From Petro‐States to ‘new realities’: Perspectives on the Geographies of oil

Abstract

Recent “oil shocks” in the form of not only price volatility, but also catastrophic oil spills, growing acceptance of climate change, and public contestations over oil wars and major projects, have multiplied in recent years – indications that the spaces and practices of energy intensive social formations are becoming increasingly politicized objects of concern. The paper summarizes the petro‐state thesis and reviews recent contributions on the geographies of oil. While the petro‐state is useful for conceptualizing some aspects of the political dynamics of oil, it fails to capture some of the dynamics of concern in four major areas of work on geographies of oil: petro‐capitalism and economies of oil violence, socially produced scarcity, petro‐state(s) and expanded oil polities, and the “new realities of oil,” such as price volatility, changes in size and location of demand and supply, and the energy dilemmas associated with energy security and climate change. The conclusion discusses recent work that ties the political geographies of oil to geographies everyday life, pointing to a research agenda for integrating the consideration hydrocarbons into wider geographical inquiries.

Closing the loop or squaring the circle? Locating generative spaces for the circular economy

“…Not an uncontested classification, it rests upon evaluations of which minerals are Political geographical analysis has indeed underscored the inextricable relationship between the physical properties of minerals and other resources (oil, carbon), and the forms of (often far from progressive) politics that arise around their acquisition, use and control (e.g. Le Billon, 2008;Huber, 2008;Kennedy, 2014;Mitchell, 2009 . As such, the issue of critical resource scarcity raises pressing questions of capital, power and their uneven spatial manifestations, which human geographers have proven adept at illuminating.…”

“…Political geographical analysis has indeed underscored the inextricable relationship between the physical properties of minerals and other resources (oil, carbon), and the forms of (often far from progressive) politics that arise around their acquisition, use and control (e.g. Le Billon, 2008;Huber, 2008;Kennedy, 2014;Mitchell, 2009). For example, Emel et al's work on sovereignty and mining has underscored the mechanisms by which valuable and increasingly rare minerals are rendered accessible beyond their geological locations.…”

From ‘energy geography’ to ‘energy geographies’

“…On the contrary, energy is inherently a 'political resource' -a fact which has been substantiated by energy geographers in three ways. First, recognized prospects for new flows of energy bring together (disparate) social groups into conversations about allocation, costs and benefits, and acceptable enduses (Bridge and Le Billon, 2012;Kennedy, 2014). Bulkeley et al (2014) conceptualizes energy infrastructure as sites of contestation and as spatial expressions or material articulations of dominant political-economic ideologies and geographic imaginaries (see also Vogel, 2008).…”

“…Political and cultural geographers have shown the way in which these spatial identities do work in the process of energy transformations. In some cases spatial representations are formal acts of boundaryma(r)king, as in claims to sovereignty for the purpose of establishing authority over resource access (Kennedy, 2014) or in negotiating the definition and delineation of 'community' and criteria for belonging (citizenship) when determining how to allocate financial benefits related to particular projects (Bristow et al, 2013). Desbiens ( 2014) documents how a national identity in Quebec, Canada, converges with legal claims to territory (territoriality) in order to foster consent for large energy infrastructure projects, in this case at the expense of indigenous land claims and livelihoods.…”

Environmental determinism as Orientalism: The geo‐political ecology of crisis in the Middle East

“…Ultimately the region's ecology explains both the internal contradictions of ‘rentier’, ‘petro’ (Kennedy, ) or the ‘failed’ states as well as the preceding and ongoing imperial onslaught based on the inflexible demand from hydro‐carbon based capitalist accumulation. Social and ecological damage become mutually reinforcing and irreversible.…”