This paper discusses some of the links between Angola’s oil wealth and its domestic and
international political situation. These include direct effects such as the role of mineral
revenue in prolonging and intensifying the recently ended civil war, and the ability of the
government to use oil revenue to both buy off and to suppress dissent internally. Also
important are indirect effects which are felt primarily through the sectoral and regional
results of extreme real exchange rate appreciation caused by large inflows of mineral
revenue.
