That worldwide oil price rises deeply affect national politics has been amply confirmed by events of the last few weeks. The latest evidence of this key fact of contemporary international affairs comes from the US presidential election campaign.
Mr Al Gore yesterday proposed that President Clinton should release oil from the Strategic Petroleum Reserves to help stabilise high prices. He combined this with attacks on the major oil companies for alleged profiteering at the expense of ordinary consumers. In doing so he is provoking his Republican opponents, Mr George W. Bush and Mr Dick Cheney, both of whom have been deeply involved with the oil business. The issue is set to become a live topic in the campaign, as the Republican team propose to open up Arctic National Wildlife Refuge areas in Alaska for exploration, posing a real dilemma for Mr Gore, who has made environmental protection a central part of his platform. The fact that US consumers pay much less for oil and petrol than most of those in the rest of the developed world figures little in this argument.
Iraq's oil production is set to enter the US campaign, following Saddam Hussein's recent accusations against Kuwait and his calls on Opec not to be dictated to by the US government. There is an opportunity for him to stir the issue up just when both candidates, for their own reasons, would prefer to keep Iraq out of the campaign. Part of his motive is to head off attempts to impose punitive financial penalties on Iraq through the UN compensation fund for Kuwait, which receives 30 per cent of Iraqi oil revenues. Russia and France oppose such penalties and are calling for a thorough review of sanctions against Iraq, which have had devastating humanitarian consequences.
Both the Gore proposals and Iraq's renewed activism demonstrate how reliant the industrialised world is on oil and how potent are the effects when its price goes as low as it has in recent years or shows the kind of sharp increases seen in recent months. There are real conflicts of interest between producers and consumers, just as between environmental considerations and cheaper fuel policies. European politics have been shaken up comprehensively over the last few weeks, with results that are still being felt and evaluated all over the continent. Inter-American relations are also affected, notably by the activism of Venezuela's new president, who has been an influential figure in Opec's councils. The issue will also figure prominently in this weekend's annual general meeting of the International Monetary Fund and the World Bank in Prague.
The oil producers are entitled to a fair price, just as are producers of other basic commodities. The developed world has become complacent over low prices and is unacceptably ill-prepared for a cyclical rise in them. Besides, governments, especially in Europe, have become extraordinarily reliant on high fuel taxes. Paradoxically, the very internationalised effects of this latest crisis finds governments stumbling with national responses. That contrast demands to be addressed more effectively in coming months.