This is, without a doubt, the book with the longest gestation that I have ever undertaken. My original intention more than two decades ago was to write a broader account of Oman’s post-1970 experience, given that the few existing works on the subject were either basic surveys or not very helpful. Since I initially outlined the topic, my professional attention was successively diverted to other projects, including the publication of eight books or monographs as well as numerous articles and chapters in books. Thankfully, that is now largely past tense.
In the meantime, a number of books were published that treated Oman’s recent history and transformation in greater detail and competence and I felt there was no need for me to add to them. Instead, my thinking on my topic evolved into a study of the first 15 years or so of the Qaboos régime with the intention of showing how the haphazard cobbling together of an unprecedented political system, an entirely new government administration, and an uncharted economic transformation produced the basis for the 50-year governance of Sultan Qaboos’s reign and beyond. It is my belief that the evolution of this system not only endures beyond the lifetime of Qaboos but quite likely will remain virtually intact well into the future. For this reason I have employed the neologism Qaboosid throughout the text. While the system was developed one step at a time in response to the desires and requirements of Sultan Qaboos, its roots are deep and undoubtedly permanent.
I have followed events in Oman from nearly the beginning of the Qaboosid era and have done research in and resided in Oman at various times over that period. I conducted fieldwork for my Ph.D. dissertation in the sultanate in 1974–19751 and have conducted additional fieldwork at various times over the decades. My employment as the historian of the Sultan’s Armed Forces during 1989–1999 provided me with manifold opportunities to strengthen my ties to Oman and deepen my knowledge and understanding of the country and its people. I regard myself as exceedingly fortunate to have met, interacted with, and to continue to claim as good friends many Omanis.
The purpose of this book is to describe and analyze the various strands woven together in the creation of the modernizing state. An important foundation stone of the new state was the mix and interaction of personalities, Omani and foreign. The influence, both positive and negative, of a wide range of personalities with an equally wide range of backgrounds, interests, and preparation, was instrumental in creating the first layers of bureaucracy and the shape of the political economy. For this reason, detailed description and explanation of who these many people were and what part they played is necessary to understand how the initial components of the new modernizing state were constructed. Personalities and their interaction seem to have come first in the process with institutions being gradually and firmly established only later. I see this as being akin to Hanna Batutu’s reliance on extensive examination of personalities in his study of social classes in Iraq.2 A second reason for providing detail on personalities and events during the crucial decade and a half after 1970 is my access to and collection of information that might not otherwise have been preserved. In that respect, this book seeks to augment the historical record.
The primary focus of the book has been the period from 1970 until the mid-1980s when the foundations of the Qaboosid system were laid and institutionalized. But in order to illustrate how these foundational developments created the pattern that persisted until the accession of Sultan Haitham, I have brought the narrative up to nearly the year of publication. It should be noted, however, that political and economic developments since the 1980s understandably have not been covered in as great detail as was done for the earlier period.
Some of the text in Chapters One and Nine has been adapted from my Sir William Luce Paper for Durham University, “The Emergence of Post-Traditional Oman.” Dr. Mohammed bin Ali Al Hinai kindly provided permission for reference to and citations from his unpublished manuscript, “Oman: Evolution, Development & Devolution of the Government Systems, 1970–2005” (2007). Gulf States Newsletter graciously granted permission for reprinting one of its maps.
Various currencies are quoted in the text for Omani financial matters, particularly in the early years of the Qaboosid régime, simply because the predominant source for this period was British government reporting, which cited values in pounds sterling. Because financial information has been derived from a multitude of sources, amounts are unavoidably represented in Omani riyals (OMR), British pounds (GBP), and US dollars (USD). I have chosen to use the symbol Ⓡ to represent the riyal Omani because it combines the “r” and the “o” of riyal Omani and avoids the more cumbersome OMR.
