Abstract
Drawing on ethnographic research in Houston, Texas, I explore how oil and gas experts negotiate social power and precariousness within the US hydrocarbon sector. In an industry long associated with corporate power, the careers of experts are precariously balanced on rising and falling hydrocarbon prices. This makes the social power these experts wield as fluid as the commodities they are premised on. I show that informal social networks solidified by industry associations can buffer this precariousness by opening new employment opportunities and allowing them to maintain their connection to elite industry circles through periods of unemployment and uncertainty. For many working in the industry, precariousness defines the US hydrocarbon sector as much as the wealth that it is known to generate. Precariousness, I argue, is not just experienced by specific groups of people but rather is a general characteristic of capitalism that touches all but a select few.
Highlights
Drawing on ethnographic research in Houston, Texas, I explore how oil and gas experts negotiate social power and precariousness within the US hydrocarbon sector
In an industry long associated with the corporate power of oil majors, the social power of experts within the industry’s hierarchies is fluid and at times tenuous – waxing and waning with boom-bust cycles in hydrocarbon prices that can lead to mass layoffs and unemployment
While I explore how industry insiders ethically value hydrocarbons and how they engage with risk and responsibility elsewhere, here I advance the literature on experts by showing how informal social networks are key to the performance of expertise and, importantly, a means by which to hedge against social and employment precariousness (Field, in press, forthcoming a)
Summary
Drawing on ethnographic research in Houston, Texas, I explore how oil and gas experts negotiate social power and precariousness within the US hydrocarbon sector. What they do not explore is how informal social networks that cut across firms and are solidified by industry associations, are an element of expert performance that can buffer social and employment precariousness and keep people within these communities through periods of unemployment.
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