In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:

Chapter 7 “Whether We’re for BP or against BP, We All Sound Conspiratorial” Throughout their long struggle to save the Lima refinery, Mayor Berger and his comrades on the task force never seemed to raise their heads above the immediate crisis and take an honest look at the odds they faced. If they had done so, they might have realized, as any number of specialists would have assured them, that their cause was hopeless. As they battled on over the course of the following year, Lima community leaders ran up against that hard truth time and time again, but they persisted in their resistance until the end. As their employers could testify, local residents had long cultivated a reputation for stubbornness, and they were led by a mayor who was fond of quoting Winston Churchill in the depths of World War II, enjoining his fellow citizens to never, never, never give up. It soon became clear that at least a small collection of local people would keep after BP with unshakable determination until the company finally decided either to save its refinery or destroy it. “no matter what BP may or may not be telling you” After a subdued celebration of New Year’s Day, 1997, Lima leaders could not have been much heartened at the refinery’s prospects. They had maybe a month left in BP’s timetable and an uncertain portfolio of social capital to work with. Social scientists like Carmen Sirianni and Lewis Friedland define social capital as “those stocks of social trust, norms and networks that people can draw on to solve common problems.” As the city of Lima geared up for its final rounds of engagement with BP, it became increasingly clear that its social capital differed somewhat from that of other industrial communities in similar circumstances. 167 168 RUST BelT ReSISTAnCe The greatest difference was a fundamentally different dynamic of community politics operating in Lima. In many other industrial cities, opposition to a devastating plant closing generally coalesced from the ground up, forming a coalition of labor and community groups that sought every angle of leverage to motivate municipal officials toward greater activism in the struggle to reverse the damaging financial decisions of the corporation in question. In Lima, however, the calculus worked somewhat the other way around. There it was the small set of local citizens on the refinery task force, led by an activist mayor, who would try to prod an unwieldy coalition of Chamber of Commerce and labor officials into an intensified engagement with BP. Nor could these activists count on support from a largely unified community. Although the flame of public anger did blaze white-hot against BP in a few specific moments of crisis, Berger would have an increasingly difficult time stoking that flame into the kind of sustained, longterm opposition that the crisis required. As many union activists withdrew in bitterness and despair and growth officials—aghast at the possible creation of a “negative business climate”—became eager to accept whatever BP would give them, in the end the mayor and a few allies would carry on largely alone.1 Still, Mayor Berger and others in the Lima community who were determined to fight to the end to save the refinery were able to draw on a few of the elements of social capital that had facilitated some level of successful resistance to corporate decisions in other communities. At times, they could rely on the critical factor of an “aroused local community,” and also at least the possibility of a critical and engaged local press. BP was a powerful global corporation, but it was not yet conclusively apparent that an adept marshalling of local political, economic, and cultural forces could not alter its decisions in some way. As labor studies scholar Bruce Nissen argues, a successful confrontation requires the existence of certain cultural/political dynamics that render corporate decisions amenable to public pressure. In Allen County, real possibilities appeared along that line. According to Belcher, the task force realized that BP was very “sensitive to public opinion.” The community was already outraged. Nobody on the task force could see the harm in further stoking that anger and then watching where the public reaction led.2 To mobilize public opinion, Berger knew, the most immediate need was to recruit the assistance of a venerable local institution that had historically viewed activism of any sort as an anathema. He needed the Lima News. Despite the paper ’s conservative history...

Share