Playing out a full hand: popular power and the vulnerability of transnational energy corporations

Abstract

In this paper we respond to the assumption, prevalent among many Northern environmental and indigenist organizations, that grassroots movements are powerless to halt development projects initiated by transnational energy corporations. We begin by examining the compromise position which the U.S. National Resources Defense Committee (NRDC) advocated in the struggle against oil development on indigenous lands in the Ecuadorian Amazon. We compare this compromise position to a number of recent victories of popular movements against large-scale energy development in Africa and the Americas. We then turn to a structural analysis of the present strategic vulnerability of transnational energy corporations. In a survey of the political economy of energy production and sale in the present century we identify three critical factors pertaining to the strategic vulnerability of energy transnationals. The first is their fear of direct confrontation with movements of energy workers and their communities. The second factor is the repeated efforts by energy transnationals to promote intermediary social actors (such as oil parastatals) that can serve as buffers against popular movements. The third is the undermining of the legitimacy and power of these intermediaries under the pressure of global economic restructuring in the period 1973 to present. We conclude that international energy is today left with only two highly problematic strategies against popular resistance: the use of violent repression and the co-option of those Northern NGOs willing to effect compromises within the hegemony of transnational capital. Key historical events referred to in this analysis include the 1973 oil embargo, the 1978 uprising by Iranian oil communities, the 1989 gathering of indigenous peoples and environmentalist in Altamira, Brazil and the 1991 Persian Gulf War. The title refers to Native American activist Russel Mean's exhortation to popular movements to reject the unnecessary compromises recommended by their would-be allies.