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3 State Crime J. 163 (2014)
State-Corporate Environmental Cover-Up: The Response to the 2010 Gulf of Mexico Oil Spill

handle is hein.journals/stecrjl3 and id is 163 raw text is: STATE-CORPORATE ENVIRONMENTAL COVER-UP: THE RESPONSE TO THE 2010 GULF OF MEXICO OIL SPILL Elizabeth A. Bradshaw Abstract: Developing the concept of state-corporate environmental crime, this article examines the government and corporate response to the 2010 Gulf of Mexico oil spill. US federal responders functioned in coordination with BP and an extensive array of privately contracted oil spill response organizations to systematically conceal the environmental damage caused by the spill through various means. State-corporate responders applied unprecedented amounts of toxic chemical dispersants in an effort to hide the oil, blocked public and media access to response operations, and relied upon a network of federal, state and local law enforcement agencies alongside private security firms to enforce the ban. In combination, these efforts constitute a state-corporate cover-up of environmental crimes in the Gulf of Mexico oil spill. Keywords: state-corporate environmental crime; BP; Gulf of Mexico oil spill; chemical dispersants; media blackout Introduction On 20 April 2010, the Deepwater Horizon oil rig (owned by Transocean) exploded in the Gulf of Mexico, killing 11 people and injuring 17. Following the explosion, the rig toppled into the Gulf 2 days later, thereby unleashing an estimated 4.9 million barrels of oil from the Macondo well (owned by BP plc). Oil continued to gush until the well could be capped on 15 July, though it was not declared dead until 19 September. However, there have been continued reports of oil flowing from Macondo in September 2011 (Jamail 2011), October 2012 (Mufson and Achenbach 2012) and January 2013 (On Wings of Care 2013). Furthermore, while legal battles continue to play out over economic compensation for the damage, the true extent of the environmental damage to the Gulf of Mexico has yet to be fully realized. Once the spill had begun, limiting the visibility of the oil was a primary objective of the state-corporate war against the Macondo well. Chemical dispersants applied both at the surface and directly at the wellhead were the primary weapons to Elizabeth A. Bradshaw, Department of Sociology, Anthropology, and Social Work, Central Michigan University, USA, brads2ea@cmich.edu. Produced and distributed by Pluto Journals www.plutojournals.com/scj/

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