Massachusetts Pension Reserves Investment Management's board voted Nov. 30 to change the name of the $95.2 billion Boston-based state pension fund's ESG Committee to the Stewardship and Sustainability Committee.
Board members noted that the change would make the work of the committee, and the broader fund, easier for the public to understand at a time when ESG, or environmental, social and governance, has become a four-letter word in parts of the country.
It's a good move for PRIM amid what has become almost "open warfare" in some states between supporters and opponents of ESG, said longtime PRIM board member Robert L. Brousseau.
Stewardship and sustainability "can be explained, and be understood by people, better than ESG," he noted.
The move comes even as some observers suggested anti-ESG sentiment may be cresting.
"The big proponent of the negative war on the term ESG is fading off into the distance," said Deborah Goldberg, board chair and state treasurer, without naming names.
On the political front, candidates who have made opposition to ESG being considered in the management of public retirement funds — including Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis and entrepreneur Vivek Ramaswamy — have shown few signs of gaining traction in the polls.
