Energy and the Asian Security Nexus
1999; Columbia University; Volume: 53; Issue: 1 Linguagem: Inglês
ISSN
0022-197X
Autores Tópico(s)Global Energy Security and Policy
ResumoEnergy security concerns have always been central to geopolitical interests. Throughout history, the effort to secure access to energy sources and ensure adequate transport routes has demanded technological, commercial, diplomatic and military agility. In this century, countries have focused primarily on the means necessary to secure access to fossil fuels--especially oil. Winston Churchill, Great Britain's First Lord of the Admiralty before the First World War, expressed such intent in his drive to establish the Anglo Persian Oil Company (today British Petroleum) and open up Mideast oil to the outside world. This was of particular concern to him as he sought to transform the British Navy, which had hitherto relied on Welsh coal, into an oil-powered fleet ready to face the German challenge on the high seas.(1) Indeed, the desire for energy security was the motivating force behind European and U.S. foreign policy efforts to speed up the process of unlocking the huge Mideast oil reserves. In the 1970s the emergence of the Organization for Petroleum Exporting Countries (OPEC)--and the oil shocks it engineered--led to a new round of energy security concerns, demanding their own set of appropriate policy responses. More recently, energy security concerns have shifted to Asia.(2) Governments in the region and elsewhere worry about how much Asia's high economic growth rates will spur energy demand and whether serious conflicts might emerge as a result. Even though this demand suffered a temporary downturn in the wake of the Asian economic crisis, contributing to the slide in world oil prices and presenting a new set of concerns for producing countries, Asia will remain at the fore of the energy security debate. This article will focus on the region's energy security concerns, analyzing Asia's existing oil supplies, its current security risks and the region's policy options. I will argue that the transformation of energy markets has all but eliminated traditional security threats. While the challenge that Asia faces today--securing the supply and transport of energy--is the same, the conditions in which it must procure these goods has altered dramatically. I will further argue that the new global economic environment, which is based on respect for and reliance on free market forces, has also affected the way governments deal with energy security concerns by encouraging the use of market mechanisms to avoid the costly mistakes that resulted from excessive state interventionism in the past. Finally, since closer energy links between Asia and the Middle East are unavoidable, policy responses related to energy security should be aimed at persuading the countries of the region that stability and peace in the Middle East is equally critical to its prosperity as it is to the West's. Indeed, burden-sharing for the purpose of protecting transport routes is a common global objective. ENERGY SECURITY: THE RISE OF THE FREE MARKET Oil supply security--ensuring access not only to the resource base but also to the transport networks delivering it--has been the predominant focus of energy policy and energy security among the oil-importing Asia-Pacific economies. Earlier concepts of energy security were based on several key criteria: maximizing the use of domestic energy resources, increasing energy efficiency through taxes and legislation, diversifying away from oil dependence to multiple energy resources and minimizing oil imports--particularly from the Mideast. Such concepts did not adequately take market forces into account. Indeed, the market was seen to work inefficiently and to respond too swiftly to oil price movements and supply disruptions. Many held that it was the government's duty to intervene in the market to protect the consumer. This traditional concept of energy security necessitated financial commitments of a large and enduring nature that were seen to be essential. These took a variety of forms: over-investing in certain facilities to ensure redundant capacity in case of supply interruptions; subsidizing freight costs of imports from certain regions; implementing policies to utilize more renewable resources; raising taxes on oil imports to make competing fuels more economical; requiring the private sector or state oil companies to purchase oil in accordance with government-to-government contracts without regard to economics or quality; giving government bureaucracies the power of informal administrative guidance; and establishing oil reserves for commodity price stabilization programs that sought to smooth out violent price movements, as in South Korea, the Philippines and Thailand. …
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