What do you think?
Rate this book
The Seven Sisters - The Great Oil Companies & the World They Shaped
A brilliant expose of the greed of the world's most precious commodity - oil!
393 pages, Mass Market Paperback
First published January 1, 1975
Ratings & Reviews
Friends & Following
Create a free account to discover what your friends think of this book!
Community Reviews
Displaying 1 - 18 of 18 reviews
Fascinating Period History of Oil from 1900-1975
Why read a chronicle of the world oil industry that ends in 1975? So much has happened in the last 40 years, and so many events have been unpredictable — from the overthrow of many of the regimes of the Middle East and North Africa to the emergence of fracking and other technologies that have changed the supply and demand equation in ways no one foresaw when this book was written.
This remains a valuable book, if only to provide the reader with a sense of perspective about how we got to where we are in international relations with oil producing nations and humility about our ability to predict the future.
Anthony Sampson is a wonderful writer, bringing to life the distinctions among each of the seven oil companies that dominated the world of oil in 1975, and providing character studies of the powerful individuals he was able to meet and interview, including Saudi oil minister Sheikh Zaki Yamani, the Shah of Iran, and many others.
1975 was a pivotal year and it looked at the time that the industrialized world would be hostage to OPEC to an unprecedented degree. As the Chairman of Gulf Oil said, “It’s taken OPEC fifteen years to put together an absolutely magnificent organization that succeeded in getting world oil prices up by a factor of four in a month’s time. They’d have to be utterly mad to do anything as stupid as go out and compete with each other to drive down the price of oil.” Well, in fact, fractures among the members of OPEC led to just such competition, and the instability of political leadership not only in Middle East countries such as Iran, Iraq, and Libya, but also in producing countries such as Russia, Venezuela, and Angola, have shown that OPEC is not a monolithic organization able to impose cartel pricing on the consuming countries of the world.
For the major oil companies, the challenge of managing great swings in supply and demand, so characteristic of the 20th Century and chronicled in this book, carry forward to this day. At one moment, everyone was worried that “we will run out of oil” and at the next moment the companies were terrified of being drowned in a glut of oil — whether from the discoveries at Spindletop in Texas in 1901, in Venezuela in the 1920s, or exploitation of the vast reserves in the Gulf States of the Middle East at the end of World War II. Up until the 1960s, the oil companies were worried about having too much oil, not too little. So even though in 1953 the British and American governments were behind the overthrow of elected Iranian leader and his replacement by the Shah, the Seven sisters did not want oil to flow from Iran at the time because of fear of an oil glut depressing prices. Today, of course, we have an oil glut and price drop brought on by slowing global economic growth and the fracking technology that has made the US, once again, self sufficient in oil. But in reading history, we should assume that this, too, is a temporary imbalance.
If anything, the power of international oil companies has become more concentrated. The Seven Sisters are now the four sisters, with the merger of Exxon and Mobil, and Chevron having acquired both Texaco and the production assets of Gulf Oil. BP has grown with the acquisition of Standard Oil of Indiana (American), and Shell remains a member of the Big Four global companies.
Sampson also provides useful historical context for the reasons the West is so resented in countries such as Iran, Iraq, and Libya, as well as the background of economic as well as religious rivalries among these producing nations. The needs and interests of those countries with large populations are much different than those of Kuwait or the Emirates with very small populations to satisfy.
In summary, read in the proper context, this book is relevant background to understanding the power of Big Oil today, and to thoughtful consideration of energy policy as we look forward to the challenges of the 21st Century.
Why read a chronicle of the world oil industry that ends in 1975? So much has happened in the last 40 years, and so many events have been unpredictable — from the overthrow of many of the regimes of the Middle East and North Africa to the emergence of fracking and other technologies that have changed the supply and demand equation in ways no one foresaw when this book was written.
This remains a valuable book, if only to provide the reader with a sense of perspective about how we got to where we are in international relations with oil producing nations and humility about our ability to predict the future.
Anthony Sampson is a wonderful writer, bringing to life the distinctions among each of the seven oil companies that dominated the world of oil in 1975, and providing character studies of the powerful individuals he was able to meet and interview, including Saudi oil minister Sheikh Zaki Yamani, the Shah of Iran, and many others.
