Talk:Ethical Oil

Open Discussion...

1. The ethical oil book is based on the premise that many of the OPEC nations are guilty of various unethical acts against their populations. The premise that Canadian Oil Sands production is "ethical" is based on the argument the Canadian government does not do these things to people in Canada. I think it fair to say that it is not original synthesis to draw the conclusion that if the reason you qualify as "ethical" is you don't do this to your own people. You also don't profit by selling weapons to the countries who you accuse in the book of doing it? It is a matter of fact we sell millions of dollars of weapons to the nations that are accused of unethical behaviour in the book. How can Canadian oil be ethical because the Canadian Government doesn't do certain things to the Canadian population, but quite happily sells the weapons to the nations who do and then call them "unethical" afterwards?

I think it a fair critical point to highlite this vs the content of the book.

I'll begin to list supporting papers and articles here.

1) The G8: global arms exporters Failing to prevent irresponsible arms transfers

(P.6) ..."Considering the extensive nature of human rights violations13 in Saudi Arabia, it is surprising that Saudi Arabia is one of only 16 countries to which automatic firearms can be exported according to Canadian regulations.14 The G8 global arms exporters, Control Arms Briefing Paper, June 2005 7.  The other countries are Australia, Belgium, Botswana, Denmark, France, Germany, Greece, Italy, the Netherlands, New Zealand, Norway, Spain, Sweden, the UK and the USA. In March 2005, Finland, Latvia, Poland and Portugal were added to the list..." The current version of the export list is available on this site and does include Saudi Arabia as per the above paper dated 2005.

2) Canadian Government Report from CSIS, I'm looking for newer versions of the same report that are unclassified.

ARCHIVED: Commentary No. 33: The Contemporary Armaments Trade

..."Certainly, strong elements of public opinion in the West appear to be opposed to the export of arms in principle, on ethical grounds. However, most governments throughout the world have long considered arms transfers to be a perfectly legitimate instrument of their foreign policy, at once beneficial to both supplier and recipient."

..."In the current climate, however, it is difficult to avoid the conclusion that most arms suppliers are driven most of the time by purely economic motives."...

3) A related news article from the UK

A Point of View: Why euphemism is integral to modern warfare

"...So, even as Gaddafi's forces were being destroyed in bizarre battles that pitted British weapons against other British weapons, plans were afoot to sell still more of the same to authoritarian regimes in the Middle East - such as Saudi Arabia and Bahrain - with documented histories of human rights abuses."

"...But why shouldn't we apply the same domestic analogy to the conduct of states themselves? If we consider a government that attacks its own citizenry to be on a par with a homicidal maniac who stabs his wife, then what does that make the government/person who supplies the knife other than an accessory to uxoricide?..."

"...Absolutely, let's call a spade a spade, a gun a gun, missile a missile, a cluster bomb a child-killer and a Tactica armoured car a means of brutal civilian repression when it's deployed by the Saudis to support the undemocratic government in Bahrain."...

I do not think it is a stretch that to claim you provide "ethical" oil alternative, this must be backed up with more than just domestic policy fluff. That a valid critisism of this "ethical" title is linked to the foreign policies of the Canadian government particularily when they connect weapons sales to regimes used to highlite the disparities between how governments treat their own populations. The connection is made by CSIS, BBC, Various International NGO's etc...

I'm not sure how to cite the above references... any help would be appretiated I'm still a rank rookie at this.

— Preceding unsigned comment added by Kurt Dundy (talk • contribs) 19:31, 29 November 2011 (UTC)

Recent Reverts Explantion Requested
Why has the final sentence in this paragraph been removed when it links directly to evolution of a career in government? I believe the final sentence adds additional information that is relavent to the first.

In 2011, Alykhan Velshi, a former staffer for Minister of Immigration Jason Kenney, founded a website to promote the ideas put forward by Ezra Levant in his book. The website, EthicalOil.org, launched a campaign to compare Canada's 'Ethical Oil' against OPEC's 'Conflict Oil' and features controversial advertisements comparing conditions for women, gays and other minorities in OPEC countries to those in Canada. EthicalOil.org has staged counter-protests in response to opposition to the Keystone XL pipeline project.

'''After setting up the ethicaloil.org website, Velshi has returned to Parliament Hill in late 2011, in the position of Director of Planning for the Prime Minister's Office. '''

Kurt Dundy (talk) 12:57, 11 January 2012 (UTC)

Recent Reverts Explantion Requested
In the part of the page titled "Criticism" you removed additional edits cited from debate held on December 6th 2011 on CBC's "The Current" between Andrew Crane, a leading York University business ethics professor and director of the Schulich School of Business‘s Centre of Excellence in Responsible Business, versus an oil industry spokesperson Kathryn Marshall. They were directly discussing the book in question. The criticism levelled on the book by a York University Business Ethics professor covered in "The Current" would appear to be a public criticism on a leading Canadian program of the book and thus relevant to this section of the page.

On December 6th 2011 a debate was held on CBC's "The Current" between Andrew Crane, a leading York University business ethics professor and director of the Schulich School of Business‘s Centre of Excellence in Responsible Business, versus an oil industry spokesperson Kathryn Marshall. Mr. Crane highlited several ethical concerns he had with the manner in which oil sands oil was being branded ethical.

