Abstract
Gaining and maintaining a social licence to locate, build, and operate a resource extraction project involves political considerations as much as stakeholder relationship building and collaborative community development. This paper presents two case studies from Canada related to oil and gas pipelines. The 40-year evolution of the Mackenzie Valley natural gas pipeline project illustrates the importance of local, national, and international history and culture in gaining a social licence. The controversies surrounding pipelines to deliver product from the Alberta oil sands illustrate how the level of social licence can depend on the national and international policy narratives about energy more than operational practices of the industry that address opponents’ criticisms. Industry leaders who relied on legal rights and institutions created in a bygone political era were outmaneuvered by activists who played by new rules based on narratives that challenge established law. The lesson for the oil and gas industry is that a stable and durable social licence capable of facilitating project advancement or continuance requires multiple levels of interlocking support based on sociopolitical narratives that build more influential political coalitions.
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Boutilier, R.G., Thomson, I. (2022). The Role of Historical and International Movements in Determining the Social Licence. In: Wood, G., Mete, G., Górski, J. (eds) The Palgrave Handbook of Social License to Operate and Energy Transitions. Palgrave Studies in Energy Transitions. Palgrave Macmillan, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-74725-1_1-1
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The Role of Historical and International Movements in Determining the Social Licence- Published:
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-74725-1_1-2
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-74725-1_1-1