1975 was a pivotal year and it looked at the time that the industrialized world would be hostage to OPEC to an unprecedented degree. As the Chairman of Gulf Oil said, “It’s taken OPEC fifteen years to put together an absolutely magnificent organization that succeeded in getting world oil prices up by a factor of four in a month’s time. They’d have to be utterly mad to do anything as stupid as go out and compete with each other to drive down the price of oil.” Well, in fact, fractures among the members of OPEC led to just such competition, and the instability of political leadership not only in Middle East countries such as Iran, Iraq, and Libya, but also in producing countries such as Russia, Venezuela, and Angola, have shown that OPEC is not a monolithic organization able to impose cartel pricing on the consuming countries of the world.
For the major oil companies, the challenge of managing great swings in supply and demand, so characteristic of the 20th Century and chronicled in this book, carry forward to this day. At one moment, everyone was worried that “we will run out of oil” and at the next moment the companies were terrified of being drowned in a glut of oil — whether from the discoveries at Spindletop in Texas in 1901, in Venezuela in the 1920s, or exploitation of the vast reserves in the Gulf States of the Middle East at the end of World War II. Up until the 1960s, the oil companies were worried about having too much oil, not too little. So even though in 1953 the British and American governments were behind the overthrow of elected Iranian leader and his replacement by the Shah, the Seven sisters did not want oil to flow from Iran at the time because of fear of an oil glut depressing prices. Today, of course, we have an oil glut and price drop brought on by slowing global economic growth and the fracking technology that has made the US, once again, self sufficient in oil. But in reading history, we should assume that this, too, is a temporary imbalance.
If anything, the power of international oil companies has become more concentrated. The Seven Sisters are now the four sisters, with the merger of Exxon and Mobil, and Chevron having acquired both Texaco and the production assets of Gulf Oil. BP has grown with the acquisition of Standard Oil of Indiana (American), and Shell remains a member of the Big Four global companies.
Sampson also provides useful historical context for the reasons the West is so resented in countries such as Iran, Iraq, and Libya, as well as the background of economic as well as religious rivalries among these producing nations. The needs and interests of those countries with large populations are much different than those of Kuwait or the Emirates with very small populations to satisfy.
In summary, read in the proper context, this book is relevant background to understanding the power of Big Oil today, and to thoughtful consideration of energy policy as we look forward to the challenges of the 21st Century.
This is the history of oil and oil companies. Chapter two open with the words “The American beauty rose can be produced in its entire splendour only by sacrificing the early buds that grow up around it”-John D Rockefeller. There is nothing better that prepares you for what’s to come. The statement encapsulates the predatory nature of these oil companies. The books also explains the behind the scenes of how democracy was subverted and sacrificed in countries that were on the way of these companies.
Even truer today-this is American politics 101, Franklin D. Roosevelt is quoted as having said about America: “the trouble with this country is that, you can’t win an election without the oil companies, and you can’t govern with it.”And today all you need to do is add other conglomerates including the military industrial complex. It’s the kind of dilemma facing American politician then and now. It also covers how OPEC was formed, the politics and the manoeuvring. It’s well researched, very informative and will give an essential history of the black gold. However, the pricing of oil is still as opaque as ever, a follow up book should explore this!
A good read!
Even truer today-this is American politics 101, Franklin D. Roosevelt is quoted as having said about America: “the trouble with this country is that, you can’t win an election without the oil companies, and you can’t govern with it.”And today all you need to do is add other conglomerates including the military industrial complex. It’s the kind of dilemma facing American politician then and now. It also covers how OPEC was formed, the politics and the manoeuvring. It’s well researched, very informative and will give an essential history of the black gold. However, the pricing of oil is still as opaque as ever, a follow up book should explore this!
A good read!
Fascinating insights into and overview of the rise of modern giants. It can be difficult to fathom how much modern society depends on the products of the oil industry, from transportation to plastics to chemicals. And, it is historically humbling that the entire span of this transformation is only on the order of 100 years. The world in which Standard Oil operated is in one sense unrecognizable and in other ways completely mirrored by the big tech companies (Facebook, Amazon, Netflix, Google, Microsoft, Twitter) today, particularly in their interactions with the U.S. government and regulators. Unlike oil that was divided geographically between consumers (West) and producers (Middle East), technology is less geographically distinguished and globalization has transformed the business world. Overall the book provokes thinking about the present by exposing aspects of the past, like any good history book does.
