Topics for Discussion

Regional Trends in the Middle East and Implications for International Energy Security

Middle East and Energy Strategy of China and the US: Competition or Cooperation

National Oil Companies and International Oil Companies: Roles and Influences

Financial Markets and Oil Shocks: Past and Future

 

To skip to a particular section of the Agenda, please click on one of the bullet points below:

• Welcome Ceremony
• Session I
• Session II
• Session III, Part One
• Session III, Part Two
• Closing Ceremony
• Speaker Biographies

 

Agenda

Welcome Ceremony
09:00	Opening Remarks Professor Yu Xintian, President, Shanghai Institute for International Studies (SIIS)
09:10	Opening Keynote The Honorable James A. Baker III, Honorary Chair, Baker Institute
	Remarks Transcript
Session I: Regional Trends in the Middle East & Implications for the United States & China
Chairperson: Professor Yang Jiemian, Vice President, SIIS
09:30	Trends in the Middle East: Implications for Oil Geopolitics & Energy Security Ambassador Edward P. Djerejian, Founding Director, Baker Institute
	Remarks Transcript
09:40	Current Middle East Regional Configuration: Judgements & Evaluations Professor Li Weijian, Director, Department of West Asian and African Studies, SIIS
09:50	New Dimension of Middle East Security and Its Implications for China's Middle East Diplomacy Mr. Ye Qing, Deputy Director, Department of West Asian and African Studies, SIIS
10:00	Comment Professor Li Rong, Deputy Director, Institute of Asian and African Studies, China Institute of Contemporary International Relations (CICIR)
10:10	Comment Professor Li Guofu, Director of the Department for Developing Countries Studies, China Institute of International Studies (CIIS)
10:20	Open Discussion
Coffee Break 10:45 am

Session II: Middle East Energy Security & Chinese-U.S. Relations: Competition & Cooperation
Chairperson: Ambassador Edward P. Djerejian
11:00	Contradictions and Conflicts between the United States and China over Middle East Oil Issues Professor Wu Lei, Center for Energy Security and Strategy, Institute of International Relations, Yunnan University
11:10	The Role of Saudi Arabia in Oil Price Setting Professor Chen Mo, Associate Professor, Institute of West Asian and African Studies, Chinese Academy of Social Sciences (CASS)
11:20	Energy Issues and China 's Policy Regarding the Iran Nuclear Issue Mr. Jin Liangxiang, Research Fellow, Department of West Asian and African Studies, SIIS
11:30	Comment Ms. Amy Myers Jaffe, Director, Baker Institute Energy Forum
11:40	Comment Mr. Gao Zhikai, Director, China National Association of International Studies
11:50	Open Discussion
Lunch 12:30 pm
Session III, Part One: National Oil Companies and Independent Oil Companies: Roles and Influences
Chairperson: Dr. Steven Lewis, Fellow in Asian Studies, Baker Institute
14:00	Financial Markets and Oil Shocks: Past and Present Professor Mahmoud El-Gamal, Chair, Islamic Economics, Baker Institute
14:15	Trends of World Energy Development in the Next 10 Years &Implications Professor Sun Yongxiang, Senior Research Fellow, Euro-Asian Social Development Research Institute, Development Research Center of the State Council
14:30	Energy Markets and China 's NOCs: How Financial Markets View NOCs Mr. Thomas Langford, Managing Director, Morgan Stanley
14:45	The Role of NOCs in China's Energy Diplomacy Dr. Xu Qinhua, Research Fellow, Centre for International Energy Security, Renmin University of China
15:00	Comment Professor Feng Fei, Director, Research Department of Industrial Economy, Development Research Center of the State Council
15:10	Open Discussion
Coffee Break 15:30
Session III, Part Two: National Oil Companies and Independent Oil Companies: Roles and Influences
Chairperson: Professor Feng Fei
15:45	Oil Investments of NOCs and IOCs: Market Impacts Professor Ronald Soligo, Professor of Economics, Baker Institute
	Slides
16:00	Overseas Investment Strategies of Chinese NOCs Dr. Yu Hongyuan, Deputy Director, Department of International Organization and International Law, SIIS
16:15	China and the Middle East : A Mutually Prosperous Relationship Mr. Sean Korney, Partner, Baker Botts L.L.P.
	Slides
16:30	China 's International Energy Strategy: "Going out" of China's NOCs Professor Zhang Lijun, Deputy Director, Department for Information and Contigencies Analysis, CIIS
16:45	Comment Dr. Xu Xiaojie, Director, Institute of Overseas Investment, CNPC Research Academy of Economics and Technology
16:55	Open Discussion
Closing Ceremony
17:20	Concluding Remarks Ambassador Edward P. Djerejian
17:25	Concluding Remarks Professor Yang Jiemian

