News & Events: Conference: Value, Space and Power: presenting at transdisciplinary conferences (23 June 2025)
On June 23rd Frances Brill, from the RC project team at UZH presented her findings from the first year of the Responsible City at a workshop on Value, Space and Power.
By Responsible City Team on Wed, Jun 25, 2025
The workshop, hosted at the University of Sheffield’s Centre for Research into Accounting and Finance in Context department, was an opportunity to engage with international audiences in the critical finance studies space.
Frances’ presentation ”Non-ideology’ and the politics of valuing in urban real estate decisions’ drew on fieldwork in Zurich and emerging partnerships with financial actors in CH. She argued that ESG in Switzerland has not decreased in interest despite global shifts and narratives of ESG decline (cf. Swiss Sustainable Finance 2025). Rather many of the topics have been re-depoliticised and made increasingly technical or mundane – part of ‘business as usual’ rather than ‘business as doing good’. This has allowed the continued growth of the market, as well as particular growth in the supporting industry whose importance in generating and sustaining the story of ESG challenges the idea that investors are always the most powerful actors. This work will continue in the coming months as the Responsible City explores further the way investors respond to changes in ESG requirements including from EU regulations as well as domestic private regulations.
Beyond her own presentation the workshop was an opportunity to connect with people across disciplinary boundaries working on similar topics. Highlights included Sarah Hall‘s (Deputy Director of UK in a Changing Europe) work on relational borders and the importance of thinking about borders in the context of governing financial services; Hannah Sender‘s work on domesticide in Lebanon; and Adam Leaver‘s presentation on changing accounting practices. These – and the many other great conversation-starting presentations are a great reminder of the richness of debates emerging in financial geography and the value of talking across contexts, disciplinary differences and career stages.