ABSTRACT
The chapter explores whether the introduction and organisation of state involvement in oil production in Norway and the UK in the 1960s and 1970s was influenced by the models used by developing countries. Previous literature has attributed little significance to the rise of state involvement in the developing oil-producing countries in the 1960s in its explanations for why Norway and the UK introduced similar policies in the North Sea. On the contrary, the introduction of direct state involvement in the North Sea was instead explained by domestic political traditions. By analysing how state involvement in North Sea oil production developed in light of state involvement in Middle Eastern countries from the late 1950s, however, the chapter highlights important similarities. By investigating more closely the process by which the Norwegian and British forms of state involvement were arrived at, we can say that ideas, arguments and experiences derived from the developing producer country context were in fact influencing the introduction and organisation of state involvement in North Sea oil, indicating the limits of previous domestically oriented explanations.
