Tusiani, Michael D. And Anne-Marie Johnson. From Black Gold to Frozen Gas: How Qatar Became an Energy Superpower

• DOI: https://doi.org/10.13169/arabstudquar.46.1.0080
• Published date: 19 January 2024
• Pages: 80-83
• Date: 19 January 2024
• Author: Hamdullah Baycar

www.plutojournals.com/asq/

BOOK REVIEW

Tusiani, Michael D., and Anne-Marie Johnson. From Black Gold to

Frozen Gas: How Qatar Became an Energy Superpower. New York:

Columbia University Press, 2023.

454 pages. Hardcover $32.00

Reviewed by Hamdullah Baycar

Michael D. Tusiani and Anne-Marie Johnson investigate the story of Qatari wealth,

which was primarily derived from oil and gas. With the rise of the importance of

gas, from just 2 million metric tons of global demand in 1970 to 357 million

metric tons in 2020, Qatar, as a supplier of 25 percent of all demand, increased its

footprint in international aairs. In fteen chapters, an introduction, and epilogue,

the authors survey Qatari political history from independence to many coups, all

revolving around the story of natural resources – mainly oil and later gas. Both

Michael D. Tusiani and Anne-Marie Johnson worked in the oil and gas industry.

While Tusiani worked for a consulting rm and has authored ve books on energy,

Johnson is a journalist who has been extensively writing on gas and oil and was

later invited to join the consulting rm that Tusiani works for.

The book begins with Qatar’s recent crisis with its neighbors. The authors draw

upon the history of crises in Qatari political history dating back to 1893. By doing

so, they show how the state has always overcome crises despite initial difficulty,

even becoming more powerful than before their initiation. In addition to Qatar’s

rise as the superpower of gas exports, the Russian invasion of Ukraine on February

24, 2022 might have empowered Qatar with increased European reliance on gas.

The book is timely as gas has become one of the most critical resources for Europe,

among other countries.

The authors focus more on oil than gas between chapters two to seven. The first

chapter takes the reader on a time travel when Qatar did not have much oil and gas

by focusing on domestic, regional, and international actors, namely the Al Thani

family; Saudi Arabia; Bahrain; different emirates of today’s United Arab Emirates;

and the British. The second chapter is reserved for the first oil concession in 1935

to the Anglo-Persian oil company, which lasted 75 years. Of course, the

concession was not without security guarantees from the British. For example,

Hamdullah Baycar is a Postgraduate Teaching Assistant, Institute of Arab and Islamic Studies,

University of Exeter, UK, h.baycar2@exeter.ac.uk

DOI:10.13169/arabstudquar.46.1.0080