Oil, risk, and regional politics in East Africa

Resource nationalism, political disputes between national and local authorities over revenue sharing, and insecurity, are common country level political risks in Africa's oil and gas industries. But the boom decade in Africa, a period of high international oil prices between 2004 and 2014, gave new significance to regional risk. 

In The Extractive Industries and Society journal, this article shows how regional cooperation and cross-border pipeline infrastructure are necessary to monetize landlocked resources in East Africa. It examines how oil and politics produce regional risk to influence the competitive positions of international oil companies and development of oil industries in South Sudan, Uganda, and Kenya. It demonstrates how international oil companies harness market and political resources to manage and mitigate not only country level risks, but also to shape regional affairs to advance their competitive positions.