Posts by Bill Carroll

About Bill Carroll

Bill Carroll teaches Sociology at the University of Victoria, and served as founding director of UVic’s Program in Social Justice Studies from 2008 to 2012. Since the mid-1980s, he has conducted collaborative research with social movement communities. His books include The Making of a Transnational Capitalist Class, Corporate Power and Canadian Capitalism Remaking Media (with Bob Hackett) and Organizing Dissent. Two 2016 books are Expose, Oppose, Propose: Alternative Policy Groups in the Struggle for Global Justice and A World to Win: Counter-Hegemony and Contemporary Social Movements (with Kanchan Sarker). His current project, “Mapping the power of the carbon-extractive corporate resource sector” (co-directed with Shannon Daub) traces modalities of corporate power within the global political economy, focusing particularly on carbon extraction in western Canada. More about Bill

Canada’s fossil fuel lobby influences policy and decisions for major federal government projects

Nov 8, 2019

By Bill Carroll, Nicolas Graham and David Chen

There’s no doubt that climate change and fossil fuel extraction were vote determining for significant sections of the population in the federal election. These issues dominated the federal leaders’ debates and since September we’ve seen hundreds of thousands across the country join student-led climate strikes demanding more robust climate action. Such demands are likely to… View Article

Who owns and benefits from Canada’s fossil fuel sector?

Oct 23, 2018

By Bill Carroll and Jouke Huijzer

Many Canadians—politicians and business people in particular—are quick to tout the value of the fossil fuel sector to our national economy. But who primarily benefits from these industries? The major investors in Canada’s fossil fuel sector (oil, bitumen, gas and coal) have high stakes in maintaining business as usual, rather than addressing the industry’s serious… View Article

5.2 million reasons the fossil fuel industry has the BC government’s ear

Mar 8, 2017

By Nicolas Graham, Shannon Daub and Bill Carroll

The problem of corporate influence in politics and government is heating up in BC as we head towards the May election. 2017 kicked off with an explosive story in the New York Times, aptly titled “British Columbia: The Wild West of Canadian Political Cash.” The story drew widespread attention to the complete absence of limits… View Article

Why is the CEO of a big Canadian bank giving speeches about climate change and pipelines?

Oct 7, 2016

By Shannon Daub and Bill Carroll

Royal Bank of Canada CEO David McKay made a few headlines last week when he offered his thoughts to the Edmonton Chamber of Commerce on the energy and climate challenges facing Canada. In his speech he called on the federal government to help get fossil fuel resources to market by approving new bitumen pipelines and… View Article