Nice read for those interested in History of Oil.... But rather than giving many irrelevant insider stories, it could have been much better if author would have correlated world events with events in oil industry. Many rubbish details make it a tedious book and fouls the fun of the book.
THE SEVEN SISTERS menuturkan kisah belakang layar tujuh perusahaan minyak raksasa yang telah merajai dunia minyak selama lima puluh tahun—Exxon (Esso), Gulf, Texaco, Mobil, dan Socal (Chevron) dari Amerika, serta Shell dan BP dari Eropa—berikut hubungan mereka yang penuh badai dengan pemerintah negara asal mereka, yang berujung krisis energi sekarang ini.
BUKU THE SEVEN SISTERS ini menelusuri pertempuran-pertempuran penentu untuk mendapatkan kendali atas minyak, serta masalah yang berulang dan kebijakan yang menghasilkan keseimbangan kekuasaan yang rawan sekarang ini antara konsumen dan produsen.
Anthony Sampson menunjukkan bagaimana John D. Rockefeller memperoleh monopoli minyak Standard Oil; bagaimana di sela perang-perang ketujuh perusahaan membagi-bagi dunia dengan berbagai kesepakatan rahasia, meski pemimpin mereka dipermalukan bagaimana dalam perang mereka menolak upaya pemerintah-pemerintah untuk mengekang mereka dan bagaimana di tahun-tahun pascaperang negara-negara produsen mempelajari permainan mereka sendiri dan akhirnya membentuk OPEC, sebuah kartel untuk mengonfrontasi kartel.
Anthony Sampson telah melakukan penelitian menyeluruh untuk buku ini di Amerika, Inggris, dan Timur Tengah. Memberikan kisah otentik tentang berbagai negosiasi dan kesepakatan dengan pemerintah-pemerintah, didukung oleh memo-memo dan kesepakatan-kesepakatan aktual dari masa itu. Dan dengan jelas dia menggambarkan tokoh-tokoh dominan yang membangun bisnis ini.
★ ★ ★ ★ ★ ★ ★ ★
Toko Buku Online GarisBuku.com
sms/WhatsApp : 0813.1020.3084 | Line @GarisBuku
Follow Us :
facebook | twitter | Blog Wordpress | tumblr | instagram
BUKU THE SEVEN SISTERS ini menelusuri pertempuran-pertempuran penentu untuk mendapatkan kendali atas minyak, serta masalah yang berulang dan kebijakan yang menghasilkan keseimbangan kekuasaan yang rawan sekarang ini antara konsumen dan produsen.
Anthony Sampson menunjukkan bagaimana John D. Rockefeller memperoleh monopoli minyak Standard Oil; bagaimana di sela perang-perang ketujuh perusahaan membagi-bagi dunia dengan berbagai kesepakatan rahasia, meski pemimpin mereka dipermalukan bagaimana dalam perang mereka menolak upaya pemerintah-pemerintah untuk mengekang mereka dan bagaimana di tahun-tahun pascaperang negara-negara produsen mempelajari permainan mereka sendiri dan akhirnya membentuk OPEC, sebuah kartel untuk mengonfrontasi kartel.
Anthony Sampson telah melakukan penelitian menyeluruh untuk buku ini di Amerika, Inggris, dan Timur Tengah. Memberikan kisah otentik tentang berbagai negosiasi dan kesepakatan dengan pemerintah-pemerintah, didukung oleh memo-memo dan kesepakatan-kesepakatan aktual dari masa itu. Dan dengan jelas dia menggambarkan tokoh-tokoh dominan yang membangun bisnis ini.
★ ★ ★ ★ ★ ★ ★ ★
Toko Buku Online GarisBuku.com
sms/WhatsApp : 0813.1020.3084 | Line @GarisBuku
Follow Us :
facebook | twitter | Blog Wordpress | tumblr | instagram
A good read!
We're down to five sisters now after some big time mergers aren't we ?
This is an excellent book. It is a slower dense read but extremely well written and researched. I learned a lot and it provides good context for when history repeats itself.
