Document details

Covering Oil: A Reporter's Guide to Energy and Development

New York: Open Society Institute (2005), 156 pp.

Contains tables, glossary pp. 141-146

Series: Lifting the Resource Curse, 2

ISBN 978-1-891385-45-2

"Over the last two years, the Initiative for Policy Dialogue and Revenue Watch, working with local partners and other sponsors, have organized workshops for journalists in the oil-exporting countries of Azerbaijan, Kazakhstan, and Nigeria on the subject of “Covering Resource Wealth.” This book is a result of those workshops, in which journalists expressed a great need for more information to help them understand the petroleum industry and the impact that petroleum development and export may have on their countries [...] [htis book] will provide journalists with practical information in easily understood language about the petroleum industry and the impact of petroleum on a producing country. The report contains tip sheets for reporters on stories to pursue and questions to ask. Sample stories are also included. A resource section recommends further reading. A glossary defines key financial, geological, and legal terms that can improve reporters’ understanding of the literature on petroleum development. We hope that this book will give journalists the background information they need to write in-depth, analytical, critical, and informative pieces on energy and development—a subject affecting millions of readers around the world." (Foreword, page 7-8)
1 Making Natural Resources into a Blessing rather than a Curse / Joseph E. Stiglitz, 13
2 Understanding the Resource Curse / Terry Lynn Karl, 21
3 A Primer on Oil / John Roberts, 31
4 Oil Companies and the International Oil Market / Katherine Stephan, 47
5 The ABCs of Petroleum Contracts: License-Concession Agreements, Joint Ventures, and Production-sharing Agreements / Jenik Radon, 61
6 Protecting Developing Economies from Price Shocks / Randall Dodd, 87
7 The Environmental, Social, and Human Rights Impacts of Oil Development / David Waskow and Carol Welch, 101
Appendix: Extractive Industries Transparency Initiative Publish What You Pay, 129