Features
- Cover Type: Paperback with 928 pages
- Published by: Free Press January 1, 1993
- Written in: English
- ISBN 10 Number: 0671799320
- ISBN 13 Number: 978-0671799328
-
Book Dimensions:
9.2 x 6.1 x 1.7 inches
- Weighs: 2.6 pounds
Product Review
Daniel Yergin's first prize-winning book, Shattered Peace, was a history of the Cold War. Afterwards the young academic star joined the energy project of the
Harvard Business School and wrote the best-seller
Energy Future. Following on from there,
The Prize, winner of the 1992
Pulitzer Prize for nonfiction, is a comprehensive history of one of the commodities that powers the world--oil. Founded in the 19th century, the oil industry began producing kerosene for lamps and progressed to gasoline. Huge personal fortunes arose from it, and whole nations sprung out of the power politics of the oil wells. Yergin's fascinating account sweeps from early robber barons like
John D. Rockefeller, to the oil crisis of the 1970s, through to the Gulf War.
From Publishers Weekly
Energy consultant Yergin limns oil's central role in most of the wars and many international crises of the 20th century. "A timely, information-packed, authoritative history of the petroleum industry, tracing its ramifications, national and geopolitical, to the present day," said PW. Photos. Author tour.
Copyright 1991 Reed Business Information, Inc.
--This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.
Reader Reviews
My interest in Daniel Yergin's "The Prize" was piqued earlier in the year, when energy, not terrorism, was the most pressing domestic problem. For an economy that had gotten so caught up with the intangibles, with over-hyped, un-real products (haven't we all had enough of "e-business solutions?"), it was refreshing to study an industry dealing with a very tangible product whose supply is so essential to the survival of our economy itself. "The Prize" traces the history of oil from its humble, entrepreneurial beginnings in the hillsides of western Pennsylvania, to the shrewd domination of the industry by John D. Rockefeller, to the breakup of Standard Oil, and through the discovery of oil in the farthest flung corners of the globe. Part of Yergin's history is something of a tragedy: the gradual seizure of oil from the voyagers who discovered it by national governments who were able to use their seizures to threaten the West during the 1973 oil shock and beyond. In this one very big instance, third world governments really did take on multinational corporations -- and defeated them. Yergin chronicles how oil went from a freewheeling business of refiners and speculators to an instrument of great geopolitical importance, one where nation-states played at least as great a role in shaping the industry as the oil companies did. In this transition, anything could -- and did -- happen. Rock bottom prices threatened the survival of oil producers one year, and sky-high prices forced drastic changes in consumer behavior the next (indeed, "The Prize" does give one a crystal-clear view of the price mechanism). Nightmare scenarios involving the political manipulation of oil did indeed come to pass in 1973, in 1979, and during the Gulf War. There is no shortage of high drama throughout this story. One thing I would add to this book is a few pages, no more, no less, on the science and technology behind oil. What is it -- or what do we think it came from? How is it extracted? How have new technologies increased efficiency? If you want a business history that will simultaneously teach you quite a bit about world history (and about the Middle East), "The Prize" is a sure bet.
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