Picard, M;
Beigi, T;
(2020)
Stains of Empire: accumulation by contamination in the Gulf.
Journal of Energy History
, 2
pp. 1-25.
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Abstract
Since the discovery of oil in the Gulf, the military-industrial complex has expanded the scale and scope of capital accumulation. We argue in this paper that the corollary to capital accumulation is contamination of human ecology, cannibalizing the daily life of many people having to live in the rubble of war and the spills of oil. Over the course of a century, surveillance from above and extraction down below fueled successive rounds of oil wars. Militarized for the purpose of extraction, the oil states of the Gulf have become wastelands littered by chemically contaminated waters, and massive oil spills. The history of war-making and oil drilling of postcolonial Iraq constitutes our case study. Inspired by Ecological Marxism, the concept of accumulation by contamination provides a critical framework to show how Energy Imperialism contributes to the asymmetric distribution of energy and toxic waste between corporate bodies and social metabolisms in the Middle East.
| Type: | Article |
|---|---|
| Title: | Stains of Empire: accumulation by contamination in the Gulf |
| Open access status: | An open access version is available from UCL Discovery |
| Publisher version: | http://www.energyhistory.eu/en/special-issue/stain... |
| Language: | English |
| Additional information: | © Journal of Energy History / Revue d'histoire de l'énergie. Published under the Creative Commons Attribution - No Commercial Use - No Modification 4.0 International (CC BY-NC-ND 4.0) license (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/deed.fr). |
| UCL classification: | UCL UCL > Provost and Vice Provost Offices UCL > Provost and Vice Provost Offices > UCL SLASH UCL > Provost and Vice Provost Offices > UCL SLASH > Faculty of S&HS UCL > Provost and Vice Provost Offices > UCL SLASH > Faculty of S&HS > SHS Faculty Office UCL > Provost and Vice Provost Offices > UCL SLASH > Faculty of S&HS > SHS Faculty Office > UCL Institute for Advanced Studies |
| URI: | https://discovery.ucl.ac.uk/id/eprint/10111842 |
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