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Date: November 25, 2024 Mon
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Results for oil
7 results foundAuthor: Watts, Michael Title: Petro-Insurgency or Criminal Syndicate? Conflict, Violence and Political Disorder in the Niger Delta Summary: The Niger delta has become the home of an oil insurgency (see Obi 2004): remotely detonated car bombs and highly sophisticated arms and equipment are the tools of the trade; over 250 foreign hostages have been abducted in the last fifteen months and close to 1000 Nigerian workers detained or held hostage on facilities; major and often spectacular attacks on and on and off shore facilities are endemic and can be perpetrated at will. Unlike the 1980s or 1990s, militants are willing and able to directly confront federal and state security forces. The vast cache of sophisticated arms are skillfully deployed in an environment - the mangrove creeks running for hundreds of miles along the Bight of Benin - in which the Nigerian security forces to quote the new Vice-President Goodluck Jonathan “cannot cope with the situation” (Daily Trust, February 27th 2007). According to a World Bank report (Jua 2007), over 600 people have been killed in the course of these conflicts -often engagements between militias and the joint military task forces - since 2000. Pipeline breaks due to vandalization and sabotage have almost doubled between 1999 and 2004 (from 497 to 895); product loss (in metric tons) due to pipeline ruptures have grown steadily from 179,000 to 396,000 metric tons over the same period (a figure roughly equal to four supertankers) [see STATOIL 2006: 25]. The direct assaults on oil installations and infrastructure cost the Nigerian government $6.8 billion losses in revenue between 1999-2004 but in the last three years the figure has increased dramatically (currently the conflicts cost Nigeria $60 million per day, roughly $4.4 billion per annum in damages and lost revenue (www.strategypage.com/qnd/nigeria/20070630.aspx). In May 2007 Nigeria drew upon $2.7 billion from its ‘domestic excess crude’ (a windfall profits account) to plug revenues shortfalls from oil deferment. President Obasanjo ordered the military in mid-2006 to adopt a ‘force for force’ policy in the delta in a vain effort to gain control of the creeks; in early 2007 the Nigerian navy had embarked upon its biggest sea maneuver in two decades deploying 13 warships, four helicopters and four boats to the Bight of Bonny to test ‘operational capability’. Yet the month of May 2007, according to a Norwegian consulting company BergenRiskSolutions (BergenRiskSolutions2007), witnessed the largest monthly tally of attacks since the appearance of a shadowy but militarily wellarmed insurgent group called the Movement for the Emancipation of the Niger Delta (MEND) eighteen months ago. Many of the oil-producing communities across the delta are torn apart by all manner of internal (for example Nembe or Finima) and inter-community (Ogoni-Andoni) conflicts or both (Soku-Kula-Oluasiri)3. There has certainly been no period since the first oil boom – palm oil in the nearly nineteenth century – in which the delta has been in such turmoil other than the civil war. The conflicts have an organic connection to oil but their genealogies are complex: in some cases communities fight over land and territorial disputes over oil bearing lands (Odiama); in some cases they are successional disputes, often of great historical depth, driven by the prospect of access to oil rents and company cash payments (Okrika) compounded by party politics; in other youth groups struggle among themselves or with elders over access to companies (Nembe); and in other cases they are sectional and communal, as ethnic communities in multi-ethnic settings, rural and urban, struggle over the establishment of electoral wards or local government councils to ensure they too can feed at the oil trough (Warri). The social forces are at once ethnic, generation, gender, class (chiefs, politicians), corporate and of course state (military and security). Conflicted communities across the oilfields entail complex configurations of such forces. They constitute a social field of violence in which the delta is now embroiled is a multi-headed hydra. Details: Berkeley, CA: Department of Geography, University of California, 2008. 36p. Source: Internet Resource: Working Paper No. 16: Accessed August 10, 2012 at: http://oldweb.geog.berkeley.edu/ProjectsResources/ND%20Website/NigerDelta/WP/16-Watts.pdf Year: 2008 Country: Nigeria URL: http://oldweb.geog.berkeley.edu/ProjectsResources/ND%20Website/NigerDelta/WP/16-Watts.pdf Shelf Number: 125958 Keywords: Natural Resources (Nigeria)OilViolenceViolent Conflict |
