Commodities, infrastructures, and violence: a view to resource chains in western Civilization

In Chapter 4, Barry analyses activist and artists denouncing of the impacts of the pipeline as following a logic of abduction. To present this argument, Barry builds on the term "abduction" as coined by pragmatist Philosopher Charles Sanders Peirce. Very broadly, abduction means to take a true premise (or observation) to present a conclusion (a generalization) that is not necessarily true. As presented in the book, there is a logic of abduction when activist portray a specific situation from the BTC controversy as representative of a broader "political situation" (the unethical behaviour of the Oil industry). 

Check this entry in the Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy on Peirce on Abduction to deepen on the concept.