ABSTRACT
The European Commission was informed of the negotiations between the companies and Organization of the Petroleum Exporting Countries (OPEC) by Angus Beckett, Chairman of the OECD Oil Committee. The relationship between the EC and OPEC, embedded in a complex configuration of international organizations, was profoundly altered by the first oil crisis. The first oil crisis therefore boosted initiatives by European countries to build ties with OPEC countries, either through direct contact or through the implementation of a global multilateralism. From 1979, attempts to conduct oil diplomacy through direct negotiations, be they political or economic, turned into diplomacy outside of interstate negotiations. The special relations between the United States and Saudi Arabia, at least until the mid-2010s, clearly hindered the establishment of direct relations between OPEC and the European Union, as well as any form of multilateral dialogue relating to oil.
