ABSTRACT
This chapter analyses the changing balance of power in the international oil industry in the 2000s. A particular focus is on five major international oil companies IOCs. The chapter demonstrates that the international oil industry has shifted from a cooperative phase in the 1990s, when the IOCs managed numerous sweetheart deals, to a conflictive phase characterized by resurgent resource nationalism and unfavourable bargaining outcomes for IOCs in the 2000s. Although the majors have made unprecedented profits during the past decade, this does not imply that they have been successful in bargaining with host states. As illustrated by the example of Venezuela, high oil prices have endowed oil-exporting states with increased bargaining power, which has been one of the drivers of the resurgence in resource nationalism. The heavy-oil projects, which were previously under private control, have fallen under state control. Besides the oil industry in Venezuela, increased regulation and/or nationalization followed in Bolivia and Ecuador.
