Coming up for Oil

Date01 June 1977
DOI10.1177/002070207703200202
AuthorRobert Boardman
Published date01 June 1977
Subject MatterEuropean Foreign Policies
ROBERT
BOARDMAN
Coming
up
for
oil
Britain
has
now
come
to
the
end
of
the
present
road
...
The
crunch,
so
long awaited,
so
often
discussed,
is
now
upon
us.'
During
periods
of
extreme
aridity
these
organisms
are
probably
in
a
cryptobiotic
state,
and
metabolic
activity
is
resumed
when
sufficient
water
becomes
available.
2
The
consequences for
foreign
policy
of
a
weakened
British
econ-
omy have
long
been
apparent.
3
Disentanglement
from
Asian
defence
roles
in
the
late
i96os
was
prompted
by
budgetary
con-
straints.
It
was
during
that
decade
that
appreciation
of
the
econo-
mic
problems
of the
United
Kingdom
began
to
eat
deeply
into
the
thinking
of
the Foreign
Office.
Diplomacy
came
to
be
one
instrument
in the
pursuit
of
what
the
Foreign
Secretary
in
Sep-
tember
1976
called
the
'Holy
Grail
of
export-led
growth.'
The
government
has
seemed
universally
cast
in
the
role
of
demandeur,
a
seeker
of
special
privileges
and exemptions
and
a
citer
of
excusing
infirmities.
Greater
concern
over the
country's
dependence
on for-
Associate
Professor
of
Political
Science,
Dalhousie
University.
Author
of
Britain
and
the
People's
Republic
of
China,
1949-1974
(1976),
and
co-editor
of
The
Management
of
Britain's
External
Relations
(973).
i
Edward
Heath,
speaking
at
the
Conservative
party
conference,
Brighton,
6
Octo-
ber
1976.
2
E.I.
Friedmann and
R.
Ocampo,
'Endolithic
Blue-Green
Algae
in
the Dry
Valleys:
Primary
Producers
in
the Antarctic
Desert
Ecosystem,'
Science, cxci
(24
September
1976), 1248.
3
Geoffrey
Goodwin,
'Economics
and
International
Politics,'
in Brian
Porter,
ed,
The
Aberystwyth
Papers:
International
Politics
1919-69
(London
1972),
pp
255-6;
Joseph
Frankel,
British
Foreign
Policy,
1945-1973
(London
1975),
PP
47-59;
William
Wallace,
The
Foreign
Policy
Process
in
Britain
(London
1975),
PP
156-87.
COMING
UP FOR
OIL
233
eign
supplies
of
raw
materials
has
marked
the
middle
197os.
Here,
though,
a
guarded
optimism
seems
justified.
Offshore
oil
has
boost-
ed
the likelihood
of
a
future
alleviation
of
balance-of-payments
strain.
It
could, therefore,
jolt
Britain
back
into
the
forefront
of
the
European
powers.
British
foreign
policy
has
been
increasingly
shaped, meanwhile,
by
membership
of
the
European
Community
(EC).
And,
in
turn,
British
views
and
core
assumptions
have
been
affecting
profoundly
the
changing
character
of
Europe.
These
three
factors
-
the
economic
crunch, membership
of
the
EC,
and
anticipation
of
the
oil
transfusion
-
are
closely
interrelated.
Britain
has
only recently
completed
its
first
full
calendar
year
of
unequivocal
EC
membership,
after
the
referendum
of
June
1975
had
ended
what
Prime Minister
Wilson
used to
call
the
period
of
'qualified' membership.
Its
first
sustained
exposure
to Brussels
has
not
come
at
a
propitious
time.
There
is
an
air
of
disenchantment
and
malaise
in Europe.
None
of
the
future
polities
envisaged
in
the
early
195os
has
come
into
being.
This
sense
of
uncertainty
and
loss
of
purpose
has several
roots.
The
attitude
of
the
United
States
to
the
Ec
has
shifted
ground
over
the
last
few
years.
Bonn
has
become
more
restless
at
having
to
foot
the
bills
of
integration,
while
Paris
remains
sensitive
to extensions
of
Community
competence.
There
is,
it
is
true,
a
record
of
past
achievements,
including
a
contribution
to
Franco-German amity.
But
there
seems,
as
a
result,
to
be
little
left
on
the
agenda
that
can
fire
the
imagination.
Debate
on
the
legal
definition
of
chocolate
or
beer
is
not
the
stuff
of visionary politics.
The
Community's
failings,
over
energy
policy
or
the
agricultural
'mountains,'
give
it
a
bad
press.
The
entry
of
new
members,
begin-
ning
with
Greece,
poses
a
new
range
of
problems.
As
membership
expands
from
nine
to
n,
decision-making
complexities
may
grind
the
Community
to
a
halt.
There
is
already
a
de
facto
tiering
into
layers
of
states
and
regions
at
different
levels
of
economic
perform-
ance
and potential
for
integration.
Intergovernmental
relations
continue
to
make
headway,
while
the
integration-minded
stand
on
the
sidelines
and
jeer
this
deviation
from the
true
path.
Finally,
the
incentive
of
external
threat
has
evaporated
in
an
atmosphere
of
East-West
detente.

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