This study derives from a concern with the Nigerian oil conflict. It focuses on the paradigm shift and various methods of conflict management practised in the oil industry, especially among the more dominant transnational oil companies (TNOCs). The article is primarily based on a field study of the three largest TNOCs in Nigeria – Shell, Mobil and Chevron. The study reveals that different oil companies operating in the Niger Delta adopt different conflict management strategies depending on the precise nature and intensity of the threats concerned, which are, in turn, largely related to the locational spread or concentration of the individual firm's oil operations. The upsurge and intensification of violent anti-oil protests in the oil-bearing communities since the 1990s have compelled petrobusiness to explore new paradigms of security communitization, security privatization, security corporatization and securitization of development. The paradigm shift, as the study demonstrates, has considerable implications for both the oil conflict and security in the Nigerian oil region.
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