PEAK OIL

future of many countries in this region represents a particular challenge. The
democratisation of the regimes of some countries such as Egypt, which Western players
generally consider worth supporting in the long term, could in the medium term not only
lead to at first increased instability in the region, but also to a government takeover by
increasingly fundamentalist powers, thus posing a special challenge for international
cooperation.
Ideological differences, for example regarding the importance of religion, state, nation and
country as well as the use of violence as a political instrument complicate the development of
stable and trusted international relations. Peak oil is expected to lead to an increase in
importance and formative power of the predominantly Islamic producer countries of the
region, thus potentially enabling them to exploit their supply relationships along ideological
lines of conflict. This is not to explicitly suggest the controversial idea of a potential “clash of
cultures”, fought by means of energy resources. However, instances of exploitation of energy
relations triggered by political events such as the controversy surrounding Danish caricatures
of the prophet Muhammad are indeed conceivable. 175
Furthermore, the wealth accumulated through oil production in the Gulf States could
potentially exacerbate ideological and political differences between Western, liberaldemocratic
industrial nations on the one side and Islamic states on the other. Various studies
on the phenomenon of rentier states as well as Thomas Friedman’s “First Law of
Petropolitics” point out that oil prices, respectively a country’s oil riches and the resulting
wealth of oil-producing countries potentially correlate to slow or non-existing democratic
development. 176 Based on this assumption, it could be concluded that peak oil promotes the
undermining of democratic developments, which in turn could greatly invalidate the efforts
of Germany and the European Union for democratisation in producer countries. In light of
the demographic intermingling of Germany and Europe with Islamic countries, an increasing
aggravation of ideological lines of conflict would also add to conflict potential within society,
thus underlining the necessity for dialogue and the establishment of resilient partnerships.
Against this backdrop, the need for Western actors to gain a nuanced overview of the political
and social structures of countries in these regions and to identify and support those powers
that peacefully advocate change in their countries arises. 177 The above already points to the
conflict between self-interest and ethical values in foreign policy, which will be discussed
further in Chapter 4.3.
175 In September 2005, controversy surrounding these caricatures led to violent protests and calls for boycott in parts of the Arab world. Iran severed all trade ties with
Denmark. Especially in a case like this, but also in the context of increasingly selective supply relations in general, it is questionable whether liberal democratic industrial
nations such as Germany would be among the favoured recipient countries. While intercultural dialogue should not be a means to an end but the end itself, this example
nevertheless underlines the urgent necessity for dialogue between the "West" and the Islamic world.
176 Cf. Michael Lewin Ross, “Does Oil hinder Democracy?”, World Politics, Vol. 53, No. 3 (April 2001), 325–361; Thomas L. Friedman, “The First Law of Petropolitics”,
Foreign Policy, Vol. 154 (May/June 2006), 28-39.
177 Volker Perthes of the German Institute for International and Security Affairs (SWP) points out that this includes accepting that civil society is not made up only of
players that engage in secular discourse, but also of conservative Islamic powers. According to Perthes, without the national moderate powers of Islam, there can be no
lasting political reform in the Arab world. Cf. Volker Perthes, “Perspektiven auf den radikalen Islamismus. Generationen des Zorns”, Qantara (September 2008),
http://de.qantara.de/webcom/show_article.php/_c-638/_nr-28/_p-1/i.html (accessed on 14 October 2010)
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