Oil on the Edge

Reviews / Votes

"This book beautifully interweaves stories of technology, institutions, localities, environment, politics, and international gaming. The story of oil development is a difficult one to tell well, precisely because it involves so many intricately woven micro-stories, so to say that Gramling has done a great job is to say he's accomplished something significant. The stories are told with grace and clarity, even occasional wit, so the reader flows through the book with considerable ease. The consequences of how oil has developed in the U.S., indeed the entire world, are terribly important, and Gramling manages to convey these consequences without the hyperbole that infuses other works on oil development, oil politics, and the environment. From world-systems to local perceptions of risk, Gramling takes us on a tour of the single most fateful resource in the earth's history."- Lee Clarke, Rutgers University

"Oil on the Edge is an extremely well-written and informative account of economic and social issues in offshore oil development. Gramling uses a highly effective narrative style to report on and assess historical developments affecting offshore oil production and its effects on the economy and the environment. He draws usefully from sociological concepts to illuminate a fact-filled account of the offshore oil business from its earliest days to its present crisis in the mid-1990s when the nation has virtually ceased such production." - Michael E. Kraft, University of Wisconsin, Green Bay