Suggested Citation:
Ghandi, Abbas and C.-Y. Cynthia Lin Lawell (2015) Is Resource Nationalism on the Rise?: Evidence from Service Contracts in Eight Countries. IAEE Energy Forum 24 (1), 35 - 37

Resource nationalism is the tendency of people and governments to assert control over natural resources located on their territory. There is a debate over whether resource nationalism is on the rise as a result of the general belief about the increasing global scarcity of oil and natural gas prior to the recent shale gas and tight oil development in the U.S., as increasing scarcity may cause some governments to hold on to their ownership or control over their fossil fuel resources for strategic and economic reasons.

This article assesses whether resource nationalism is on the rise by reviewing the energy strategy and oil and natural gas fiscal systems of eight major oil or natural gas producing countries that have either adopted a variation of a service contract or have shown interest in this framework as an alternative to production sharing contracts over the period 1990 to 2014.