Baker Institute Speaker Biographies

The Honorable James A. Baker, III
Honorary Chair, James A. Baker III Institute for Public Policy
James A. Baker, III, served as the 67th Secretary of the Treasury under President Ronald Reagan and as the 61st Secretary of State under President George H.W. Bush. Long active in American presidential politics, he led presidential campaigns for Presidents Ford, Reagan, and Bush over the course of five consecutive presidential elections from 1976 to 1992. He served as White House Chief of Staff for President Reagan and for President Bush. Mr. Baker is presently a senior partner in the law firm of Baker Botts L.L.P. He is also Honorary Chair of the James A. Baker III Institute for Public Policy.

Ambassador Edward P. Djerejian
Founding Director, James A. Baker III Institute for Public Policy
Edward P. Djerejian is the founding director of the James A. Baker III Institute for Public Policy. He served both President George H.W. Bush and President William J. Clinton as assistant secretary of state for Near Eastern Affairs and Presidents Reagan and Bush as U.S. Ambassador to Syria. He served President Clinton as U.S. Ambassador to Israel before completing his foreign service career in 1994. He also served President Reagan as special assistant and deputy press secretary for foreign affairs. He has been awarded the Presidential Distinguished Service Award, the Department of State’s Distinguished Honor Award, and numerous other honors including the Ellis Island Medal of Honor and the Anti-Defamation League’s Moral Statesman Award.

Mahmoud A. El-Gamal
Chair, Islamic Economics, James A. Baker III Institute for Public Policy
Mahmoud A. El-Gamal is professor of economics and statistics at Rice University where he holds the Chair in Islamic Economics, Finance, and Management. Before joining Rice in 1998, he was an associate professor of economics at the University of Wisconsin at Madison. He has also worked as an assistant professor at the University of Rochester and the California Institute of Technology. He was an economist at the Middle East department of the International Monetary Fund from 1995 to 1996 and the first scholar in residence of Islamic finance at the U.S. Department of Treasury (2004). His recent books are Islamic Finance: Law, Economics, and Practice, Cambridge University Press, 2006, and a major translation project for classical Islamic law and its contemporary interpretations: Financial Transactions in Islamic Jurisprudence, Dar Al-Fikr, 2003. Other publications have included academic journal articles and book chapters on monetary and exchange rate policies, foreign direct investment in the Arab world, growth and investment in various Arab countries, and financial models for employment-generating small and medium enterprises. El-Gamal’s recent interviews have appeared in The Economist, Financial Times, BBC World Radio, The Washington Post, National Public Radio and Public Broadcasting Service, among others.

Amy Myers Jaffe
Wallace S. Wilson Fellow in Energy Studies, James A. Baker III Institute for Public Policy
Amy Myers Jaffe is the Wallace S. Wilson Fellow in Energy Studies at the James A. Baker III Institute for Public Policy and associate director of the Rice University energy program. Her research focuses on the subject of oil geopolitics, strategic energy policy, including energy science policy and energy economics. Jaffe is widely published in academic journals and numerous book volumes and served as co-editor of Energy in the Caspian Region: Present and Future (Palgrave, 2002) and Natural Gas and Geopolitics: From 1970 to 2040 (Cambridge University Press, 2006). She served as a member of the reconstruction and economy working group of the Baker/Hamilton Iraq Study Group and as project director for the Baker Institute/Council on Foreign Relations Task Force on Strategic Energy Policy. She was among Esquire magazine’s 100 Best and Brightest honorees in the contribution to society category in 2005. Prior to joining the Baker Institute, Jaffe was the senior editor and Middle East analyst for Petroleum Intelligence Weekly, a respected oil journal. She received her bachelor’s degree in Arabic studies from Princeton University.