Author: Watts, Michael Title: Crude Politics: Life and Death on the Nigerian Oil Fields Summary: Nigeria is an oil-rich petro-state but its developmental record in one of catastrophic failure (Ahmad and Singh 2003). According to IMF, the $700 billion in oil revenues since 1960 have added almost nothing to the standard of living of the average Nigerian. Eighty-five per cent percent of oil revenues accrue to one percent of the population and a huge proportion of the country’s wealth – perhaps 40% or more, has been stolen. Over the last decade GDP per capita and life expectancy have, according to World Banks, both fallen. The United Nations Development Program (UNDP 2005), ranks Nigeria in terms of human development - a composite measure of life expectancy, income, and educational attainment – on par with Haiti and Congo. Why has such extraordinary oil wealth – and the developmental opportunities it affords - generated nothing more than violence, rage, disillusionment and catastrophically failed development? Why has the heart of the Nigerian petrostate degenerated into a zone of insurrection and how has the political nerve centre of the country, the Muslim north, come to be a breeding ground for radical Islamists? Both of these questions are related in complex ways to oil, to the fact that oil (and gas) saturates, provides the ether, the political, economic, cultural and ideological realities of contemporary Nigeria. Details: Berkeley, CA: Institute of International Studies, University of California, 2009. 27p. Source: Internet Resource: Working Paper No. 25: Accessed August 11, 2012 at: http://oldweb.geog.berkeley.edu/ProjectsResources/ND%20Website/NigerDelta/WP/Watts_25.pdf Year: 2009 Country: Nigeria URL: http://oldweb.geog.berkeley.edu/ProjectsResources/ND%20Website/NigerDelta/WP/Watts_25.pdf Shelf Number: 125989 Keywords: Natural Resources (Nigeria)OilViolenceViolent Conflict |
Author: Rettberg, Angelika Title: Gold, Oil and the Lure of Violence: The Private Sector and Post-conflict Risks in Colombia Summary: For the first time in decades Colombia seems to be on course towards a negotiated settlement with its two remaining guerrilla groups, the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia and the National Liberation Army. However, the post-conflict prospects are not altogether auspicious. Abundant weapons in circulation, demobilised combatants with criminal expertise, and multiple opportunities for applying this know-how in both legal and illegal activities and organisations as part of the steady and continuing reconfiguration of criminal groups pose serious risks to stability and the sustainability of peace in Colombia over the coming years. This report presents a number of the challenges for Colombia's post-conflict stability arising from criminal networks and activities in regions associated with the extractive industry - and specifically in regions dedicated to oil extraction and gold mining. While domestic and foreign investments have risen over recent years, and overall security conditions have improved, it is likely that armed violence will continue and undergo further transformations in these regions. The emergence of new sorts of non-conventional armed violence, operating across the spectrum between conflict and criminality, illustrates the challenge of consolidating a post-conflict arrangement in Colombia. Details: Oslo: Norwegian Peacebuilding Resource Centre (NOREF), 2015. 13p. Source: Internet Resource: Accessed July 28, 2016 at: https://www.clingendael.nl/sites/default/files/Rettberg_NOREF%20Clingendael_Gold%20oil%20and%20the%20lure%20of%20violence_the%20private%20sector%20and%20post-conflict%20risks%20in%20Colombia_Sept%202015_FINAL.pdf Year: 2015 Country: Colombia URL: https://www.clingendael.nl/sites/default/files/Rettberg_NOREF%20Clingendael_Gold%20oil%20and%20the%20lure%20of%20violence_the%20private%20sector%20and%20post-conflict%20risks%20in%20Colombia_Sept%202015_FINAL.pdf Shelf Number: 139886 Keywords: Criminal NetworksGoldNatural ResourcesOilOrganized CrimeTheft of Natural Resources |
Author: Perouse de Montclos, Marc-Antoine, ed. Title: Violence in Nigeria: A qualitative and quantitative analysis Summary: Most of the academic literature on violence in Nigeria is qualitative. It rarely relies on quantitative data because police crime statistics are not reliable, or not available, or not even published. Moreover, the training of Nigerian social scientists often focuses on qualitative, cultural, and political issues. There is thus a need to bridge the qualitative and quantitative approaches of conflict studies. This book represents an innovation and fills a gap in this regard. It is the first to introduce a discussion on such issues in a coherent manner, relying on a database that fills the lacunae in data from the security forces. The authors underline the necessity of a trend analysis to decipher the patterns and the complexity of violence in very different fields: from oil production to cattle breeding, radical Islam to motor accidents, land conflicts to witchcraft, and so on. In addition, they argue for empirical investigation and a complementary approach using both qualitative and quantitative data. The book is therefore organized into two parts, with a focus first on statistical studies, then on fieldwork. The book is a co-publication of the ASCL and IFRA (Institut Francais de Recherche en Afrique). Details: Leiden: African Studies Center, 2016. 218p. Source: Internet Resource: Accessed July 29, 2016 at: http://www.ascleiden.nl/news/violence-nigeria-qualitative-and-quantitative-analysis Year: 2016 Country: Nigeria URL: http://www.ascleiden.nl/news/violence-nigeria-qualitative-and-quantitative-analysis Shelf Number: 139893 Keywords: Cattle RaidingCrime StatisticsOilTerrorismViolent Crime |
