
Private Empire
ExxonMobil and American Power
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Narrated by:
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Malcolm Hillgartner
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By:
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Steve Coll
About this listen
Steve Coll investigates the largest and most powerful private corporation in the United States, revealing the true extent of its power. ExxonMobil’s annual revenues are larger than the economic activity in the great majority of countries. In many of the countries where it conducts business, ExxonMobil’s sway over politics and security is greater than that of the United States embassy. In Washington, ExxonMobil spends more money lobbying Congress and the White House than almost any other corporation. Yet despite its outsized influence, it is a black box.
Private Empire pulls back the curtain, tracking the corporation’s recent history and its central role on the world stage, beginning with the Exxon Valdez accident in 1989 and leading to the Deepwater Horizon oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico in 2010. The action spans the globe, moving from Moscow, to impoverished African capitals, Indonesia, and elsewhere in heart-stopping scenes that feature kidnapping cases, civil wars, and high-stakes struggles at the Kremlin.
At home, Coll goes inside ExxonMobil’s K Street office and corporation headquarters in Irving, Texas, where top executives in the “God Pod” (as employees call it) oversee an extraordinary corporate culture of discipline and secrecy.
The narrative is driven by larger-than-life characters, including corporate legend Lee “Iron Ass” Raymond, ExxonMobil’s chief executive until 2005. A close friend of Dick Cheney’s, Raymond was both the most successful and effective oil executive of his era and an unabashed skeptic about climate change and government regulation. This position proved difficult to maintain in the face of new science and political change, and Raymond’s successor, current ExxonMobil chief executive Rex Tillerson, broke with Raymond’s programs in an effort to reset ExxonMobil’s public image. The larger cast includes countless world leaders, plutocrats, dictators, guerrillas, and corporate scientists who are part of ExxonMobil’s colossal story.
The first hard-hitting examination of ExxonMobil, Private Empire is the masterful result of Coll’s indefatigable reporting. He draws here on more than 400 interviews, field reporting from the halls of Congress to the oil-laden swamps of the Niger Delta, more than 1,000 pages of previously classified U.S. documents obtained under the Freedom of Information Act, heretofore unexamined court records, and many other sources. A penetrating, newsbreaking study, Private Empire is a defining portrait of ExxonMobil and the place of Big Oil in American politics and foreign policy.
©2012 Steve Coll (P)2012 PenguinListeners also enjoyed...
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Critic reviews
"ExxonMobil has met its match in Coll, an elegant writer and dogged reporter… extraordinary...monumental." (The Washington Post)
"Fascinating.... Private Empire is a book meticulously prepared as if for trial, a lawyerly accumulation of information that lets the facts speak for themselves...a compelling and elucidatory work." (BLOOMBERG)
"Private Empire is meticulous, multi-angled and valuable.... Mr. Coll’s prose sweeps the earth like an Imax camera." (Dwight Garner, The New York Times)
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By: Steve Coll
-
The Achilles Trap
- Saddam Hussein, the C.I.A., and the Origins of America's Invasion of Iraq
- By: Steve Coll
- Narrated by: Malcolm Hillgartner
- Length: 17 hrs and 58 mins
- Unabridged
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When the United States invaded Iraq in 2003, its message was clear: Iraq, under the control of strongman Saddam Hussein, possessed weapons of mass destruction that, if left unchecked, posed grave danger to the world. But when no WMDs were found, the United States and its allies were forced to examine the political and intelligence failures that had led to the invasion and the occupation, and the civil war that followed. One integral question has remained unsolved.
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From the Saddam’s Point of View.
- By philip on 03-08-24
By: Steve Coll
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Blood and Oil
- Mohammed bin Salman's Ruthless Quest for Global Power
- By: Bradley Hope, Justin Scheck
- Narrated by: Peter Ganim
- Length: 12 hrs and 37 mins
- Unabridged
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From award-winning Wall Street Journal reporters comes a revelatory look at the inner workings of the world's most powerful royal family, and how the struggle for succession produced Saudi Arabia's charismatic but ruthless Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman, aka MBS.
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Nothing New Here
- By Susie Takach Seligman on 09-10-20
By: Bradley Hope, and others
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The Prize
- The Epic Quest for Oil, Money & Power
- By: Daniel Yergin
- Narrated by: Michael David Axtell
- Length: 46 hrs and 11 mins
- Unabridged
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Now with an epilogue that speaks directly to the current energy crisis, The Prize recounts the panoramic history of the world’s most important resource—oil. Daniel Yergin’s timeless book chronicles the struggle for wealth and power that has surrounded oil for decades and that continues to fuel global rivalries, shake the world economy, and transform the destiny of men and nations. This updated edition categorically proves the unwavering significance of oil throughout the twentieth century and into the twenty-first by tracing economic and political clashes over precious “black gold.”
