On the Political Nature of “Market Dominance” in the Energy Sector (1973 Crisis)

Abstract

The article attempts to analyze the oil crisis of 1973 from the perspective of changes in the world financial system’s functioning. The author takes as the starting point of the crisis not the “oil embargo” of the Arab countries in response to the Yom Kippur War, but Richard Nixon’s decree of 1971 on the rejection of the gold fixing the dollar (Nixon Shock). The result was a transformation of the mechanisms and principles of the Bretton Woods system. According to the author, the economy and the socio-political model of the Western countries, subsequently (after the collapse of the socialist camp) of the whole world, underwent a transformation. The article’s relevance is due to the fundamental similarity of the parameters and characteristics of the world economy’s current crisis with the crisis of 1973, which gives the author reason to consider the current crisis a relapse. The author proves that the current global crisis is caused by the shortcomings and costs of the socio-economic model formed in 1973 On the agenda are the same questions and problems that were not answered 50 years ago.