Reading this book, which was published in 1975, just after the "oil crisis" and before the fall of the Shah, is a bit like reading a Victorian assessment of the Napoleonic wars. Sampson provides of nutshell history of the events from the beginning of the oil industry to the climactic years that saw the balance of power shift from the seven multi-national oil companies to the producing countries, but so much has happened since the mid-1970s that his emphases and speculations about the future seem quaint.
This is very much a political history. There is nothing here about the geology of oil, why it was found in some places in abundance and completely absent in others. He also does not really explore the varying cultures of the oil-producing countries and why their relationships were so fractious. In fairness, the title is The Seven Sisters and his focus is on the five American and two European corporations that dominated oil exploration, productions, transport, refining, and distribution for much of the 20th century.
While this is not an in-depth look at the culture of each of these companies, Sampson is very good about explaining the differences among them. There are whole books on the creation and break-up of Standard Oil, but he briefly explains how the post-trust-busting companies acquired their characters. Mobil, for example, was based in New York and actually had very little of its own oil; its focus was on buying and selling it. Exxon, in contrast, had vast reserves, first in Texas and then in the Middle East. Texaco was famous for making no pretense of being about anything except making money and pinching pennies along the way. While Mobil attempted to seem benevolent and sophisticated, Texaco was proudly parochial.
Shell experienced a constant tension between its Anglo and its Dutch controllers, but was a far more patrician organization than any of the American companies. While the American management was dominated by chemical engineers and early on even roughnecks that came up out of the oil fields, the upper ranks of Shell were populated by university men and aristocrats. British Petroleum (BP) was actually an arm of the government of the United Kingdom and so was a trust by design, the opposite of the American companies.
Sampson's main objective is to illustrate the transfer of economic power from the companies to the producing countries, to explain how, when, and where it happened, and he does this well. He presumes his reader has a ready grasp on the 19th and 20th century events of the Middle East, but he does rather whitewash the bad behavior on the part of the Europeans. The Iranian leader Mosaddegh, who did so much to shift control of the oil fields from the companies to his own country in the 1950s, died under house arrest in 1967, a fact that Sampson, who seems very impressed by his persecutor, the Shah, does not even mention.
A revelation to me was that the oil embargo of 1973-74 was primarily a political protest against the American and European support of Israel in the latest Arab-Israeli war, not part of the ongoing struggle to get control of the resource. I was in eighth grade at the time and my political awareness, which was just dawning, was fixed on the growing Watergate scandal rather an international affairs. While Sampson's book is quite useful at explaining what were for him contemporary events, his own predictions for the future missed the mark. He gave, for example, short shrift to the future of alternative energies, which have made such great strides in Europe in the past 25 years. And his belief that a "world government" would be necessary to regulate oil seems almost bizarre at this point.
This is very much a political history. There is nothing here about the geology of oil, why it was found in some places in abundance and completely absent in others. He also does not really explore the varying cultures of the oil-producing countries and why their relationships were so fractious. In fairness, the title is The Seven Sisters and his focus is on the five American and two European corporations that dominated oil exploration, productions, transport, refining, and distribution for much of the 20th century.
While this is not an in-depth look at the culture of each of these companies, Sampson is very good about explaining the differences among them. There are whole books on the creation and break-up of Standard Oil, but he briefly explains how the post-trust-busting companies acquired their characters. Mobil, for example, was based in New York and actually had very little of its own oil; its focus was on buying and selling it. Exxon, in contrast, had vast reserves, first in Texas and then in the Middle East. Texaco was famous for making no pretense of being about anything except making money and pinching pennies along the way. While Mobil attempted to seem benevolent and sophisticated, Texaco was proudly parochial.
Shell experienced a constant tension between its Anglo and its Dutch controllers, but was a far more patrician organization than any of the American companies. While the American management was dominated by chemical engineers and early on even roughnecks that came up out of the oil fields, the upper ranks of Shell were populated by university men and aristocrats. British Petroleum (BP) was actually an arm of the government of the United Kingdom and so was a trust by design, the opposite of the American companies.