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Great book!
- By Javier H. Eguino on 04-09-25
By: Daniel Yergin
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The Upside of Oil and Gas Investing
- How the New Model Works and Why It Puts the Traditional Model to Shame
- By: Jay R. Young
- Narrated by: Jay R. Young
- Length: 3 hrs and 59 mins
- Unabridged
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The oil and gas industry is old and is notoriously resistant to change. Author Jay Young wants to revolutionize it. In his book, The Upside of Oil and Gas Investing, Jay Young presents a new investment model for the oil and gas industry that represents a total change in the way much of the smaller independent companies in the industry operate. He dissects the industry in detail, showing you the pitfalls investors can find themselves falling into when they sign onto a deal structured according to the old model.
By: Jay R. Young
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The War Below
- Lithium, Copper, and the Global Battle to Power Our Lives
- By: Ernest Scheyder
- Narrated by: Matt Godfrey
- Length: 12 hrs and 8 mins
- Unabridged
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The War Below reveals the explosive brawl among industry titans, conservationists, community groups, policymakers, and many others over whether the habitats of rare plants, sensitive ecosystems, Indigenous holy sites, and other places should be dug up for their riches.
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Misses its chance at greatness
- By B L on 09-16-24
By: Ernest Scheyder
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A Colossal Failure of Common Sense
- The Inside Story of the Collapse of Lehman Brothers
- By: Patrick Robinson, Lawrence G. McDonald
- Narrated by: Erik Davies
- Length: 16 hrs and 38 mins
- Unabridged
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One of the biggest questions of the financial crisis has not been answered until now: What happened at Lehman Brothers and why was it allowed to fail, with aftershocks that rocked the global economy? In this news-making, often astonishing book, a former Lehman Brothers Vice President gives us the straight answers - right from the belly of the beast. In A Colossal Failure of Common Sense, Larry McDonald, a Wall Street insider, reveals, the culture and unspoken rules of the game like no book has ever done.
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First take: Tale of the narcissist
- By Susan Hayden on 07-28-09
By: Patrick Robinson, and others
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The World for Sale
- Money, Power and the Traders Who Barter the Earth’s Resources
- By: Javier Blas, Jack Farchy
- Narrated by: John Sackville
- Length: 12 hrs and 4 mins
- Unabridged
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In The World for Sale, two leading journalists lift the lid on one of the least scrutinised corners of the economy: the workings of the billionaire commodity traders who buy, hoard and sell the earth's resources. It is the story of how a handful of swashbuckling businessmen became indispensable cogs in global markets: enabling an enormous expansion in international trade and connecting resource-rich countries - no matter how corrupt or war-torn - with the world's financial centres.
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Explains a lot!
- By jaga on 03-24-21
By: Javier Blas, and others
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Power Failure
- The Rise and Fall of an American Icon
- By: William D. Cohan
- Narrated by: Eric Jason Martin
- Length: 28 hrs and 17 mins
- Unabridged
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No company embodied American ingenuity, innovation, and industrial power more spectacularly and more consistently than the General Electric Company. GE once developed and manufactured many of the inventions we take for granted today, nearly everything from the lightbulb to the jet engine. GE also built a cult of financial and leadership success envied across the globe and became the world’s most valuable and most admired company. But even at the height of its prestige and influence, cracks were forming in its formidable foundation.
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Much better than other GE books
- By Brannon Crawford on 12-26-22
By: William D. Cohan
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The New Map
- Energy, Climate, and the Clash of Nations
- By: Daniel Yergin
- Narrated by: Robert Petkoff
- Length: 15 hrs and 48 mins
- Unabridged
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The world is being shaken by the collision of energy, climate change, and the clashing power of nations in a time of global crisis. The "shale revolution" in oil and gas - made possible by fracking technology, but not without controversy - has transformed the American economy, ending the "era of shortage", but introducing a turbulent new era. Almost overnight, the United States has become the world's number one energy powerhouse - and, during the coronavirus crisis, brokered a tense truce between Russia and Saudi Arabia.
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Not his best: Overly broad, kind of sloppy
- By Jonathan Kelman on 02-23-21
By: Daniel Yergin
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Wildcatters
- The True Story of How Conspiracy, Greed, and the IRS Almost Destroyed a Legendary Texas Oil Family
- By: Charles Moncrief
- Narrated by: Scott Pollak
- Length: 6 hrs and 37 mins
- Unabridged
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Wildcatters is the amazing story of greed, corruption, and scandal in the framing of one of the most famous oil families in Texas and the subsequent IRS raid of unprecedental proprtions. This book will confirm your suspicions of the IRS yet provides a glimmer of hope in our criminal justice system.