Author: James, Laura M. Title: Fields of Control: Oil and (In)security in Sudan and South Sudan Summary: Oil and security in Sudan and South Sudan are, in the words of one former oil minister, 'two faces of the same coin'. At the international, regional, national, state, and community levels, it is possible to trace how oil exploration, extraction, and exploitation have contributed to insecurity, both directly and indirectly. More rarely, these activities have temporarily improved security, often through patronage or subornation. At the same time, security levels have an impact on oil production, as fighting provokes shutdowns or, more subtly, deters future investment. This Working Paper reviews the historical linkages between oil and security in Sudan and South Sudan, and provides an overview of the key actors in the sector. After considering the security impact of the political and economic dimensions of oil production, it examines the more direct relationship between oil and violence, assessing the current situation within and between the two states as well as at the local community level as of mid-2015. It then identifies the similarities and differences between the Sudanese and South Sudanese oil ministries' approaches to human security, and the impact of the current civil conflict. The key conclusions are: - The oil-conflict nexus is widely acknowledged as a global phenomenon, yet in Sudan and South Sudan, it has been intensified by an accident of history and geography: the location of most of the oilfields along the volatile former colonial border between the two countries. - Under recent peace agreements, the Sudanese and South Sudanese governments have to some extent harnessed the oil industry to promote security between the two countries, based on the common interest established by South Sudan's possession of most of the oil and Sudan's control of the export infrastructure. At a subnational level, however, oil, patronage, insecurity, and civil conflict remain closely bound together. - Barring major new discoveries in the future, oil production in Sudan and South Sudan has probably already peaked. The economic and political adjustments to declining revenue, some of which have already begun, could further boost insecurity in both countries. - The oilfields have been an important prize in the civil conflict that broke out in South Sudan in December 2013. While the rebels have not captured the oilfields, their activities have significantly diminished the government's cash flow. The violence was initially exacerbated by oil-linked community discontent in Unity and Upper Nile states. The ongoing fighting has also further contributed to environmental degradation and poor community relations in the oil areas. - There are rumblings of ongoing community discontent in Sudan, particularly among Missiriya groups, which have been responsible for pervasive low-level insecurity that has been hindering oil operations. The government has made partial efforts to address this, and has thus far succeeded in limiting the unrest, but not in eliminating the underlying causes. - Since late 2013, relations between Sudan and South Sudan have been unusually cooperative, based on a common interest in keeping the oil flowing. This rapprochement remains vulnerable, however, not only to potential economic pressures and new disputes when the oil agreement expires at the end of 2016, but also to cross-border aspects of ongoing civil strife in both countries, combined with local tensions. - Sudan's poor management of the oil sector has led to corruption, over-centralization, and environmental degradation, causing serious grievances among the local communities. This dynamic has to some extent been mirrored in the new state of South Sudan. While Sudan's efforts at improvement remain largely nominal, South Sudan has managed to put in place strong legislation in line with international best practices. There has been no effective implementation, however, and the prospect of progress receded when the civil conflict began. The bulk of the research for this paper was carried out in January-April 2014, with further work conducted in April and October 2015. Given the lack of transparency in much of the oil sector in Sudan and South Sudan, this research is based on cross-referencing of the widest possible range of sources. These include not only official publications and unpublished internal reports, but also interviews with policy-makers, advisers, and officials. Due to poor security conditions, the author was not able to visit the oil areas and interview community members directly; however, she drew on secondary sources to ensure that their voices informed the analysis. Details: Geneva, SWIT: Small Arms Survey, 2015. 