"...its narrow focus on human rights and the rule of law distracts attention from the massive environmental damage and energy consumption involved in extraction and processing of tar sands oil..."

"...the claim that tar sands operations fully respect human rights is debatable, with numerous First Nations claiming that these operations impair their rights to clean water and a healthful environment..."

"...the xenophobic undertones of the Ethical Oil message – it is no coincidence that most of the countries targeted by the campaign are ethnically, culturally or religiously distinct from the white Canadian majority, and the dangerous “otherness” of the foreigner is a central trope of Levant’s book..."

"...to be a real leader Canada would have to show that it is genuinely committed to progress toward a post-carbon economy and improvement of the human rights records of Canadian companies overseas. This would include holding Canadian oil companies to the same high standards wherever they do business in the world. It is disingenuous to say that oil companies in Canada are ethical leaders if those very same companies are busily pumping oil and propping up those same repressive foreign regimes that the Ethical Oil campaign vilifies..."

Kurt Dundy (talk) 13:03, 11 January 2012 (UTC)


 * Why I think it should be included modified to include Ms. Marshall's rebuttal text.

The context of the edits.

York University is is Canada's third-largest university, Ontario's second-largest graduate school, and Canada's leading interdisciplinary university.

York University's business school and law school have continuously been ranked among the top schools in Canada and the world.

Addressing “criticism that is only tangentially related to Levant's book “ I don’t think I am going out on a limb here when I point out Mr. Crane was offering direct critical analysis of the book, that hardly qualifies as “tangentially related to Levant’s book”… I believe that when a top ranked Canadian University and Business School program both domestic and on the world stage…. has a tenured professor with a Ph.D. ‘Marketing, Morality and the Natural Environment’ ... who teaches Ethics and Social Responsibility in Management and International Business Ethics at this top ranked school… I think it fair to say he is one of the perfect people to offer critical analysis of Ezra’s book on “Ethical Oil”. This was all done on a leading Canadian journalistic program. This man is more than qualified to offer insightful and meaningful critical analysis of the content of this book, that adds substantial value for wiki users viewing this page.

I’ll cede the point that my presentation could be much better, particularly with the lack of the rebuttal statements from Kathryn Marshall. I’ve ordered a copy of the program text to ensure I accurately capture Ms. Marshall’s rebuttals.

As to your comment of undue, given the earlier content of the page and the content of Ezra’s book I don’t think 4 points and about 8 or 9 lines from Mr. Crane's direct critical analysis of the book are undue at all (I think it safe consider him a leading expert on the subject in Canada... - prof top domestic school, top 20 international, teaches ethics), nor do they digress. Once I get the transcript and have accurately captured Ms. Marshall’s rebuttal statements I’ll put another version up here for you to look at prior to posting. If this page is going to have a Critical section lets put meaningful critical analysis there… That does nothing but improve the page for users in my opinion. Kurt Dundy (talk) 17:42, 13 January 2012 (UTC)

update:

I've received the transcript of the CBC radio episode, and written a draft of a summary suggestion for the criticism section of this page. Dr. Andrew Crane and Jody Williams are eminently qualified to make critical comments on the content of this book, and the ethical oil argument. Business ethics professor at an internationally ranked Canadian business school, and a nobel laureate chairing a nobel women's rights group.

To save some space I would suggest getting rid of the comment about the book signing, it has nothing whatsoever to do with a critical assessment of ethical oil... it adds nothing to a wiki readers ability to look at a summary of the book and counter points to it if reading or researching the topic.

"At a book signing event in Saskatoon on 17 September 2010, police had to be called to defuse a verbal clash between demonstrators and Levant. Most of the demonstrators were gone before the police arrived, but Levant started his subsequent question and answer session by addressing a critic's question.[32]"

Draft edit suggestion...

''CBC's The Current held a debate on the merits of the ethical oil argument. Nobel laureate and chair of the Nobel Women's Initiative Jody Williams, argued that the ethical oil position was disingenuous and suspect of commercial interests rather than genuine concern for women’s rights. She argued the oil industry with no history of advocating the case of women’s rights, is ill placed to begin the discussion. Katherine Marshall ethicaloil.org spokesperson responded that the ethical nature of the oil production needs to be discussed, and she expected human rights activists and groups to be more inclined to promote dialogue. Dr. Andrew Crane a business ethics professor at York University agreed the ethical argument for oil production should be discussed, but also added the narrow focus of the books argument was prioritising human rights over other ethical evaluating factors. Dr. Crane further stated that Canada was not taking a leadership position by trying to improve ethical extraction practices across the board, not just in Canada but overseas. He argued a primary ethical indicator is leadership, and companies operating in Canada and Canadian companies operating abroad were not being held accountable within the ethical oil argument for their overseas practices. Katherine Marshall responded the focus should be on the pushing these “unethical” countries for regulatory action, rather than the pushing the companies to improve in the absence of a regulatory impetus.'' Kurt Dundy (talk) 14:48, 30 January 2012 (UTC)