Conflict resolution and regional co-operation

The role of the Gulf Co-operation Council 1970–2002

Bibliographic Data

ID10280951
AuthorsFrauke Heard‐bey (corresponding author), Frauke Heard-Bey
Year2006
Volume42
Issue2
Pages199-222
Publication date2006-02-17
Peer ReviewedYes
Open AccessNo
TypeARTICLE
VenueMiddle Eastern Studies (JOURNAL)
Journal identifiersISSN: 0026-3206 • E-ISSN: 1743-7881
PublisherTaylor & Francis (PUBLISHER • GB)
DOI10.1080/00263200500445851
OpenAlexW2091441864
LanguageEN
Citations received10

When the Gulf Co-operation Council (GCC) was founded in May 1981 in Abu Dhabi, commentators on middle-eastern matters generally expected this new pact to disintegrate very soon given the failure of several previous attempts at grouping together other Arab states. The cynics have been proven wrong. The GCC has survived into the new millennium. Since its inception, membership of the GGC has been limited to the six non-republican oil producing states of the Arabian Peninsula, which are: Saudi Arabia, Kuwait, Oman, Bahrain, Qatar and the United Arab Emirates.' The GCC was born out of conflict within the region. Yet the strongest catalyst for the genesis of the GCC was the common political 'landscape', which the Arab countries of the Gulf shared in the 1970s. All of them also enjoyed the prospect of steadily increasing prosperity. The GCC's roots reach back to an era when the rulers of these originally tribal communities were suddenly forced to consult each other and establish some form of cooperation while facing an uncertain future. When the British Labour government announced its decision in 1968 to withdraw British military and diplomatic protection from the Gulf, Bahrain, Qatar, the seven Trucial States and Oman emerged reluctantly from their status of semi-dependence on Britain into full statehood. Saudi Arabia and Kuwait had reason to be apprehensive of the power vacuum in the Gulf after the British withdrawal in 1971. The predominant threat facing them at the time was the animosity of the majority of Arab governments, which being socialist and anti-west endeavoured to undermine some of the conservative regimes of the Gulf. In President Gamal Abdul Nasser's Cairo public opinion was mobilized against these 'stooges of colonialism', and Baghdad proliferated revolutionary cells and anti-regime organizations in Bahrain, Oman, the People's Front for the Liveration of Oman and the Arabian Gulf (PFLOAG) and others elsewhere in the region, while PFLOAG2 had a revolution for the entire Gulf written on its banner. The Shah of Iran appealing to the common anti-revolutionary sentiments suggested some form of Gulf-wide co-operation. But the Arab states of the Gulf prevaricated, firstly because they did not want to be so closely tied to an Iran which was aspiring to become the biggest regional power, and secondly because they were wary of the provocation this would pose to Baghdad's declared ambition to call the shots at least at the eastern end of the Arab World. The oil crisis of the 1970s and the unexpected and very large increase in wealth then gave the oil exporting Arab states of the Gulf the means to engage the rest of

Conflict resolution · Political science · Resolution (logic · Computer Science · Islamic Studies and History · Law · Middle East and Rwanda Conflicts · Socioeconomic Development in MENA

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