Natural Resources, Contending Theoretical Perspectives, and the Problem of Prescription: An Essay

Natural resource studies have gained increasing scholarly attention, yet these studies have remained outside the mainstream of political science inquiry. This essay explores why it is that natural resources political studies have failed to attain greater prominence, reviews the strong prescriptive tradition characterizing these studies, and offers a critique of the major theoretical constructs used to explain natural resource policy. It is argued that explanation can best be advanced by developing greater interconnections between theory and observation.