The departure of Woolworths CEO Brad Banducci last month and Qantas CEO Alan Joyce in September last year heralded a significant changing of the guard at two giants of corporate Australia.

Mr Joyce’s tenure at Qantas was marked by heavy support for political campaigns including the Voice, while Mr Banducci’s Woolworths also supported the ‘Yes’ vote and went scrooge on Australia Day.

In neither case could Woolies or Qantas mount a credible argument that the cause of constitutional recognition of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islanders hit the bottom (let alone top) lines of the grocery or aviation industries respectively.

That wasn’t the point, of course.

Corporate social and political activism in Australia and across the West has become quite the cottage industry.

It is underpinned by political operatives who serve on boards of companies and their shareholders (including industry funds) as well as corporate affairs teams, and an entire profession of so-called environmental, social and governance (ESG) specialists.

Boards find standing items on their agendas to discuss ESG issues, taking time away from their core business strategy and growth.

Major companies uncritically adopt Reconciliation Action Plans, target “carbon neutrality” irrespective of whether their company is a material carbon emitter and celebrate all sorts of diversity without reference to their commercial purpose (which is the reason they exist).

A company doesn’t have a vote in a referendum or an election, nor can it get married or form a relationship with another person: its identity is a corporate one.

A company’s share capital and shareholders exist to finance (and hopefully profit from) its strategy and growth.

The notion of a corporation taking a leading position on a question of politics or morality is a furphy.

The only justification is that this position is essential for the business’s bottom line.

But these days, that need not be a serious consideration.

Corporate activism is not a totally new phenomenon.

Newspapers, for example, have always taken editorial stances on issues – remember Rupert Murdoch and the campaign for an Australian republic in 1999 where all his papers advocated for a Yes vote.

Dick Smith used his private business interests to advocate for Australian made and owned products.

Naturally, churches have taken views on social and moral issues, even weighing into the dangers of communism in the 1950s.

But historically companies in Australia would limit their campaigning to issues that touched their bottom line.

The attempt by Labor Prime Minister Ben Chifley in the 1940s to nationalise the banks and the airlines was a clear example.

Private banks such as the National Bank of Australasia and airlines such as Australian National Airways mounted ferocious (and successful) campaigns against Chifley at the 1949 election – however, this issue was clearly one that coalesced with their commercial interests.

Activist investors like Mike Cannon Brookes and industry super funds, armed with billions of dollars from decades of compulsory superannuation contributions, can wield significant power and influence over corporate boards, requiring companies to take positions or decisions that aren’t consistent with commercial interests.

Remember it’s at the behest of Mr Cannon-Brookes that AGL (a power company) is now in the business of getting rid of power generation assets.

It may be that corporate activism ends up being more annoying than nefarious, but where the institutional zeitgeist has become a genuine problem is at universities.

These academic halls, which are multibillion dollar businesses themselves, have increasingly taken positions on social and political issues aligning with corporate Australia.

During the Voice campaign universities offered safe spaces and special consideration for disappointed pro-Voice students, without recognition or accommodation for those with a different point of view.

In places where free speech and debate should flourish, by taking a position universities create a chilling effect on students and academics alike, constraining debate and the expression of views that diverge from the institutional position.

After the scandals at Harvard and other US college campuses over the Israel-Gaza issue, there are renewed calls for universities to adopt policies of institutional neutrality such as that taken by the University of Chicago.

Australian universities would do well to follow suit to foster debate and the pursuit of knowledge and truth rather than fostering group think.

In the corporate sphere, picking political sides is not only a waste of shareholder money, it also alienates the shareholder base.

Of the top 50 Australian companies, not one of them supported the ‘No’ case, even though 60 per cent of Australians ended up voting that way.

Almost all those 60 per cent of voting Australians will own shares through their compulsory superannuation fund or other investments.

What mandate do companies have to lecture this clear, democratic majority?

Rather than pick a side in a political or social debate, why not focus on corporate financial success, and let the individual citizen decide their own view.

By Georgina Downer. Originally published in Sky News Australia on 9 March 2024.