ABSTRACT
The First World of Europe, Japan, and North America gradually was coming to pragmatic terms with the Second World of the Soviet Union and the other states that modernized through "socialist revolution." However, the greatest transformation occurred within the Third World of less developed and so-called nonaligned states of Africa, Asia, and Latin America. The Third World's distinguishing features have been political domination by and economic dependence upon the more powerful First and, in some cases, Second Worlds. Originally organized in Baghdad during September 1960, the Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries was designed as a mechanism for protecting its members' mutual interests against the collective actions of the transnational oil corporations which have operated as a price and production "cartel" in the world market since the 1920s. The Arab states are engaged in "oil-drum accumulation" as their increasing share of posted petroleum prices swells their national savings of finance capital.