Sampson's main objective is to illustrate the transfer of economic power from the companies to the producing countries, to explain how, when, and where it happened, and he does this well. He presumes his reader has a ready grasp on the 19th and 20th century events of the Middle East, but he does rather whitewash the bad behavior on the part of the Europeans. The Iranian leader Mosaddegh, who did so much to shift control of the oil fields from the companies to his own country in the 1950s, died under house arrest in 1967, a fact that Sampson, who seems very impressed by his persecutor, the Shah, does not even mention.
A revelation to me was that the oil embargo of 1973-74 was primarily a political protest against the American and European support of Israel in the latest Arab-Israeli war, not part of the ongoing struggle to get control of the resource. I was in eighth grade at the time and my political awareness, which was just dawning, was fixed on the growing Watergate scandal rather an international affairs. While Sampson's book is quite useful at explaining what were for him contemporary events, his own predictions for the future missed the mark. He gave, for example, short shrift to the future of alternative energies, which have made such great strides in Europe in the past 25 years. And his belief that a "world government" would be necessary to regulate oil seems almost bizarre at this point.
It isn't all about the divide between the Jewish and Muslim faiths in the Middle East. Western exploitation of the regions natural resources and all that went with it (artificial borders, propping up despots, ignoring the greater population and their rights) goes a long way to explaining the lingering distrust of the West dating back to the Crusades and before
There is absolutely no reason today to read this fine book which was published in 1974 to explain to the general public why the great oil price crisis of 1973 occurred and what had been the role of the "Seven Sisters" (i.e. the cartel of five American and two British oil producers that had directed and controlled world oil production since the 1920s). This is a work of journalism that used only material of public record and thus needs to be rewritten today.
Sampson managed to please everyone. To make those who hated big business happy, he recounted the stories of some of the more notorious sins committed by members of the Seven Sisters. One Texas based company wanted to sell oil to Nazi Germany. Another firm was active in the CIA coup that ousted the democratically elected government of Iran and installed the pro-American Shah.
To make admirers of the American management of the world economy happy, he made it clear that the Seven Sisters colluded to keep prices down and supply consistent.
Sampson made it clear that the Oil Price crisis of 1973 had occurred because the OPEC members led by the Shah of Iran had revolted against the tutelage of the Seven Oil Multinationals in order to drive prices and their revenues higher. Sampson was far from sure that the Seven Sisters would not be able to re-assert their authority at some point in the future. He was convinced that they wanted to be in charge and that they wanted the OPEC members to follow their directions.
What his happened since is that the oil companies have abandoned all effort to the control the market and that governments of the major oil exporting nations are attempting to manage the market in the way that the Seven Sisters had for so many years.
Sampson managed to please everyone. To make those who hated big business happy, he recounted the stories of some of the more notorious sins committed by members of the Seven Sisters. One Texas based company wanted to sell oil to Nazi Germany. Another firm was active in the CIA coup that ousted the democratically elected government of Iran and installed the pro-American Shah.
To make admirers of the American management of the world economy happy, he made it clear that the Seven Sisters colluded to keep prices down and supply consistent.
Sampson made it clear that the Oil Price crisis of 1973 had occurred because the OPEC members led by the Shah of Iran had revolted against the tutelage of the Seven Oil Multinationals in order to drive prices and their revenues higher. Sampson was far from sure that the Seven Sisters would not be able to re-assert their authority at some point in the future. He was convinced that they wanted to be in charge and that they wanted the OPEC members to follow their directions.
What his happened since is that the oil companies have abandoned all effort to the control the market and that governments of the major oil exporting nations are attempting to manage the market in the way that the Seven Sisters had for so many years.
Historia; Anthony Sampson relata la historia de las 7 compañias petroleras más grandes del mundo desde sus origenes hasta la creación de la OPEP para enfrentarlas en sus abusos. realmente me hizo odiar el petroleo.
An excellent account of how the giants of the oil and gas industry came to be. Not as complete as the Prize, but touches on some matters the Prize doesn't and fills in the gaps. Both should be read.
Read
May 24, 2010
pp
A detailed history of of oil corporations and producers up through the mid-seventies.
armand hammer, international man of mystery
Outdated, but wow. the oil companies are as bad as we all think they are.
Bagaimana dunia minyak bekerja, di bawah satu kontrol "7 saudari"
Displaying 1 - 18 of 18 reviews