Ownership structure changes, like capital concentration in funds, theoretically shouldn’t alter passive incentives, given fee competition and single-company engagement costs. Free rider problems also contribute to passivity. Despite these, recent factors boosting involvement include: (i) the influence of major investment funds, (ii) growing use of proxy advisors by institutional investors, (iii) political pressure and stewardship considerations, and (iv) collaboration, especially among hedge funds. ESG investing could be a game changer due to millennial demand, systemic risk reduction, and fee opportunities. This prompts institutional investors to shift from passive to active engagement, fostering collaboration. New collaboration forms include: (i) among major funds, (ii) between hedge and ESG funds (wolf pack activism), (iii) among non-activist institutional investors, and (iv) on new platforms like Climate Action100+ and PRI. Legal risks and obstacles, such as acting in concert, insider trading rules, and antitrust laws, are explored, with suggestions to enhance collaboration opportunities and ways of bolstering opportunities for collaboration.

Climate activists across generations and borders demonstrate in the streets, while people also take climate actions via everyday professional efforts at work. In this dispersal of climate actions, the pursuit of personal politics is merging with civic, state and corporate commitment to the point where we are witnessing a rebirth of togetherness and alternative ways of collective organising, from employee activism, activist entrepreneurship, to insider activism, shareholder activism and prosumer activism. By empirically investigating this diffuse configuration of the environmental movement with focus on renewable energy technology, the commercial footing of climate activism is uncovered. The book ethnographically illustrates how activism goes into business, and how business goes into activism, to further trace how an ‘epistemic community’ emerges through co-creation of lay knowledge, not only about renewables, but political action itself. No longer tied to a specific geographical spot, organisation, group or even shared political identity, many politicians and business leaders applaud this affluent climate ‘action’, in their efforts to reach beyond mere climate ‘adaptation’ and speed up the energy transition. Conclusively, climate activism is no longer a civic phenomenon defined by struggles, pursued by the activist as we knew it, but testament of feral proximity and horizontal organising.