Victor McFarland

Victor McFarland is assistant professor of history at the University of Missouri. His research interests center on energy, the environment, and U.S. relations with the Middle East, with a special focus on Saudi Arabia. Oil Powers: A History of the U.S.-Saudi Alliance (Columbia University Press) is his first book. In it, connecting foreign relations and domestic politics, McFarland challenges the view that the U.S.-Saudi alliance is the inevitable consequence of American energy demand and Saudi Arabia’s huge oil reserves. Oil Powers traces the growth of the alliance through a dense web of political, economic, and social connections that bolstered royal and executive power and the national-security state. McFarland shows how U.S. and Saudi elites collaborated to advance their shared interests against rivals at home and abroad. Facing objections from their own people, Washington and Riyadh chose to shield their partnership from public oversight and accountability. American support empowered the Saudi royal family and helped the kingdom expand its influence across the Middle East, Saudi elites also encouraged a rightward shift in U.S. foreign and economic policy–with profound long-term effects. Oil Powers reveals the role of the U.S.-Saudi alliance the entrenchment of a global order fueled by oil. Odd Arne Westad, author of The Cold War: A World History, note that “The extraordinary relationship between the United States and Saudi Arabia has influenced both countries, often for the worse. There is no better guide to the origins of this complex alliance than McFarland’s new book. Anyone with an interest in the U.S. role in the Middle East should read it. “