ABSTRACT
There are those who say that concern over security of energy supplies was an aberration of the 1970s, and that in the 1980s the market has been allowed to work, simultaneously correcting excessive consumption and bringing forth additional supply. One good result, they add, is that the power of the oil cartel, OPEC[ 1 ], to hold the West to economic and even political ransom has been destroyed, as that organisation’s continuing difficulties in propping up a declining oil price have demonstrated. The market has worked - and will continue to do so, provided governments do not interfere.
