The word sustainability has lost its meaning. Once a rallying cry for conscious consumption and ethical business, it has been drowned by profit and politics. What comes next is not the end of caring for the planet. It’s the rise of new models and terms that more accurately address the challenges ahead.

The Politicization of ESG & DEI

Corporate sustainability frameworks are collapsing under political pressure. Policy experts now admit that terms like sustainability, net zero, and carbon neutral have been stretched thin. Analysts warn these slogans so easy to misuse they risk doing more harm than good.

As Reuters reported, ESG — once a catch-all for responsible business practices, from cutting carbon emissions to tackling workplace discrimination — has become politically polarizing in the West. Larry Fink, CEO of BlackRock, abandoned the term as early as 2023, recognizing before many of his peers that climate-conscious investing was falling out of fashion.

Under the current U.S. administration, companies shifted from greenwashing (pretending to be more environmentally friendly than they actually are) to greenhushing (hiding their social & environmental initiatives to avoid political backlash).

Yet BlackRock still employs more than 700 “global sustainable and transition specialists.” Whether or not you believe in climate change, the world’s wealthiest institutions are preparing for rough times ahead.

Fossil fuel pushback and the case against climate change

Some researchers argue that rising global temperatures may reflect natural fluctuation cycles the earth undergoes every few thousand years. A study from the Harvard-Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics noted that “many records reveal that the 20th century is probably not the warmest nor a uniquely extreme climatic period of the last millennium.” For fossil fuel executives, this conclusion gives them little reason to change course.

Climate activists have heavily relied on alarmism, shame, and moral superiority to push for social and administrative change. These tactics have backfired horribly, spurring intense push back against environmental awareness, conservation, and regulation.

Think about it — why would one of history’s most profitable industries accept regulations, when their existence is founded on profit? It goes against their economics.

Consideration cannot be forced. It can only be incentivized — especially when behavior has gone unchecked for generations.

To those on the receiving end, moralizing feels like an invasion. They disregard the message entirely, however valid.

“Go Woke, Go Broke.”

The phrase “go woke, go broke” grew from shareholder pushback against ESG. Social justice initiatives were seen as costly or misaligned with core business.

A few companies, like Google, have balanced governance with profitability, but they remain exceptions.

Spiral Dynamics: Stage Orange, Stage Green, and Beyond

To understand our climate — political and cultural — Spiral Dynamics offers perspective. The model describes how individuals, organizations, and civilizations evolve through stages of values and worldviews.

Most of the developed world inhabits Stage Orange: extreme individualism, profit over everything and thrives on self-interest.

Stage Green occurs in response to the hollowness of the material world, spurring a search for deeper meaning. As Ross Edwards, “a crucial component of the Green worldview is the awareness that humanity and the world has been torn apart by capitalism, imperialism, colonialism – any “ism” that divides people into winners and losers.”

What Green wants, above everything else, is peace and love for all, yet it lacks the practical wisdom to realize its vision.

Orange does not yield easily. We’ve been in a transition point for decades now. In color theory, when green and orange mix, they create brown. It’s messy, sh**ty, unstable, and likely to remain so for at least 10 to 15 more years (according to other systems I’ve studied).

Now, the stage that follows Green is what really interests me — Stage Yellow.

From Sustainability to Regeneration

Stage Yellow sees the limits of profit-driven Orange and judgmental Green. It seeks integration, not conflict. Regeneration is its cultural and economic expression.

Sustainability is defensive, asking how we can avoid losing more.

Regeneration asks how we can create conditions where life — human, ecological, cultural — can thrive again.

For business, this means moving beyond ESG metrics and into measurable impact that communities can feel. For governments, it means implementing policies that actively restore, not just mitigate. For individuals, it means shifting from guilt to agency. Doing less harm isn’t enough. What matters is doing more good.

It’s smart business to care for the planet

As climate volatility increases, concern for environmental and social wellbeing will only grow.

Those that invest in community will always have the edge. Human connection and community is irreplaceable.

Companies that commit to protecting shared resources and delivering communal benefits gain both credibility and leverage.

Regeneration begins in relationships: how we treat one another, how we share resources, and how we design systems that leave people better than we found them.

The AI boom has fueled a hacking boom similar to the early days of the internet. As trust in technology and all things digital plummets, the real currency is community. Businesses that maintain networks of trust and reciprocity will ensure their ability to weather future storms.

Making space for what’s to come

Systems, institutions, and governments are crumbling. In the chaos, space is opening.

Language evolves. When terms become politicized, new ones rise to replace them.

A shared future requires global collaboration — bridges across cultures, countries, and continents. It requires listening to voices different from our own.

Let’s embrace complexity, draw from what has come before, and shape frameworks that meet people where they are.

Consideration, after all, is an inside job. ✸

A special thanks to all the people in my life who contribute to the insightful conversations that spark these articles.