ABSTRACT
Oil rentier states, if not damned definitively by their wealth, are thought to share several failings arising from the atrophy of their tax extractive capacity. 1 Blessed with substantial oil revenues, they need not tax their populations as much as other states enjoying similar per capita incomes. Consequently, the argument goes, they are less accountable to their citizenry than more extractive states. The rentier state enjoys relative autonomy as long as the rents keep flowing. The petroleum industry is capital intensive, employs few workers and lacks substantial linkages with the broader economy, further insulating it against social and political pressures. 2
