International trade in fuel commodities: A network approach

Much as the contemporary understanding of world trade is often based on simple models where two countries engage in trade, so is world trade in fuel commodities typically conceived as consisting of either net-importing or net-exporting countries. However, by paying attention to the structure of world trade, represented by actually occurring trade flows between the actors in such networks, it becomes evident that the structures of such networks are far more complex than intuitively understood. In this chapter, role-analytical tools from social network analysis are applied to bilateral fuel commodity trade flows between 85 countries. Using a novel heuristic for identifying ties between role-equivalent sets of actors, this chapter maps the structure of fuel commodity trade by looking at both the value of such trade flows as well as the non-monetary energy dimension of such flows. Comparing these structural maps with a typological Galtung-style core-periphery structure shows significant similarities, although at a resolution that reveals the existence of 6-8 different roles, expanding the simple, intuitive distinction between net-importers and net-exporters.