The Development of Capitalism in the Gulf Cooperation Council

Abstract

As British hegemony in the Gulf underwent a slow decline from 1930 to 1970, the Gulf sheikhdoms were able to negotiate an independent status with their old colonial master. Britain recognized the Sultanate of Muscat and Oman’s independence in 1951, followed by Kuwait in 1961 and the remaining Gulf states—Bahrain, Qatar, and the seven “Trucial States” that became the future UAE—in 1971.¹ Saudi Arabia, a remote and inhospitable area surrounded by desert, had managed to retain a relative independence from British control during the apex of colonial rule. With the unification of the kingdoms of Najd and Hijaz in 1932, the country in its modern form was born. The accumulation structures underpinning capitalist class formation across the Gulf date from this period of state building.²