ABSTRACT
This introduction presents an overview of the key concepts discussed in the subsequent chapters of this book. The book presents a study which is based on the conviction that in recent year's excessive attention has been devoted to the exporting and importing countries, and too little to the companies. In other words, the problem is seen to be more in the decline of concentration or horizontal integration at the stage of oil production, than in vertical disintegration, meaning separation of production from marketing. The opposite situation, in which there is excess supply, and the national oil companies of the Arab countries find themselves unable to market the volume of oil that they targeted, is not raised. They can ape the majors by building up their expertise in all stages of the oil industry can opt for a second strategy, playing a marginal role in the international industry but becoming leading industrial conglomerates in their own economies.
