ABSTRACT

The "energy crisis" is a manifestation of the great disorder in the world today. International political and economic relations are also affected by the "energy crisis." This crisis has caused the major capitalist countries to go through the "coldest winter." The "energy crisis" in the capitalist world, in essence, reflects the crisis of the capitalist system; it is an outcome of aggravated contradictions in the capitalist-imperialist system. It is caused by the brutal exploitation and wild plunder of the people at home and abroad by monopoly capital. So far as the present is concerned, it is also a direct result of the frantic external expansion and struggle for world hegemony carried out by the two superpowers, US imperialism and Soviet revisionism. Under the capitalist system, "the production of surplus value or profit is the absolute law of this mode of production". It has been said that the present "energy crisis" is due mainly to a shortage of petroleum supplies.