HOUSTON ─ The oil and gas industry’s response to environmental activism and toughened local regulations in the 21st century is a lot like France’s response to potential German aggression in the 1930s, according to David Blackmon, director of government affairs at Linn Energy. In order to give its army time to mobilize in case of a German attack, France built the Maginot Line, a series of fortifications and barriers along its borders with Switzerland, Germany and Luxembourg. It was a tactical response that kept Germany from attacking directly; but it wasn’t strategic, and Germany invaded France via the unguarded Belgian border.

It was an interesting comparison, if an odd one ─ one in which the environmental movement and government regulators are the supposed aggressors, and the oil and gas industry is considered the victim. But Blackmon said he hoped to recall a tactic that people had hoped would be effective, but because of a lack of a coherent, long-term strategy, it failed.

Blackmon focused his remarks on the trend to remove regulatory authority from the states, as seen with local fracking bans across the country. On the other end, there is the effort to nationalize environmental regulation.

“The move away from state oversight is unacceptable and unworkable for our industry if it’s allowed to continue to grow,” Blackmon said. “This is a multifaceted assault from a variety of directions and groups, and the industry continues to attempt to address all these attacks on its ability to remain in business as we always have: on a tactical, case-by-case basis rather than a strategic thought process looking for global solutions.”

Blackmon warned against using traditional, case-by-case tactics against environmental activism, which can be highly organized and well-funded.

“When you think about that just in the context of Texas, there are 1,200 home-rule cities and towns in the state of Texas alone,” he said. “The activists who were successful in Denton are working in 11 of those cities now that we know of … We can’t continue to address these kinds of efforts on a case-by-case basis, we just get overwhelmed. We don’t have the people to do it and our companies don’t want to commit the human resources necessary to address it on a case-by-case basis.”

Blackmon highlighted the communications field as a critical area that needs to be thought of in terms of strategy.

“Our industry has adopted a too heavy reliance on paid advertising as our main communications in telling our story, trying to in effect influence public opinions,” he said. “Too many trade associations think problems can be solved by tossing millions of dollars at high-quality advertising campaigns, and the campaigns we see mounted are very high-quality, very good, very expensive to mount. But I would submit to you that they have a very limited ability to truly influence regulatory and legislative policy. And too many industry executives think if they help to fund such campaigns, their companies don’t really need to take other areas of communication seriously and spend money on those areas as well.”

Rather, the industry should engage face-to-face and establish camaraderie at the local level in the communities where it operates well before environmental activists have a chance to engage.

“[Companies] really don’t want to dedicate the resources and people,” he said. “It’s all face-to-face communication that we need to engage in … and most of our companies don’t really want to engage in that way. They want to instead write a big check for an advertising campaign at the national level and think they’ve done something really effective, but in reality the battle is right there on the ground at the local level. “

The industry suffers when it comes to social media, Blackmon said. Companies should encourage their younger workers to spread their message via social media, in effect becoming brand ambassadors in that space, he added.

“We’re getting destroyed on social media every day … we’re so horribly outnumbered and outclassed in those realms, it’s amazing,” he said.

Blackmon also said there tends to be a thinking in the industry that if the country elects a Republican president in 2016, the industry’s problems will disappear.

“That is incredibly wrong-headed,” he said. Inertia from current rulemakings will still be felt, and “a Republican coming in would be faced with the same challenge as Ronald Reagan and George Bush. Even though you’ve got political appointees now at the EPA, the staff is still going to be made up of people who came from the Sierra Club and the NRDC … You can’t easily change the staff at these agencies.”

Blackmon said the oil and gas industry is starting to shift its focus from tactical to strategic. “But I think we have to speed that process up and refocus our energies and monies in more strategic ways in addressing these issues,” he said.