British Scholar: March 2008 Scholar of the Month

Scholar of the Month

March 2008

For Previous Scholars of the Month Click Here

British Scholar is proud to present the March 2008 Scholar of the
Month James Bamberg. Bamberg is currently the Alfred D.
Chandler International Visiting Scholar at the Harvard Business
School. For many years he has been the official historian of British
Petroleum (BP). His works include:

- Energy and Enterprise: The Transformation of BP in the Second Era
of Globalisation (forthcoming)

- British Petroleum and Global Oil, 1950-1975: The Challenge of
Nationalism (The History of the British Petroleum Company, Vol. 3)
(Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2000)

- The History of the British Petroleum Company, Vol. 2: The
Anglo-Iranian Years, 1928-1954 (Cambridge: Cambridge University
Press, 1994)

1. Where, when, and why did you become interested in British history?

JB: In my early teenage years, during the 1960s, I went to a traditional, very
disciplinarian English public school (i.e. a fee-paying school in the private
sector), where most of the teaching was very dull, and quite out of touch with
the excitement of youth culture in that decade. History at school consisted
mainly of memorizing and reciting chronologies of dates and events, which
was unbelievably boring. Until one day a new history teacher arrived and lit up
the whole subject. I can’t remember his first name, because we never used
them at that school. Everyone was known by their surname. I think his was
Davies or Davis, I’m not sure which. I shall always remember that the first
essay title he set us was ‘There is no such thing as good or bad, but only
change in taste’. Having become used to reciting chronologies, I found this
very challenging, and I felt sure that my essay was a disaster, but much to my
surprise, our new teacher responded very positively. He kindled my interest in
history, no mean feat as I was generally much more interested in building and
riding motor cycles, and other rebellious pursuits, than in academic study.

2. Who most influenced your academic development?

JB: My academic development was influenced by a combination of another
brilliant teacher and my personal background. After I left school and went to
Cambridge University to read history, I became disillusioned and dropped out
after the first two years. But several years later, in the late 1970s, I returned as
a mature student. One of Cambridge’s most promising young history dons at
that time was Clive Trebilcock, an inspiring teacher, who supervised a course
on the comparative economic development of Russia, Germany and Japan.
He came across more as a modern technocrat than what I thought of as a
typical history don, and he had a formidable intellect, which I found extremely
daunting, but also stimulating. He was interested in the history of business,
which was then quite fashionable in Cambridge and elsewhere. I became
interested in business history, partly because the teaching was so good, but
also because it resonated with me personally. My father had been a highly
successful businessman, but I could never understand what made him tick,
and business history seemed to hold out the possibility of getting closer to
understanding my own background.

3. If you hadn’t become a historian what career path would you have chosen?

JB: This reminds me of the question that I used to dread more than any other
when I was a boy: what are you going to do when you grow up? To be honest,
I have always felt very uneasy about the whole idea of a career path, and if I
hadn’t happened upon history, I don’t know what else I might have done. I don’
t think that I have a dominant talent or ambition in any one direction. So if I
hadn’t become a historian, perhaps I would have done a number of other,
quite diverse things ranging maybe from business to the arts, instead of
following a single career path. An eclectic career or a drifter, depending on
which way you look at it.

4. What project are you currently working on?

JB: My current research is principally focused on very recent contemporary
history that relates to issues of current concern, with a continuing emphasis on
the international petroleum industry. I am particularly interested in themes such
as energy and the environment (especially climate change), energy security,
resource nationalism, competition, technology, the changing structure of the
industry, and the competencies of the major international companies, and the
challenges to their positions in the international energy system. I have three or
four papers in an advanced stage of gestation on some of these themes.

5. What projects do you see yourself working on in the near future?

JB: I am starting a new book on the transformation of the major international
oil companies since the 1970s. Prior to that, the oil majors largely controlled
the international flow of oil, which was channeled through their vertically
integrated operations by large internal hierarchies. These companies, the
famous Seven Sisters, played a key role in the energy security of the West.
But since control of the upstream (crude oil production) sector was seized
from the majors by the OPEC countries in the 1970s, the once-dominant
companies have had to respond to new challenges, which form the core of
this book. Some key elements in the change process were that the oil majors'
vertically integrated operations were broken up, new markets emerged for
transactions in crude oil and refined products, new competition emerged from
powerful national oil companies and specialist players in the industry, climate
change appeared as a major new concern that threatened the future of the
industry, downsizing and outsourcing reduced the internal capabilities of the
majors, service companies like Schlumberger strengthened their hold on key
technologies, and some of the Seven Sisters were swallowed up in a wave of
mergers and acquisitions. With the revival of resource nationalism in producer
countries like Venezuela and Russia, the remaining 'super-majors' now
struggle to survive in a shrinking pond, with most of the world's petroleum
resources out of their reach, their production in decline, and dwindling oil and
gas reserves. Having charted their progress over the last thirty years, the
book plan ends with the question: where can the oil majors go from here?

6. Of your academic projects, which one has proved to be the most fulfilling?

JB: I spent so long on a multi-volume company history of BP that this must
rank as the most fulfilling, otherwise I could not justify it. It took me into all sorts
of areas, thematically and geographically, that I previously knew nothing
about, and I had wonderful access to all BP’s records, plus the opportunity to
interview lots of people inside and outside the company. My major
disappointment with it came last year, when I finished the manuscript of the
fourth volume, which ends in 2005, only to be told that BP would not give
permission for it to be published, at least for the time being. They are able to
do this under the terms on which they commissioned the book. So while the
process was fulfilling, the end result has fallen short at the moment. Hopefully
BP will soon allow the manuscript to go forward to publication.

7. Where do you see the field of British history heading in the next few years?

JB: I hope it’s not predictable, because it’s much more interesting when the
field is disturbed. Everyone, of course, is looking to be original and to come
up with something new that creates a significant discontinuity. The most
important thing as far as I’m concerned is that I’d like to see history grow, and
offer improved opportunities for gifted young historians to find jobs, which
seems to be a dire problem at the moment. I cannot see economic history,
which has always been broadly my field, making a major comeback in the
near future. If I were starting again, I think I might take up environmental
history, in one form or another.

8. What advice do you have for graduate students and beginning academics
about finding a topic of interest and publishing on it?

JB: Follow your nose as well as the literature, choose a topic you’re
genuinely interested in, and avoid fads or the pursuit of stardom. Don’t worry if
you make a few false starts, and don’t be perturbed if the job market seems
against you.

If you have questions or comments for Professor Bamberg you may
contact him at: jbamberg@hbs.edu