Shell, Nigeria and the Ogoni. A study in unsustainable development

Richard Boele, Heike Fabig and David Wheeler
Additional contact information
Richard Boele: Kingston University, UK, Postal: Kingston University, UK
Heike Fabig: University of Sussex, UK, Postal: University of Sussex, UK
David Wheeler: York University, Canada, Postal: York University, Canada

Sustainable Development, 2001, vol. 9, issue 3, 121-135

Abstract: In the first paper in this trilogy (Boele et al., 2001) we described the history of the Royal Dutch|Shell Group from its inception in 1890 through to the year 2000, discussed briefly the importance of corporate reputation to the group and described the significant impacts on Shell of the events of 1995 in Nigeria. We traced the relationship of the Shell Petroleum Development Corporation in Nigeria to impacts on the natural and social environments of the Niger Delta and more specifically on the Ogoni. Finally we discussed the emergence of political resistance and significant conflict between Shell and the Movement for the Survival of the Ogoni People (MOSOP) and concluded that, despite significant apparent changes in attitude at the group level, distrust and antipathy towards Shell remained entrenched in Ogoni. In this second paper, we explore in more detail issues raised by economic globalization for the practice of corporate social responsibility and stakeholder management, and contrast these concepts with an alternative 'rights-based' approach to sustainable development. We relate our observations to Shell's current approach and conclude that the Shell group and specifically the Shell Petroleum Development Corporation in Nigeria may require an alternative approach to sustainable development if they wish to merit the full confidence of communities in areas of the world as complex and distressed as Ogoni. Copyright © 2001 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd and ERP Environment

Date: 2001
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (4)

Downloads: (external link)
http://hdl.handle.net/10.1002/sd.168 Link to full text; subscription required (text/html)

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:wly:sustdv:v:9:y:2001:i:3:p:121-135

DOI: 10.1002/sd.168

Access Statistics for this article

Sustainable Development is currently edited by Richard Welford

More articles in Sustainable Development from John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.
Bibliographic data for series maintained by Wiley Content Delivery ().