Accounting and the economic development of the oil and gas sector in Libya: historical review, theoretical analysis and empirical investigation

The oil sector and the choice of accounting system in Libya are very important factors that have the potential to affect Libya's economic development. Revenue from the oil sector forms the bedrock of Libya's economy and the accounting system used to report the performance of the oil sector provides the main information for regulating and controlling the economy's development. This research mainly modelled and empirically tested processes whichinteracted with and significantly influenced the development of: (a) Libyan accounting practice in general; (b) Libyan oil and gas accounting practice in particular; and (c) Libyan oil and gas up-stream activities. This modelling was carried out through examining and building on the existing literatureassociated with the addressed issues. This constructed model (the model) is not a fundamentally new model but is arguably more comprehensive, moresophisticated and more advanced than those currently existing in the literature and can claim to have been derived from a considered theoretical base.The empirical work carried out and the reasoning applied to the analysis of the empirical work, support the possibility that the accounting methods and the Western influences on the environmental factors affecting the development of Libyan accounting education and accounting practice have significantly influenced the economic development of Libya's oil and gas upstream activities. It is not claimed that this conclusion is attested to as a scientific fact or that it can be generalised to other developing countries. But nevertheless the reasoned arguments applied to the historical analysis of the development of the Libyan oil and gas up-stream activities seems compelling. This finding, if robust, seems of crucial interest to the Libyan authorities and to the rest of the international world since it supplies a reinterpretation of historical events associated with the conflict between Libya and primarily the USA. Libya's actions in this version of history seem entirely logical and defensible.The findings do lend support to the existing literature associated with the addressed issues. The "success" of the empirical analysis enhances thefeasibility of the constructed model and gives a degree of assurance to its robustness.