72p. Source: Internet Resource; HSBA Working Paper 40: Accessed July 29, 2016 at: http://www.smallarmssurveysudan.org/fileadmin/docs/working-papers/HSBA-WP40-Oil.pdf Year: 2015 Country: Sudan URL: http://www.smallarmssurveysudan.org/fileadmin/docs/working-papers/HSBA-WP40-Oil.pdf Shelf Number: 139897 Keywords: Natural ResourcesOilOil Conflict |
Author: Maehler, Annegret Title: Oil in Venezuela: Triggering Violence on Ensuring Stability? A Context-Sensitive Analysis of the Ambivalent Impact of Resource Abundance Summary: This paper studies the causal factors that make the oil-state Venezuela, which is generally characterized by a low level of violence, an outlier among the oil countries as a whole. It applies a newly elaborated "context approach" that systematically considers domestic and international contextual factors. To test the results of the systematic analysis, two periods with a moderate increase in internal violence in Venezuela are subsequently analyzed, in the second part of the paper, from a comparative-historical perspective. The findings demonstrate that oil, in interaction with fluctuating non-resource-specific contextual conditions, has had ambiguous effects: On the one hand, oil has explicitly served as a conflict-reducing and partly democracy-promoting factor, principally through large-scale socioeconomic redistribution, widespread clientelistic structures, and corruption. On the other hand, oil has triggered violence - primarily through socioeconomic causal mechanisms (central keywords: decline of oil abundance and resource management) and secondarily through the long-term degradation of political institutions. While clientelism and corruption initially had a stabilizing effect, in the long run they exacerbated the delegitimization of the traditional political elite. Another crucial finding is that the impact and relative importance of oil with respect to the increase in violence seems to vary significantly depending on the specific subtype of violence. Details: Hamburg, Germany: German Institute of Global and Area Studies (GIGA), 2009. 43p. Source: Internet Resource: GIGA Working Paper, No. 112: Accessed August 30, 2016 at: http://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=1534618 Year: 2009 Country: Venezuela URL: http://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=1534618 Shelf Number: 140096 Keywords: Natural ResourcesOilPolitical CorruptionSocioeconomic Conditions and CrimeViolence |
Author: Maehler, Annegret Title: Nigeria: A Prime Example of the Resource Curse? Revisiting the Oil-Violence Link in the Niger Delta Summary: This paper studies the oil]violence link in the Niger Delta, systematically taking into consideration domestic and international contextual factors. The case study, which focuses on explaining the increase in violence since the second half of the 1990s, confirms the differentiated interplay of resource]specific and non]resource]specific causal factors. With regard to the key contextual conditions responsible for violence, the results underline the basic relevance of cultural cleavages and political]institutional and socioeconomic weakness that existed even before the beginning of the "oil era." Oil has indirectly boosted the risk of violent conflicts through a further distortion of the national economy. Moreover, the transition to democratic rule in 1999 decisively increased the opportunities for violent struggle, in a twofold manner: firstly, through the easing of political repression and, secondly, through the spread of armed youth groups, which have been fostered by corrupt politicians. These incidents imply that violence in the Niger Delta is increasingly driven by the autonomous dynamics of an economy of violence: the involvement of security forces, politicians and (international) businessmen in illegal oil theft helps to explain the perpetuation of the violent conflicts at a low level of intensity. Details: Hamburg, Germany: German Institute of Global and Area Studies (GIGA), 2010. 38p. Source: Internet Resource: GIGA Working paper No. 120: Accessed August 30, 2016 at: https://www.giga-hamburg.de/en/system/files/publications/wp120_maehler.pdf Year: 2010 Country: Nigeria URL: https://www.giga-hamburg.de/en/system/files/publications/wp120_maehler.pdf Shelf Number: 140097 Keywords: Natural ResourcesOilOil TheftPolitical CorruptionViolence |