Throughout the story of Esav, from its beginnings in this week's parasha to its last mention in this week's haftora (taken from the last chapters of the Tanakh), Esav is described as wicked in an almost deterministic manner. One can explain that there was nothing deterministic at all but that God only "informed" his mother before his birth what his future would be.
Another way to explain this is to say that he was born with the tendency for violence, but a tendency which he did not need to follow up on. According to this, we would say that even if he were not destined to be the father of the Jewish People, any effort put into his service of Hashem would have been valued in its own right. It is no one's fault but his own that he did not fulfill this potential.
The value of each person's efforts and intentions even while doing a mistaken act can actually be learnt from a verse later in the haftora (Malakhi 1:11). God tells us that across the world His name is great among the nations and that they all serve Him. This is explained by our Rabbis (Talmud Bavli Menachot 110a) and later by Rashi and Rambam (Guide for the Perplexed 1:36) as meaning that although they serve idols they relate to Hashem as the God of gods.
Although the nations being described are not monotheistic, on some deeper level they are considered to be serving Hashem. This is because the core of their intention is valued even if their acts are incorrect. If this is how God judges human beings, God's "hate" for Esav (Malakhi 1:3) is only because Esav did not fulfill his potential, not because he was not as great as Yaakov.