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Dr. Jane Goodall’s recent onstage conversation with Forbes senior editor Maggie McGrath was billed as a blueprint for sustainable business leadership, and the elites in Manhattan ate it up. Goodall urged CEOs to take responsibility and to “have courage,” framing sustainability as a moral choice companies can make rather than a government mandate.
During the talk she even shared a human story about a CEO who changed his company after his child asked whether his work was hurting the planet, a reminder that personal conscience — not regulatory coercion — often sparks real corporate reform. That anecdote should give pause to the left’s narrative that only regulators or activists can force businesses to act.
Goodall also called out the excesses of corporate culture, warning that business has become obsessed with power and money, a critique that conservatives can respect even while rejecting the idea that capitalism must be punished. Her point is useful: free enterprise works best when guided by conscience and common sense, not virtue-signaling mandates from disconnected elites.
That said, the backdrop to these conversations is an entire corporate ecosystem leaning into ESG frameworks that often reward symbolism over substance. When Forbes’ own coverage highlighted Goodall’s plea for leaders to act with courage, it underscored a reality conservatives have warned about for years — pressure from media and investors can push companies into costly, performative commitments that don’t help working families.
Practical conservatives should welcome voluntary stewardship, innovation, and companies that genuinely reduce waste while keeping American jobs and families first, but we must be blunt about tradeoffs: meaningful sustainability can cost more and cannot be achieved by edict alone. The smartest path is to let entrepreneurs drive solutions, not Washington bureaus or boardroom orthodoxy.
If Americans want real conservation, we should champion market-driven innovation, local stewardship, and incentives that reward results instead of punishing prosperity. Jane Goodall’s appeal to individual choice — to “choose wisely” the impact we make — is a lesson conservatives can convert into policy: encourage private responsibility, protect livelihoods, and trust the people who build prosperity to also care for the land that sustains it.
