Politics of carbon/hydrocarbon democracies: Oil as a political (meta-)narrative

This paper discusses the metanarrative importance of carbon/hydrocarbon energy resources, fossil fuels, for the theory of democracy, on the one hand, and, on the other, their metanarrative position within the major security theories in international/inter-state relations. The paper is a study of how facts in the form of certain theories generate carbon/hydrocarbon narratives of democracy and international relations. When we refer to carbon/hydrocarbon democracies, we actually analyze the various democratic structures that emerged from the prevalence of the political discourse on coal or oil. While the former energy resource gave rise to an emphasis on egalitarianism, the latter exposed democracy to technocratic and plutocratic tendencies. Simultaneously, the paper also addresses the undemocratic potentials of potentials of rentier states. At the international system level, from a realist approach, the struggle for carbon resources, carbon/energy dependence and resource/carbon nationalism are essential issues for a state's power and welfare. The liberal notion of international energy policies implies market-driven and cooperative designing of energy relations by various state and non-state institutions and organizations. From a constructivist perspective, the focus is on petro-securitization and a whole range of distinct public, as well as private, cultural, economic and political perceptions that give oil multiple contextual and symbolic meanings.