ABSTRACT
Geopolitical competition for oil has its origin in competition among different factions of capital arising from the progressive accumulation of fixed capital in the oil industry. Competition for raw material develops first in manufacturing industry, causing capital to migrate to extractive industry to ensure the production of cheap raw material at volumes commensurate with the demand in manufacturing industry. Competition for raw material, however, migrated to the extractive sphere with the concentration of fixed capital in the production of raw material. The concentration of capital in extractive industry, historically the consequence of growing demand for raw material (in manufacturing), becomes its primary source. Resource extraction grows in order to valorize capital fixed in extractive industry itself, and the profitability of extractive industry becomes dependent on the quantitative expansion of existing or potential resources. Access to, and control of, available and potential oil reserves becomes necessary to valorize large and growing magnitudes of capital fixed in the production process, including transportation and downstream operations. Expanding natural resources can be achieved through actual geographical expansion to incorporate new reserves into production, or through the application of technologies that enhance the natural productivity of already existing resources. Both geographical expansion and technological development require additional investment in fixed capital and lead to overproduction and overaccumulation, thus threatening the profitability of capital invested in extraction. To expand resources without further investment and to control the production of resources and their availability on the market, capitalists in extractive industry resort to expansion through centralization, i.e. through the merger and acquisition of capital already invested in the production of natural resources.
