Commons threaded

Can commoning be woven into the fabric of the era of post-responsibility corporations? Maisie McCarthy sees a pluralistic light ahead.

It’s no surprise that with Trump in, ESG is out. In the new US campaign season, that’s not just a political slogan but a corporate strategy. CEOs are pulling back on purpose faster than you can say “woke capitalism”. 

Amidst rising litigation, reputational risk, and accusations of purpose-washing, ESG has evolved from a boardroom darling to a strategic liability. But beneath the backlash lies something more revealing: the collapse of ESG and purpose isn’t just about marketing missteps but points to a more profound structural incompatibility between the logic of purpose and the logic of capital.

So, the real question becomes: can purpose survive capitalism?

As ESG became just another ticker symbol, its collapse was inevitable. What initially aimed to reform an unsustainable system was instead absorbed by it. A logic based on quarterly earnings could only ever sustain the illusion of long-term vision. And when ESG failed to generate shareholder value, it was dismissed as market noise, rather than a mission. 

So, the real question becomes: can purpose survive capitalism? Or must it replace it?

This inquiry became the foundation of my dissertation. With limited existing research on the reasons behind the retreat from ESG and purpose marketing, I focused on those radically translating purpose into practice: Pro-Purpose Organisations and Social Enterprises. Firms that do not merely promote CSR, but actively endeavour to embed purpose into how they organise, employ, and operate. 

Yet, even for these organisations, steeped in brand ethics and impact consultancy, the contradictions cut deep: As one practitioner put it: “Companies exist to make a profit… They’re just profit. That is the logic of a company. A company needs to drive profits, and if it’s disconnected… anything you do that is disconnected from that, either in strategy or in communications, is vulnerable.”

In other words, shareholder logic is gravitational. Even for those trying to orbit outside it, when constrained by the same economic structures that encourage short-term profit maximisation, it’s more than difficult, it’s destabilising. 

Yet, an economic innovation expert argued: “This idea that economic relationships can only work driven by profit is a myth. It’s a story told to defend the status quo. There’s no reason why you can’t establish economic relationships that still support people…. What is driving it is a sense of common purpose and is about collaboration.”

Here lies the philosophical pivot. Once we understand profit as a consequence rather than a command, other systems become not only imaginable but actionable. This isn’t anti-commercial, but post-extractive. When profitability forms symbiosis with purpose, new economic models could become the norm.

And in this realisation, for some businesses, the withdrawal of purpose signals a closed door. But for others, it becomes an opening, not an obituary. As the expert continued: “In some way, you could argue that maybe Trump, by destroying the credibility of the existing structures… maybe made this possible. Now, that is obviously a highly optimistic reading of the future…. Another reading of the future is that [with] Trump, having controlled everything… any attempt to create anything else will be destroyed and shot down immediately… because [he] cannot allow people to believe that there’s a real alternative to capitalism.”

For social enterprises, this isn’t theoretical. It’s existential. Their legitimacy doesn’t just rest on what they sell, but how they sell it and who benefits from its production.

This is a fork in the road. Either ESG collapse becomes retreat or radicalisation. Either purpose withdraws, citing concerns about greenwashing, regulatory uncertainty, or risk aversion, or it becomes fertile ground in which the next economy is seeded.

For social enterprises, this isn’t theoretical. It’s existential. Their legitimacy doesn’t just rest on what they sell, but how they sell it and who benefits from its production. So maybe the only option is to develop new types of economic structures that can resist the gravitational pull of capitalism.

Enter Tony’s Chocolonely, which seeks to create a values-based alternative supply network for chocolate (see box – Commoning in cocoa).

By treating its supply chain as shared terrain, Tony’s demonstrates what commoning can look like in business: creating collective systems that generate mutual benefit from producer to consumer. This isn’t a purpose as positioning. Its purpose is as a platform. A starter model for what commoning business logics might mirror—collaboration over extraction, infrastructure over branding, system design over storytelling.

Of course, tensions remain. Questions about scalability, hierarchy, and sustainability continue to hinder its growth. But the point is not perfection. It’s experimentation. Experimentation with making collaboration commercially viable, perhaps even beyond just chocolate…

As models like Tony’s emerge, reframing purpose as infrastructure is no longer mere hearsay, but a blueprint for a new ethos.

And with the growing conversation, my participants were beginning to say the quiet parts out loud…

One strategy director working at the intersection of brand and behaviour change put it bluntly: “I think a tick box approach is no longer going to work. You’re going to have to show really fundamental philosophical alignment with being better in a way that isn’t just about changing the packaging and taking out an ingredient”.

That alignment demands something far more profound than marketing. It requires a re-design of the business itself – a theme cited with increasing urgency. As one contributor from a UK-based Social Enterprise seeking to reimagine the role of advertising in shaping sustainable futures put it:  “The deep design of business, like oh, we maybe need to re-work the way our business is designed so it doesn’t focus on short term shareholder profit because essentially if we do that, then we’re going to be locked into this system of never ending growth.”

They continued, pressing on the structural roots of the crisis: “Business structure and ultimately capitalism in its current form isn’t going to work… It’s either the system will collapse, or we need something completely different. The current form of business is just not progressive and ambitious enough. … Ultimately, there’s still [problems] with over consumption [and that] is still kind of the core of the problem.”

This isn’t just a critique, it’s construction. Participants were not rejecting growth out of idealism, but from survival instinct. Overconsumption is not an unfortunate byproduct of profit cycles. It’s the business model. Structural reform isn’t a moral preference, but an ecological imperative.

So, if radical reform is required, how do we learn how to do it?  As a leading sustainability strategist and impact director explained, “Solving these societal challenges is not something that is taught at any step of the career path of marketers. … And so, to do that well, you need to work, have them work in with other people, other skills.”

Perhaps it’s time for more than just a workshop; it requires a rewrite.

This is where commoning steps in. More than just a governance model, commoning is a pedagogy. One based not only on the organisation of resources and supply chains, but also on relationships and responsibilities. It invites collaboration, shared expertise and knowledge pluralism.  But, as Martin Parker, professor of management at the University of Bristol, writes, “Business schools have become loudspeakers for neoliberal capitalism”.  Perhaps it’s time for more than just a workshop; it requires a rewrite. 

Because ultimately, to survive, you must adapt. As one purpose-led social enterprise leader put it: “It will be the brands that are already resilient because they’ve built in sustainability into the end purpose, into the core of what they’re doing. Be it their supply chains, be it the materials they’re using, be it the people that they’re employing, be it the structure of the business”.

If social enterprises can expand collective governance and democratic practices, they could serve as the purpose-led prototypes of a post-capitalist economy. Therefore, the story of ESG may not be considered a failure, but rather a Trojan horse. Seemingly a collapse, it could conceal a foundation for a far more profound reflection. 

All participant quotations cited remain anonymous in accordance with ethical guidelines.