You don’t get formal training as a Greenpeace activist, you get it by working with other great activists and seeing how they do it. Then I ran the national communications for Greenpeace in the US.
Then I was recruited to run it globally, which was just a dream job. At the time we had offices in 42 countries. After that, I worked as head of PR for The Body Shop with Anita Roddick (in London), very much on the campaign focus of a company. We worked on fair trade, women’s issues, environment issues and human rights, not normally something a for-profit company does as part of its core business.
Was it unusual, at that time, to move from Greenpeace to a corporate?
I can’t think of too many companies that would have hired me out of Greenpeace, but The Body Shop thought it was a fantastic idea.
Was that the glory days of both environmental activism and corporate social responsibility?
Absolutely, one of the radical things I remember at Greenpeace was organising the first Greenpeace Business conferences – the UK office would invite a corporate CEO, like the head of Shell, or the head of a company making pharmaceuticals or toxic chemicals.
The keynote was the head of Greenpeace and the head of the company debating in front of a very large public audience in London.
At the time, there were so many people in Greenpeace who said, “We can’t be doing this. This is outrageous. You know, we’re giving a platform.” But it garnered international interest. It was very brave on both sides. I think we need more of that kind of bravery.
When you look at the way things work now, what’s different?
The far right and corporations have gained so much power and influence that it’s definitely harder to bring about change just through public concern about environmental destruction.
It’s difficult for protesters to take part in even simple, peaceful protests without getting charges of sometimes up to 20 years of jail time.
Back when I started there was a real sense of the public’s right to protest, and for societies to question how far corporations should be allowed to go when it came to dumping waste or in our case now contributing to climate change.
Look at Trump who wants to rip apart every bit of long fought for regulation that prohibits companies from destroying the natural environment and a liveable planet.
Drill, baby, drill?
It’s a terrifying thought that somehow, we’ve moved that far over to the right.
So you’ve ended up being a bit of a shape shifter, moving from activism to corporate, even to government agencies. And starting organisations yourself?
I have learned with every role I’ve had that there are way different and interesting ways to get stuff done.
I founded 350.org in Australia and ran it for 10 years working very closely with Bill McKibben and the whole US founding team, and I learned so much through the divestment campaign against fossil fuels.
Divestment proved to be the most remarkable success. No one thought it would be in the beginning. Bill and the whole team thought of it more of a moral thing members of the public could do – a bit like the anti-apartheid divestment movement. Now we’re talking about trillions of dollars that have been actively moved out of fossil fuels. It’s one of the reasons I work for Ethinvest, an impact investment adviser, now. I was asked so many times by so many, “If I move my money out of fossil fuels, where can I invest it?” Now I work for a company that helps people find ways to do that.
Did that divestment and investment work lead to your focus on the energy transition?
I have to credit Climate Capital Media for that. It’s a team of about eight, mostly older journalists who were from the old school of when the media had much more power. We just started getting together and focusing on the trends of “What do you need to know if you want to know where to put your money?”
I’d say we’re two weeks ahead of every mainstream media outlet on climate, because as much as Bloomberg is amazing, or The New York Times or The Economist, they’re not dedicated to climate change, and that’s all we do. That’s where I have spent the time researching, writing about and talking to innovators about the energy transition.
We are actually moving quickly on an issue that is possibly the biggest threat humans have ever faced. Everyone needs to know that but most – busy with their day-to-day lives and faced with a whole lot of disinformation – have no idea
You’re very clearly a true believer in the power of communications
Yes, and I’m completely and deeply worried about disinformation and what it’s doing to our ability to understand the biggest risks to the world, and the solutions we need. Look at the nonsense of nuclear power in Australia from Peter Dutton and the Liberal Party, backed up by the Murdoch media. It’s such a threat to investors’ understanding of where the real opportunities are. And the truth is, decarbonising offers the biggest financial and economic opportunity for the whole world, but also Australia – the country with unlimited and affordable renewable energy and an enviable supply of rare earth minerals.
I started working with Greenpeace as an envelope stuffer when I was about 21. You don’t get formal training as a Greenpeace activist, you get it by working with other great activists and seeing how they do it
Describe the “black hats” that are manipulating public discourse
One of the challenges is that it’s much easier to be evil than it is to do good. Good is a harder sell. The alternative is dark and scary, a lot of people don’t want to look at it. They don’t want to give to organisations trying to take it on. So as head of philanthropy at Ethinvest, I think it’s an important role to play to say to often conservative philanthropists, “If you’re not looking at this, it will undo every bit of good work you’ve funded over many years.”
I’ve assigned you an informal title of PR for good or Influencer for good. How does that sit with you?
Lots of people like me who’ve come from a communications background see the importance of that work. We need to communicate to people why it’s so important.
It’s so easy for Peter Dutton to just drop in nuclear, as though it’s a silver bullet solution to climate change, which is utterly and completely false.
But to many it sounds like a simple solution versus the more complicated energy transition to renewables and batteries.
We have to get that communication piece right, to tell people why it’s going to be so much better if we can make the change.