Sean Korney
Partner, BakerBotts L.L.P.
Sean Korney has extensive international experience, covering all aspects of the energy chain from exploration and production to consumption. He has worked on major acquisitions, transactions and joint ventures in the Middle East, Africa, Asia and the Americas. In addition to practicing law in international markets, Korney has lived in Dubai, Singapore, Canada and Venezuela, providing him a unique view of the impact legal matters in the energy sector have on the general population in key markets. His representations include work for CNOOC Limited on LNG projects designed to increase the supply of LNG to terminals in China. He was also involved in Asiamoney’s “M&A Deal of the Year” in 2002, which involved CNOOC in its acquisition of Repsol YPF’s oil and gas interests in Indonesia. This year, Korney is serving as co-chair of the International Conference for the Association of International Petroleum Negotiators in Morocco. He is based in the Dubai office of Baker Botts but works with clients in all major energy markets around the world.

Thomas R. Langford
Co-head, Global Energy Group and Managing Director, Morgan Stanley
Thomas R. Langford is a managing director and co-head of the Global Energy Group. Langford has responsibility for the major integrated and selected independent E&P and R&M companies. In addition, he is the head of the Houston Office and Southwest Region for Investment Banking. Prior to joining Morgan Stanley, he worked at Exxon and McKinsey & Co. After beginning his career in New York, Langford spent four years based in Asia where he led several strategic and financing assignments in countries across the region, including the privatization of PTT in Thailand, Sinopec in China, and the Gas Authority of India. In addition, he has spent considerable time in the Middle East. Since returning to New York in 2000, he has been involved in a number of notable strategic and financing transactions including the Phillips acquisition of Tosco, the merger of Conoco with Phillips, the acquisition of CanHunter by Burlington Resources, Marathon’s acquisition of KMOC in Russia, and the acquisition of Unocal by Chevron.

Steven W. Lewis
Director of Asian Studies, James A. Baker III Institute for Public Policy
Steven W. Lewis is the James A. Baker III Institute’s fellow in Asian Studies and professor of the practice in humanities and director of the Asian Studies Program at Rice University. His research interests are focused on exploring the growth of a transnational Chinese middle class, the influence of advertisements in new public spaces in Chinese cities, the development of privatization experiments in China’s localities, and the reform of China’s energy policies, national oil companies, and international energy relations. Lewis received his doctorate in political science from Washington University in St. Louis.

Ronald Soligo
Professor of Economics, James A. Baker III Institute for Public Policy
Ronald Soligo is a professor of economics at Rice University. His research focuses on economic growth and development and energy economics. Soligo was awarded the 2001 Best Paper Prize from the International Association for Energy Economics for his co-authored paper with Kenneth B. Medlock III “Economic Development and End-Use Energy Demand,” Energy Journal (April 2001). Other recently published articles include “The Role of Inventories in Oil Market Stability,” with Amy Myers Jaffe, Quarterly Review of Economics and Finance (2002); “Automobile Ownership and Economic Development: Forecasting Passenger Vehicle Demand to the Year 2015,” with Kenneth B. Medlock III, Journal of Transport Economics and Policy (May 2002); “The Economics of Pipeline Routes: The Conundrum of Oil Exports from the Caspian Basin,” with Amy Myers Jaffe, in Energy in the Caspian Region: Present and Future, Amy Myers Jaffe, Yelena Kalyuzhnova, Dov Lynch and Robin Sickles, editors (January 2002); and “Potential Growth for U.S. Energy in Cuba,” with Amy Myers Jaffe, ASCE Volume 12 Proceedings, Cuba in Transition (Web site). Soligo is currently working on research on OPEC and the Gas Forum for Exporting Countries. He holds a Ph.D. degree from Yale University.