The Cooperation Council for the Arab States of the Gulf was established in 1981 and its six member states are Bahrain, Kuwait, Oman, Qatar, Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates. These countries have a lot in common. Their inhabitants are mostly of Arab origin, they are traditional monarchies and they are marked by a conservative official interpretation Islam. None of them has an outright colonial past that could be compared to Algeria or India. With few exceptions, there was little interference in internal matters and partly as a result their inclusion into the world economy took place very late. (Pawelka 1993)

Nevertheless, there are differences of a “quantitative” nature. Their oil and gas reserves vary significantly and so does the size of the countries. Therefore, this chapter will provide background information on the GCC states, followed by a description of the Gulf Cooperation Council itself. Given the fact that all six states are important oilexporters, a chapter on the characteristics of oil based economies will precede the case studies.

This book does not contain any historical abstracts but there is a growing literature that fills this gap. A work of reference has been provided by Rosemary Said Zahlan's (1998) The Making of the Modern Gulf States: Kuwait, Bahrain, Qatar, the United Arab Emirates and Oman; also Jill Crystal's (1995) Oil and Politics in the Gulf. Rulers and Merchants in Kuwait and Qatar. On Dubai and Abu Dhabi, Christopher Davidson (2008; 2009) has recently published separate and detailed volumes. On Qatar, Allen J. Fromherz, Qatar. A Modern History, was released in 2012. As for Saudi Arabia, Madawi al-Rasheed's A history of Saudi Arabia (Al-Rasheed 2002) is a good reference. (Al- Rasheed 2002) Francis Owtram (2004) provided a history of Oman: A Modern History of Oman. Formation of the State since 1920. These volumes take also into account economic aspects.

A few decades ago, research on the GCC economies was mostly published by a small group of authors including Giacomo Luciani, Hazem Beblawi, Rodney Wilson, Tim Niblock, and Robert Looney (1994; 2004). During their long publishing career they wrote and edited numerous volumes on aspects of political economy. Recently, a new generation of prolific authors has come into being.