Corporate irresponsibility in authoritarian contexts: organizational ignorance, rectification, and contested memories in the fire at Vila Socó case
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2025-03-25
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Barros, Amon Narciso de
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This thesis investigates how organizations strategically manage Organizational Ignorance (OI) to sustain Corporate Social Irresponsibility (CSiR) over time, particularly in authoritarian contexts. The research consists of three interrelated articles, each employing different methodological approaches to explore this phenomenon. The first article examines the case of the Vila Socó fire, analyzing how Petrobras mobilized OI before and after the tragedy to minimize its responsibility and shape rectification efforts. Methodologically, this study is based on documentary analysis of a local truth commission, legal records, newspapers reports, and institutional statements. As a theoretical contribution, the article introduces the concept of "Rectification in the Company's Terms," adding a new dimension to the CSiR framework by demonstrating how corporations manipulate rectification processes to avoid corporate accountability and prevent effective damage repair. Building on the empirical findings of the first article, the second article proposes a theoretical connection between CSiR and OI, arguing that the suppression and accumulation of ignored knowledge over time lead to CSiR events. To illustrate this process, the article introduces the metaphor of the "funnel of ignored knowledge," explaining how deliberate negligence leads to the restriction of knowledge until an overflow point, at which previously concealed information triggers a CSiR event. This article adopts a theoretical-conceptual approach based on literature review. The third article explores the political dimension of the case, examining how the alliance between the State and Petrobras shaped memory disputes to avoid accountability. The methodology includes documentary analysis, interviews with local institutional actors, and participant observation in the community, capturing both corporate silencing strategies and the forms of resistance from the community, which nurtured its own interpretations of the Vila Socó fire. As a contribution, it proposes the concept of "Intergenerational Counter-Memory Mobilization," which describes how communities resist hegemonic narratives of traumatic events and construct alternative memories over time. The thesis advances the CSiR literature by demonstrating that corporate irresponsibility is not merely a reactive phenomenon, but an intentional process sustained by OI and political-institutional alliances that favor corporations at the expense of victims and society. Furthermore, it contributes to Memory studies by exploring how narrative disputes shape perceptions of accountability over time.