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Risk and responsibility: Private equity financiers and the US shale revolution

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  • Sean Field

Abstract

Drawing on ethnographic research in Houston, Texas, I explore how private equity financiers in the US hydrocarbon industry are empowered to define and take financial risks on our collective behalf. The US shale revolution could not have unfolded without the financial risk‐taking activities of private equity financiers who channeled billions of dollars into US unconventional exploration and production (“fracking”). These financiers are motivated not only by their own capitalist projects but also by feelings of responsibility to take financial risks for the benefit of others. Shedding light on this enigmatic community, I attend to the relatively neglected area of hydrocarbon finance and highlight how perceptions of financial risk and responsibility become entangled to shape our collective energy present(s) and future(s). As an essential piece of the financial infrastructure that connects investors around the world with US hydrocarbon activities, I suggest that private equity firms are conduits not only of capital but also of responsibility.

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  • Sean Field, 2022. "Risk and responsibility: Private equity financiers and the US shale revolution," Economic Anthropology, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 9(1), pages 47-59, January.
    • Handle: RePEc:bla:ecanth:v:9:y:2022:i:1:p:47-59
    DOI: 10.1002/sea2.12221
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    References listed on IDEAS

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    1. Horacio Ortiz, 2014. "The Limits of Financial Imagination: Free Investors, Efficient Markets, and Crisis," Post-Print hal-00966544, HAL.
    2. Thomas A. Reuter, 2021. "Climate change as a cultural artifact: Anthropological insights to help avert systemic collapse," Economic Anthropology, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 8(1), pages 175-179, January.
    3. Aneil Tripathy, 2017. "Translating to risk: The legibility of climate change and nature in the green bond market," Economic Anthropology, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 4(2), pages 239-250, June.
    4. Horacio Ortiz, 2013. "Financial value: economic, moral, political, global," Post-Print hal-00869852, HAL.
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    1. Sean Field, 2023. "Value as ethics: Climate change, crisis, and the struggle for the future," Economic Anthropology, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 10(2), pages 177-185, June.

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