After four years of stocktaking and its first tentative attempts at mobilizing Libya's population, the Qadhafi government in 1973 stood poised to embark upon a number of breathtaking economic and political initiatives. These would form the foundation of its long revolutionary decade from 1973 until 1986. These experiments were fueled by an estimated $95 billion of oil revenues, propelling Libyan per capita income from $2,216 in 1969 to almost $10,000 a decade later. Some of the characteristics that had already emerged during the new regime's first four years – the impatience with bureaucratic and political mechanisms that in Qadhafi's mind prevented the Libyan population from participating directly in the country's revolution, and the distrust of the lingering impact of traditional forces in the country – now became central features of what the Libyan leader referred to as his Third Universal Theory. Codified in Qadhafi's Green Book, the Third Universal Theory was, according to its author, an alternative to capitalism and Marxism. Its directives, reflecting a profound distrust of political parties and bureaucratic institutions as obstacles to popular participation, provided the theme for a number of increasingly dramatic economic, social, and political initiatives. These culminated in the creation of a Jamahiriyya – a country directly governed by its citizens, without the intervention of intermediaries.

The massive inflows of revenues after 1973, and during the second oil crisis of 1979, presented Qadhafi with an economic windfall it would systematically use to pursue his vision of a just, egalitarian, and participatory society – and to adopt an increasingly activist confrontation with the West.