Vlado Vivoda

Resource Nationalism, Bargaining and International Oil Companies: Challenges and Change in the New Millennium

By focusing on major international oil companies (IOCs), this paper examines the balance of power in the oil industry in the current decade, which, unlike the previous two cooperative decades, can be characterised as ‘conflictual’. In this decade, due to their weak relative bargaining power, the IOCs have generally been unsuccessful in bargaining with oil-exporting countries and national oil companies (NOCs). As a result, we are witnessing the return of the obsolescing bargain. Various factors endow oilexporting countries and their NOCs with increased bargaining power vis-a-vis the major IOCs. High oil prices, increased industry competition, the lack of alternative investment options for IOCs and an increasingly hostile political climate in many oil-exporting states, translate to weaker bargaining power and unfavourable outcomes for IOCs. Their future as viable business entities is further compromised by the changing policy and regulatory environment in response to global climate change. By examining the strategies that major IOCs have adopted and may adopt to deal with systemic changes in the international oil industry, this paper proposes that to ensure the majors’ long-term survival and viability, home governments should assume partial control of major IOCs and thus transform them into NOC-IOC hybrids.

Oil Import Diversification in Northeast Asia: A Comparison Between China and Japan

In this article, we explore why oil import patterns differ between states with a view to understanding the relationship between agent-based explanations such as strategy and structural explanations-for example, geography. We compare degree of diversification between China and Japan in an effort to explore the relationship between agency and structure in the formation of energy security policy. The China-Japan comparison is contextualized with reference to the baseline case of the United States, a well-diversified importer. We employ the Shannon-Wiener index of diversity to assess the extent of oil import diversification, and temporal changes in diversification for China, Japan, and the United States. A key finding is that Chinas statist approach has allowed it to diversify its sources of imported oil more quickly than Japans hybrid approach. In fact, since becoming a net oil importer in 1993, Chinas sources of imported oil have diversified quite rapidly. Japans overreliance on the Middle East for much of its imported oil has been endemic since 1973.

Assessment of the Governance Performance of the Regulatory Regime Governing Foreign Mining Investment in the Philippines

This paper assesses the performance of the regulatory regime for foreign mining investment in the Philippines. Based on this, it outlines policy recommendations for the Philippine government, which, if implemented, are likely to improve the governance infrastructure in the sector and, in turn, reduce regulatory risk for foreign mining investors and attract more foreign investment. The main argument is that the poor performance of the governance structures in the Philippine mining sector is behind the high level of regulatory risk for foreign mining investment, and the low levels of foreign investment. After outlining the relevant theoretical frameworks essential for the assessment of the performance of the regime, the article maps the regulatory regime governing foreign mining investment in the Philippines by summarizing the major rules and regulations, institutions (rule‐makers and regulators) and stakeholders in the Philippine mining industry. This is followed by the assessment of the performance of the...

Bargaining Model for the International Oil Industry

This paper establishes a model for analyzing the dynamics of the host state-international oil company (IOC) bargaining relationship. Theoretically, the model advances our ability to investigate bargaining dynamics between host states, oil companies and other stakeholders in the oil industry. It is a sophisticated mechanism which identifies the complex array of relationships and bargains within which the host state-IOC bargaining relationship is nested. The model builds on and leverages the key contributions of earlier bargaining models. It enables us to integrate relevant ideas from existing scholarship on host state-MNC bargaining while also taking into account other actors and bargains at domestic and international levels that affect bargaining between an IOC and a host state. Practically, the model will help actors choose strategies more systematically, leading to higher relative bargaining power that may translate to preferable bargaining outcomes.

China challenges global capitalism

This paper establishes a novel understanding of the nature and implications of Chinas rise. By borrowing Robert Gilpins concept of sub-optimisation, it is argued that China is the most prominent player in a non-Western subgroups suboptimisation strategy, which undermines the Western-dominated neoliberal capitalist system, or the Washington Consensus, and liberal democratic values, taken as gospel by Western economists, governments and industry for the past 30 years. While China and other non-Western states are a part of this system, a consequence of their actions within the system, and particularly in the international energy markets, is that they are increasing their relative gains at the expense of the larger group. China-led subgroups suboptimisation strategy may result in direct competition between the predominant neoliberal Western paradigm, which is synonymous with globalisation, and which has entered into a structural crisis, and the emerging non-Western economic and political capitalist model.

