Climate change and racial justice ‘are not separate issues’

Impact investors are highlighting the relationship between social and environmental impact. The latest voice on this is Rachel Robasciotti, founder and chief executive of social impact firm Adasina Social Capital. Climate is “embedded in social justice investing”, said Robasciotti, speaking this week at the book launch for The Social Justice Investor.

“If you’ve chosen certain communities to keep taking the economic hits, it’s going to be those same communities that are the first to be impacted by climate change,” said Robasciotti. Climate change and social injustice are created by “the same set of behaviours: it’s extracting unsustainably from people and the planet”.

She shared how her personal experiences highlighted this issue for her: “I grew up in a really poor, segregated Black neighbourhood in California. The Black people that lived there came up to build the dam. It’s very dangerous to build dams and they took the most dangerous jobs. Many [Black] people were lost in that process. And then we were redlined into living in the south side of the town – the bloodzone if the dam were ever to collapse.

“And in 2017, as a result of extreme weather and climate change, the dam actually was under threat of breaking. At that point, I very clearly understood the relationship between racial injustice and economic injustice. They’re inextricable.”

In a similar vein, Energy Impact Partners’ Anthony Oni told New Private Markets last year: “The effects of climate change disproportionately impact marginalised communities, and investing in diverse founders and entrepreneurs can help to address these inequalities.” Oni manages EIP’s $112 million Elevate Future Fund, investing in diverse and under-represented founders in the climate space.

The Social Justice Investor is a book introducing individual investors and savers to local- and community-based investing. Its author is Andrea Longton, a Washington, DC-based community development finance investor.