The Struggles for Organizational Discursive Hegemony on the Sustainability of Fracking in Colombia

Abstract

Over more than ten years different organizations in Colombia (South America) have discussed the advantages and disadvantages of implementing hydraulic fracturing processes (fracking) as a way to increase the production and exports of oil and natural gas. Drawing on the fields of critical organizational discourse studies and environmental studies, this manuscript explores how the Colombian discourses on fracking emerge, recontextualize, operationalize, and become hegemonic in order to present fracking as a sustainable or unsustainable practice. After performing a discourse analysis of organizational texts published between 2012 and 2020 by different Colombian organizations, I argue that the intertextual discourse on the sustainability of fracking reflects both interorganizational collaboration and disruption.