ABSTRACT
In early 1972 the Gulf members of OPEC and representatives of the international oil companies met in Geneva. The contentious financial issues were resolved quickly, and the OPEC members turned the discussions towards fundamental questions of government participation in the ownership of the oil companies. During this phase of negotiations with the oil companies, Saudi Arabia was to take charge; and Sheikh Ahmed Zaki Yamani, its Oil Minister, was to be the dominant figure. OPEC appointed Yamani, who had been advocating participation since 1968, to negotiate with the oil companies on behalf of all Gulf producing countries. Most OPEC members, ever mindful of Mossadeq’s disastrous episode, favored the more cautious method of participation. This conservative tendency provoked the emergence of the ‘anti-OPEC group of oil technocrats and economists, whose political program for the Arab oil producers was based on the desirability of nationalizing the foreign companies.
