Oil. Geopolitics Reborn: Oil, Natural Gas, and Other Vital Resources

Competition over vital resources is a potent source of international friction among nations and within states. The result is the increasing interplay of international and internal struggles and the growing militarization of the global energy resource quest

From Scarcity to Abundance: The Changing Dynamics of Energy Conflict

Energy security and geopolitics have played a pivotal role in international affairs for a very long time, ever since the development of oil-powered vehicles and weapons of war. Until recently, the geopolitics of energy have largely been governed by perceptions of scarcity—the assumption that oil and other energy reserves were relatively limited, and that competition over their exploitation would lead to recurring crisis and conflict. However, the recent utilization of advanced extractive technologies—including deep-sea drilling and hydraulic fracturing—have resulted in unexpected production gains and fostered a sense that abundance, rather than scarcity, will govern the future energy picture. This perception, in turn, has led to expectations that conflict over energy will diminish. But the deployment of the new technologies has engendered new conflicts of its own, as in the disputes over offshore oil and natural gas deposits in the Arctic Ocean and the East and South China Seas. Also, many nations view energy as a critical source of wealth and power, and so they continue to spar over the ownership and exploitation of valuable reserves. Accordingly, the prospects for relative abundance are not likely to eliminate the risk of conflict over critical energy supplies

The New Geography of Conflict

During the Cold War, strategic planning focused on diverging ideological views between the United States and the Soviet blocs located in central and southeastern Europe and Northeast Asia. In the last decade these regions lost much strategic significance for the U.S. whereas other regions (e.g., Caspian Sea basin, the Gulf states, South China Sea) are receiving increased attention from Washington and other industrialized countries. A renewed concern of global resources, especially oil and natural gas, has created a new international, national and local geography of conflict. China and Russia have made their presence felt in key energy producing areas through foreign policy emphasis while Japan has demonstrated its concern by strengthening its fleet of warships and aircraft. Also industrializing nations of the developing world (e.g., Brazil, Malaysia, Turkey) have similar energy concerns. On a local scale conflicts have occurred over control of valuable timber, diamond fields and other export commodities. The mapping and spatial analysis of natural resources reveals that many critical sources of vital materials are located in contested or chronically unstable areas. Resource shortages and conflicts extend into other problems such as environmental degradation, transnational crime and ethnic conflicts. An analysis of global resource trends and their associated geopolitical phenomena provide policymakers with a basic tool towards resolving or reducing the risk of violent conflicts

The Resource Curse and Rentier States in the Caspian Region : A Need for Context Analysis

Although much attention is paid to the Caspian region with regard to energy issues, the domestic consequences of the region’s resource production have so far constituted a neglected field of research. A systematic survey of the latest research trends in the economic and political causalities of the resource curse and of rentier states reveals that there is a need for context analysis. In reference to this, the paper traces any shortcomings and promising approaches in the existent body of literature on the Caspian region. Following on from this, the paper then proposes a new approach; specifically, one in which any differences and similarities in the context conditions are captured. This enables a more precise exploration of the exact ways in which they form contemporary post-Soviet Caspian rentier states.Obwohl der Region am Kaspischen Meer im Zuge von Energiediskursen große Aufmerksamkeit zuteil wird, stellen die innerstaatlichen Folgen der Ressourcenproduktion in der Region ein bislang vernachlässigtes Forschungsfeld dar. Ein systematischer Überblick über die jüngsten Forschungstrends zu wirtschaftlichen und politischen Kausalzusammenhängen des Ressourcenfluchs und zu Rentierstaaten offenbart die Notwendigkeit von Kontextanalysen. Hierauf Bezug nehmend, analysiert der Aufsatz sowohl die Mängel als auch viel versprechende Ansätze in der betreffenden Literatur zur Region am Kaspischen Meer. Der Aufsatz stellt letztendlich einen neuen Ansatz vor, der Unterschiede und Gemeinsamkeiten in den Kontextbedingungen erfasst, um zu erforschen, wie diese die gegenwärtigen post-sowjetischen Rentierstaaten in der Region am Kaspischen Meer tatsächlich prägen

Rethinking energy, climate and security: a critical analysis of energy security in the US

Understanding the complicated relationship between energy, climate and security is vital both to the study of international relations and to ensure the continued survival of a world increasingly threatened by environmental change. Climate change is largely caused by burning fossil fuels for energy, but while discussions on the climate consider the role of energy, energy security debates largely overlook climate concerns. This article traces the separation between energy and climate through an analysis of US energy security discourse and policy. It shows that energy security is continually constructed as national security, which enables very particular policy choices and prioritises it above climate concerns. Thus, in many cases, policies undertaken in the name of energy security contribute directly to climate insecurity. The article argues that the failure to consider securing the climate as inherently linked to energy security is not just problematic, but, given global warming, potentially harmful. Consequently, any approach to dealing with climate change has to begin by rethinking energy security and security more broadly, as national (energy) security politics no longer provides security in any meaningful sense