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Ft. Worth Wildcatter Family
- By Stephen M. Silverman on 06-29-24
By: Charles Moncrief
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All the Shah's Men
- An American Coup and the Roots of Middle East Terror
- By: Stephen Kinzer
- Narrated by: Michael Prichard, Jonathan Yen
- Length: 11 hrs and 7 mins
- Unabridged
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In a cloak-and-dagger story of spies, saboteurs, and secret agents, Kinzer reveals the involvement of Eisenhower, Churchill, Kermit Roosevelt, and the CIA in Operation Ajax, which restored Mohammad Reza Shah to power. Reza imposed a tyranny that ultimately sparked the Islamic Revolution of 1979 which, in turn, inspired fundamentalists throughout the Muslim world, including the Taliban and terrorists who thrived under its protection.
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Hard to please
- By Rick on 09-25-04
By: Stephen Kinzer
What listeners say about Private Empire
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- Brendan
- 06-19-19
Interesting but glad it's over
Interesting book. Now I see ExxonMobil as much more of a mundane company than some nefarious international company.
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- S.M.Then
- 10-08-12
the many lives of a behemoth oil company
An investigation into a giant oil company and the people who run it and how it manages
its public profile and its engagement in places where there is little or no rule of law.
The book does not give answers but it does pose lots of questions.
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- JC
- 05-10-12
Great Fly on the Wall Perspective of ExxonMobil
If you like to feel like an insider, then this book is for you! I really like Steven Coll's pacing, as he was able to get my attention immediately as he starts with the tragedy surrounding the Exxon Valdez and all the characters involved in this historical event. From there he takes you through the ups and downs of this enormous private enterprise, which I found very insightful.
The key to the success of this book is the neutral perspective assumed by Coll, as I hate books that try to portray something that is simply big as also automatically bad. I am a businessman, and this book allowed me some keen insights into the thinking and doings of a major employer, energy producer, and endless source of speculation and controversy.
This book is not going to change your life by any means, but it is a great impartial look behind the curtain of a major global player.
I would highly recommend this book to any students of business or generally to anyone who likes to glimpse the inside.
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9 people found this helpful
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- Kingdom Trader
- 07-14-19
The History of Oil
There are many supporting actors throughout disparate countries during different decades that unless you listen carefully during the early chapters it may become confusing as the story evolves. Overall well presented by both author and narrator although I felt the ending was weak as I was expecting a strong close given the build up as the story reached its conclusion. But then at 24 hours this was a long listen but enlightening if not extremely familiar with ExxonMobil history.
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- Stuart
- 04-28-15
Interesting history
May have liked a bit more of the whole intrigue thing, but maybe it just is what it is! Overall a good read and would recommend it to anyone wanting to learn about the oil industry players.
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1 person found this helpful
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- Mayo
- 04-18-18
Excellent insight ExxonMobile/Industry
It's like ordering a puzzle and getting 15 bonus companion puzzles. 10/10 for depth/detail/nonbiased perspective.
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1 person found this helpful
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- Cinnabelle
- 04-17-18
Very educational!
This book is masterfully written. It is clear, concise and incisive. it gives an understanding of how global companies operate in their own self-intrest and above that of their nation. Also shows the interactions between government and trans-national companies and how corporate money can bend government policies to their interests.
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1 person found this helpful
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- Kenneth
- 06-23-12
Fantastic in multiple ways
If you could sum up Private Empire in three words, what would they be?
Worth The Purchase
What did you like best about this story?
The in-depth look at running an oil company. The shear detail was impressive. Furthermore, the geopolitical aspects were explained well. For example, I had no idea of how much assistance Exxon received from the government on international matters. The look into the risk metrics used in the oil industry and the mind numbing lawsuits give me a greater respect for Exxon and "privately run" oil companies in general.
Any additional comments?
I hope to find more books similar to this one.
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2 people found this helpful
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- Richard C. McGovern
- 11-13-17
A dynamic history of a modern american corporation
American Empire shows how despite both parties' desires, Exxon Mobil and US foreign policy became inextricably bound up. It also paints a fascinating portrait of current Secretary of State Rex Tillerson. “AUDIBLE 20 REVIEW SWEEPSTAKES ENTRY”
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- ABDULHAKK
- 06-09-17
discusting
we are always here how Oil spills blood all over... but to know the exact way and the mind behind it you must read this book .
it is disgusting how money and greed can go so far.
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1 person found this helpful