Nuclear Policy and Regulation in Japan after Fukushima: Navigating the Crisis

Abstract The aftermath of the Fukushima disaster, the worst nuclear accident since Chernobyl, has seen a public debate emerge over the future desirability of nuclear power in Japan. While Japanese citizens’ suspicion of nuclear power has grown, the nuclear industry and electricity utilities have called on the central government to recommission the country’s reactors amid warnings of devastation for the Japanese economy. This article analyses nuclear policy-making in Japan in the aftermath of Fukushima, with the aim to identify key theoretical, institutional and organisational drivers and constraints to future change in Japan’s nuclear energy policy. Despite the growing anti-nuclear sentiment and concerns about the environmental risks of nuclear power, we contend that the continuing power of vested interests will make it difficult for Japan to completely abandon nuclear power during the course of the next decade. However, given the independence of the newly established nuclear regulator and the fact that an effective veto power is held by local government officials, some of whom are opposed to the recommissioning of nuclear plants in their prefectures, we argue that the nuclear policy and regulatory landscape in Japan will undergo moderate change.

International oil companies, US Government and energy security policy: an interest-based analysis

This article evaluates the importance of US international oil companies (IOCs) for US energy security and is particularly important given the absence of scholarly analysis of the subject area in both the energy security and international business literature. The analysis suggests that the interests of US IOCs and the US Government have not been exclusively aligned and that the two sides have historically, in most cases, acted independently in pursuit of their interests. The IOCs act in harmony with the US foreign and energy security policy only when their interests are congruent, or under severe threat, such as that of legal action. The US IOCs have historically played a very limited role in enhancing US energy security. In recent years, to the extent that they have been unable to secure access to new oil reserves and increase their oil production, they are not supporting US energy security interests.

Determinants of Foreign Direct Investment in the Mining Industry

A range of social, political, and economic factors determine where mining companies invest their scarce capital. This chapter identifies nine areas of risk that investors need to consider before investing in the sector. These include high sunk costs, the finite life of a deposit, and the long period to achieve a positive financial return. Add to this, legacy issues and it is clear that mining is a high-risk venture. This chapter argues that increased attention to the nine areas of risk may benefit mining companies in the future.

Rise of state–firm bargaining in the 2000s

INTRODUCTION 1. From Neoliberalism to Resource Nationalism: States, Firms and Development PAUL A. HASLAM AND PABLO HEIDRICH PART 1: The Political Economy of Resource Nationalism 2. Trends in Minerals, Ores and Metals Prices SAMUEL K. GAYI AND JANVIER D. NKURUNZIZA 3. Rise of state-firm bargaining in the 2000s VLADO VIVODA 4. The Emergence of Industrial Policy Lite: Latin Americas Blind Spot ANIL HIRA 5. Regional Trends and Context for Latin American Resource Nationalism PABLO HEIDRICH 6. Natural Resource Nationalisms and the Compensatory State in Progressive South America EDUARDO GUDYNAS PART 2: From Limited to Radical Resource Nationalism: The Country-Cases 7. The Liberal Rarity of South America: Oil and Mining Policy Reform in Colombia in the 2000s CARLOS CABALLERO ARGAEZ AND SEBASTIAN BITAR 8. Mexicos New Wave of Market Reforms and its Extractive Industries JUAN-CARLOS MORENO-BRID AND ALICIA PUYANA 9. Resource Nationalism and Brazils Post-neoliberal Strategy JEWELLORD NEM SINGH AND ELIZA MASSI 10. Mining policies in Humalas Peru: A Patchwork of Improvised Nationalism and Corporate Interests JAVIER ARELLANO-YANGUAS 11. Resource Nationalism in the Plurinational state of Bolivia LORENZO PELLEGRINI 12. Resource Nationalism and the Bolivarian Revolution in Venezuela DANIEL HELLINGER CONCLUSION 13. Towards a Theory of Resource Nationalisms PAUL A. HASLAM AND PABLO HEIDRICH

State-Market Interaction in Hydrocarbon Sector: The Cases of Australia and Japan

Australia and Japan have much in common. Both countries are developed economies, located in the Asia-Pacific region, and are members of the International Energy Agency (IEA). Given these general similarities, one would anticipate that their governments adopt similar approaches to energy markets. However, this chapter demonstrates that there is much contrast in their respective approaches to energy markets. On one hand, in Australia, the government adopts a laissez-faire approach to energy markets, largely behaving as a facilitator of investment in upstream activities. The Australian hydrocarbon sector is dominated by international energy companies, which control both upstream and downstream sectors, and are responsible for supplying much of Australia’s energy. On the other hand, having first-hand experience from the 1970s oil crises, the Japanese government perceives energy resources as strategic commodities. Unlike in Australia, energy in Japan is securitized, where the government plays an active role in ensuring that Japan has access to uninterrupted supplies of affordable energy. Against this backdrop, this chapter explores contrasting approaches to hydrocarbon sector by the Australian and Japanese governments and highlights key similarities and differences between the two cases.