Book Review: Oil and State in the Middle East
| Published date | 01 December 1960 |
| DOI | 10.1177/002070206001500427 |
| Author | F. R. C. Bagley |
| Date | 01 December 1960 |
| Subject Matter | Book Review |
378
INTERNATIONAL
JOURNAL
OIL
AND STATE
IN
THE
MIDDLE
EAST.
By
George
Lenczowski.
1960.
New
York:
Cornell University
Press;
Toronto: Thomas
Allen
Ltd.
xix,
379pp.
$7.25.)
This
weighty
book
will
probably
long
remain
the standard
authority
on
its
subject.
Professor
Lenczowski, now
of
the
University
of
Cali-
fornia
(Berkeley),
was Polish
ambassador
at
Tehran
during
World
War
II
and
afterwards
wrote a
most
valuable
work
on
Russia
and
the
West
in
Iran.
Dr.
Musaddiq's
"crusade"
in
1951
gave
him
the
impulse
to
embark
on
the
present
work,
in which
he studies
the
Middle
Eastern
oil
industry
schematically (not historically,
as was
done
by
S.
H.
Lon-
grigg,
Oil
in
the
Middle
East.)
To
collect
material,
he
paid
annual
visits
to
the
area
between
1952
and
1958.
He
covers
virtually
all
im-
portant
developments and
problems-economic,
legal,
diplomatic,
poli-
tical
and
social-which
affected
Middle
Eastern
oil
in
those
years.
He
also studies objectively
the
attitudes
and
motives
of
the
many
different
Middle
Eastern
and
Western
interests
involved-governments,
com-
panies,
employees
and workers,
consumers,
public opinions,
etc.-
and
throws
much
light
on
recent events
including
the
Suez
affair.
The
factual
and
statistical
information
(which
is
most
abundant
for
Iraq
and
Sa'udi
Arabia)
is
thoroughly
documented;
most
of
it
comes
in-
evitably
from
company and
other
Western
sources,
but
the
author
has
also
used
Arabic
and
Persian
newspapers,
documents
and
books
(though
not
the
one
and
only
solid
book
on oil
by a
Middle
Easterner,
namely
Mostafa
Fateh's
Panjah
Sal-6
Naft
dar
Iran).
Although
there
are
references
to
the
formation
of
the
U.A.R.,
Iraqi
revolution
and
subsequent events,
most
of
the
work
seems
to
have
been
compiled
earlier.
Nor
does
the
author
appear
to
have foreseen
the present glut
of
oil
and
surplus
of
tankers,
which
has
led
to
the
shelving
of
schemes
like
the
proposed
Iranian-Turkish and
other
pipelines,
and
to
stagnation
or
slight
diminution
in
the
revenues
paid
to some
governments.
With
Libyan,
Algerian
and
Soviet
oil
now about
to
come
onto
the
market
in
much
greater
quantities
than
once ex-
pected,
the
lull
may
be
of
rather
long
duration.
The
author
stresses,
however,
that
economics
are
less
likely
to
cause
trouble
than
politics.
Durham
University
F.
R.
C.
BAGLEY
0
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