This investigation, covering the past two decades, attempts to determine what benefits the Soviets have sought to gain in their relationships with Middle Eastern oil-producing nations. Chapter I surveys the U.S.S.R.'s oil industry and its tentative prospects for the 1980's. Chapter II discusses Soviet involvement in the Middle East since 1950, including nationalization and oil embargoes. In Chapter III, developments less favorable to the U.S.S.R. are, analyzed: the growing influence of conservative, anti -Soviet oil-producing states and the deradicalization of other Middle Eastern nations. Chapter IV concludes that the Soviets have met with varying success in their Middle Eastern involvements. The future of their oil industry remains uncertain.

The purpose of this study is to explore the activities of transnational organizations which were involved in the Nigerian civil war, in order to evaluate the hypotheses of this study - that the transnational organizations studied here contributed to the outbreak of the civil war; that they attempted to influence the behavior of the conflicting parties; that they helped to prolong the war; and that they served as instruments of conflict resolution in the civil war. The final chapter summarizes the conclusions arrived at in various chapters of the study. The evidence yielded varying degree of support to the hypotheses, These transnational actors are seen to have, through their different interactions with both sides affected the course of the war and have produced mixed impacts. They produced some evidence for the explanation of behavioral patterns likely to be displayed by transnational actors in similar situations. Also, these interactions are seen as giving some validity to the perceived need to expand the analytic framework of actors in international politics.