I first presented some of the material and characterizations of the situation before 1970 and in the early days of the new régime in Oman in the Twentieth Century. I have examined the Dhufar War – as well as al-Jabal al-Akhdar War of the 1950s – in considerable detail in Oman’s Insurgencies.3 This work was based on unreleased archival materials from numerous sources and extensive interviews and other personal communications. Consequently, my discussion of the Dhufar War in Chapters Two, “Pivotal 1970,” and Seven, “The Security Environment,” draws on that book.4 The great majority of materials utilized for Oman’s Insurgencies could not be sourced fully and that remains true here. Nevertheless, the account is supplemented by references to more recently opened British archival documents and secondary publications appearing since Oman’s Insurgencies was published. It will be noticed that most of the published sources are in Western languages since, until the last few years, authoritative Arabic publications on the subject were limited. Circumstances have prevented me from accessing many of these.
Elsewhere in the book, much of my material either relies upon or is corroborated by British archives, particularly the Foreign (and Commonwealth) Office records. US archives and private papers in both the UK and the US were also very useful. Necessary reliance on official British documents has inevitably given the manuscript the appearance of a British perspective. The wealth of historical record therein is a side effect of the close relationship between Britain and Oman. But in the absence of Omani or other Arab records and the lesser relationship of the US and other Western countries during the key 1970s–1980s period, British records provide the most comprehensive source of information and corroboration. However, I have taken pains to present as unbiased analysis as possible and one that does not accept British assessments uncritically.
Perhaps the most important source, though, has been my five decades of association with Oman. It is impossible to count the numbers of interviews and conversations I have had with Omanis and non-Omanis conversant with the country. The bland reference to “author’s interview(s)” does not do justice to the wealth of knowledge and insight that I acquired in this way. I have chosen to respect the confidentiality of these interactions except where the individual has passed away and a few other exceptions. In addition, I have provided the year of the interview.
It is with deep thanks and gratitude that I acknowledge the welcome advice and suggestions of a number of people who read and commented on various drafts of this manuscript. Sir Terence Clark and John Townsend kindly read the initial chapters of an earlier version and Calvin Allen, Zoltan Barani, M. Redha Bhacker, Yahya Nasser al-Fahdy, Jim Krane, and the late Richard Muir read all or parts of the last full draft. Helpful comments were also provided by the anonymous readers for Brill. Special thanks are owed to Cal Allen for his advice in revising the final version of Chapter 1.
This book is dedicated to K.A.S., a good friend with whom I was privileged to engage in many conversations about the substance of the study. I would also be greatly remiss if I did not acknowledge the immeasurable help, support, and patience of L.M.B. Thank you for being in my life.
Tucson, October 2023
Published as Oman in the Twentieth Century: Political Foundations of an Emerging State (London: Croom Helm; New York: Barnes & Noble, 1978; reprinted by Routledge, 2016).
“Perhaps the exposition lapses here and there into minutiae or verges on a scholarly overkill. Particularly in the chapters relating to the early phases of communism, when the party was composed of a small number of isolated figures, too much attention may have been given to individual characteristics, but the patient reader will realize that then – in the thirties – much depended on personal and accidental factors, the movement having become objectively grounded only in the succeeding decade. Moreover, even in these chapters care was taken not to lose sight of the wider context, and to bring to the surface – except where otherwise necessary – only the private details that could simultaneously throw light upon the condition of society.” Hanna Batatu, The Old Social Classes and the Revolutionary Movements of Iraq: A Study of Iraq’s Old Landed and Commercial Classes and of Its Communists, Baʿthists, and Free Officers (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1978), pp. xxi–xxii.
J.E. Peterson, Oman’s Insurgencies: The Sultanate’s Struggle for Supremacy (London: Saqi, 2007).
I have had the good fortune as well to publish two other books on Oman: Historical Muscat: An Illustrated Guide and Gazetteer (Leiden: Brill, 2007) and Impressions of Oman & the Gulf: Nineteenth-Century Sketches by Charles Golding Constable (London: Scala Arts, 2023).