Like it or not, BP doesn’t have the luxury of saying: “Oh, we’ll do something less profitable but better for the planet.” Capitalism chews you up and spits you out if you do that. “Shareholder value” is not a consulting gimmick, or at least not only that; it is a very real disciplinary force.

All of this, to be clear, is not to absolve BP of responsibility. Rather, it is to make a case about how we should understand the problems we face – that is, not as a problem of greedy individual firms, but a system rigged against positive change.