Abstract
Highlighting the uniqueness of websites as a specific form of interactive and visual communication tool, we explore how corporate websites aid storytelling in times of distress. Using the corporate website of BP as our empirical context, we analyze the visual story that unfolded before and after the 2010 Deepwater Horizon disaster though a visual semiotic method, and argue that the changes in the story potentially mitigated the impact of the environmental catastrophe after the spill. We propose that our website analysis of a case of serious corporate misdoing, where a company’s stated and actual environmental practices were in dissonance, provides an insight to the construction of the ‘liquid organization,’ as well as to what Bauman calls ‘liquid power’ or ‘the art of escape from all forms of social responsibility.’ As such, we believe that mobilizing website study in management practice and education can provide a better understanding of ‘corporate hypocrisy’ in a liquid, modern world, as well as enable stakeholders’ responsibility and power to hold organizations accountable for their misdoings.
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