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EXTRACTIVISM Lecture Series 22/23: Petrolism in the Middle East
24.11.2022 in Kassel: Petrolism in the Middle East (Prof. Dr. Martin Beck, Kurdistan University Hewlêr)
Research on regions of the world as diverse as Latin America, the Middle East, North Africa and sub-Saharan Africa has shown that petroleum and the rents derived from its export have a high impact everywhere. However, this influential force takes on very different forms depending on the regional context. Due to the abundance of hydrocarbon rents on the Arabian Gulf Peninsula since the oil revolution in the early 1970s, a regional system based on commodity rents has emerged with petrolism, which has left its mark not only on the oil-producing Gulf monarchies but also on the states of the Middle East with few or no deposits of raw materials - in particular Egypt, Jordan and Lebanon. The transnational distribution of rents between the resource-rich but sparsely populated Arab Gulf states and the resource-poor but populous countries of the Mashreq takes place via two channels: Budget remittances and investments from the Arab Gulf monarchies (and, in the case of Lebanese Hezbollah, Iran) to the Mashreq and labor migration in the opposite direction.
The lecture sets itself four tasks. Firstly, it aims to shed light on the impact of oil extraction on the political economy and regional relations in the Middle East. It is important to emphasize that petrolism has created asymmetrical interdependencies between states that have high oil rents and those that have little or no natural resources. The system of petrolism has consolidated the emergence of so-called semi-rentier states, whose political economies are in many ways similar to those of oil rentier states.
Secondly, the petrolism system has faced major challenges since the 2010s. On the one hand, regional events - in particular upheavals in connection with the "Arab Spring" - and global developments - in particular the oil price shock in 2014 - have constituted a trend away from pension abundance towards pension scarcity for the first time since the oil revolution. In view of the global energy transition, it seems very likely that this trend will intensify in the medium to long term.
Thirdly, it will be shown that the Gulf monarchies - Saudi Arabia in particular, but also the United Arab Emirates and Qatar - have responded proactively to the new challenges. The structural adjustments propagated by the Gulf monarchies and their efforts to play an active role in the global energy transition are less likely to produce remarkable results. Rather, it is new forms of petro-aggression and successful adjustments in the area of rent-seeking with which some of the Gulf monarchies have caused a sensation. In particular, the effectiveness of the Saudi Arabia-led OPEC+ will be discussed.
Fourthly, the lecture will conclude with reflections on how research on extractivism in the Middle East and other regions of the world, which have so far only paid insufficient tribute to each other, could learn from each other.
From the series
Climate Change and Extractives: Risk or Opportunity?
Extractivism lecture series in the winter semester 2022/2023
It is already foreseeable that the global importance of raw materials will continue to increase in the coming years. Efforts to make the energy transition sustainable and thus help shape climate change require that raw materials are given a special status. The desired energy transition for the purpose of sustainable climate policy will massively change the raw material basis of the global economy. This not only means profound change processes for the countries of the Global North, but also has serious consequences for many countries of the South that depend on raw material exports. This challenges the existing structure of the international system and the global economy.
The lecture series addresses this problem context and approaches the issues initially from the perspective of Latin America and the Maghreb. The contributions focus on the relationship between raw materials and climate change from an empirical, regional and/or theoretical perspective. They are linked by the fact that they not only analyze the risks of the relationship between raw materials and climate change, but also shed light on the possibilities and opportunities.
The lecture series takes place on Thursdays from 6 p.m. to 8 p.m. alternately in Kassel and Marburg. To take part in the event online, you can register HERE.
27.10.2022 in Kassel: 500 years of interdependence between Latin America and Europe (Prof. Dr. Hans-Jürgen Burchardt, University of Kassel)
03.11.2022 in Kassel: Amazon, oil reserves and corporate climate management: A Brazilian perspective on the achievability of the Paris climate goals (Prof. Dr. Anita Engels, Thomas Frisch, Solange Commelin; University of Hamburg)
10.11.2022 in Marburg: Patrimonial capitalism, pensions and development (Prof. Dr. Oliver Schlumberger, University of Tübingen)
17. 11.2022 in Kassel: Geopolitics of the "Great Transformation" (Prof. Dr. Markus Lederer, Technical University of Darmstadt)
24.11.2022 in Kassel: Petrolism in the Middle East (Prof. Dr. Martin Beck, Kurdistan University Hewlêr)
01.12.20 22 in Kassel: Supply chain laws and certification of resources (Prof. Dr. Lena Partzsch, Freie Universität Berlin)
08.12.2022 in Marburg: Oil and the middle classes in Iran (Prof. Dr. Mohammed Farzanegan, Philipps University Marburg)
15.12.2022 in Kassel: Circular economy, raw materials and climate change (Prof. Dr. Sina Leipold, Umweltforschungszentrum Leipzig)
12.01.2023 in Marburg: Everything flows? The importance of water for the social contract in Morocco (Dr. Annabelle Houdret, German Development Institute, Bonn)
19.01.20 23 in Kassel: Is Latin America too rich for development? (Dr. Hannes Warnecke-Berger / Prof. Dr. Hans-Jürgen Burchardt, University of Kassel)
26.01.20 23 in Marburg: Climate change and prospects for socio-ecological transformation (Prof. Dr. Klaus Dörre, Friedrich Schiller University Jena)
02.02.20 23 in Kassel: News of the "resource curse": On the relationality of unequal development (Prof. Dr. Stephan Lessenich, Goethe University Frankfurt am Main)
09.02.2022 in Marburg: 500 years of interdependence between the Maghreb and Europe (Prof. Dr. Rachid Ouaissa, Philipps University Marburg)