Relations between monarchical regimes in the Gulf and their Shia citizens, particularly in Saudi Arabia, Bahrain and Kuwait, have soured to levels as bad as after the Iranian revolution in 1979, when they were seen as an Iranian fifth column. In reaction to the popular uprising in Bahrain in February and March 2011, the Bahraini regime and its regional allies unleashed military force, symbolised by the Saudi and GCC intervention in Bahrain in mid-March 2011, as well as by a media campaign that spread throughout the GCC countries warning citizens of the "sectarian" Shia protesters and the dangers they pose to the "nation". The "Shia threat" has again become the catchall answer to demands for democratic reform and accountability in the Gulf. As a result, sectarian relations within the Arab Gulf countries, as well as with Iran and the Shia-led government of Iraq, have reached a new low point. Small steps that have led to 'marginal recognition' of Saudi Shia after a deal with King Fahd in 1993, for example, have been reversed and sectarianism is the new old reality of domestic politics and international relations in the Gulf. Hence, regime responses in Bahrain and Saudi Arabia have created a Sectarian Gulf, that has shaped the political landscape in other Gulf states like Kuwait, and has influenced how the Gulf states reacted to the Arab Uprisings abroad. For now, the Gulf monarchies have weathered the first storm of the Arab Uprisings through a mix of repression, handouts of wealth, and the creation of the Sectarian Gulf. The rhetoric of the Sectarian Gulf has given newfound powers and opportunities to sectarian identity entrepreneurs, people, whose political, social and economic standing depends on the skillful manipulation of sectarian boundaries and who profit if these boundaries become the defining markers of a particular segment of society. This paper is based on several fieldwork trips to all the six GCC member states (Saudi Arabia, Bahrain, Kuwait, UAE, Qatar and Oman) between 2011 and 2013. It draws upon interviews with youth activists, key opposition figures, government representatives and diplomats, as well as a close reading of the online discussions surrounding the protests in the Gulf states.

The paper’s working thesis is that meaningful security sector reform is difficult to achieve in the absence of serious political reform, and that technical and operational reforms can have positive impact only if coupled with meaningful accountability and discipline for violations of international law enforcement standards. Security sector reform has become a core concept in any consideration of political transition as well as programs of political reform that involve something less – in Bahrain’s case much less – than transition. Bahrain illustrates an interesting authoritarian model: the Bahrain Independent Commission of Inquiry documented numerous abuses associated with the security crackdown in 2011, and recommended security sector reform as key to addressing the country’s political crisis. Security sector reform should have the goal of establishing a law enforcement regime that is professional, accountable, responsive, and humane. Professionalism in part requires acquisition of technical skills (investigative protocols, crime scene management, comprehensive records). Equal treatment, not merely non-discrimination, belongs at the heart of police reform, and security forces’ composition should reflect the communities served. Professionalism also requires adherence to international policing standards. Can a polity undergo serious security sector reform when a ruling family is primarily motivated to protect, prolong and expand its ruling prerogatives, when key family members hold all crucial security posts, and when recruitment from the citizenry is limited to those who share the ruling family’s Sunni identity -- Sunnis account for a minority of Bahrainis – and instead draws on Sunnis in neighboring Arab states and the Baluchistan area of Pakistan? This paper, after reviewing the protectorate origins of Bahraini security forces and their performance in stifling political protest movements, will examine the extent to which authorities have implemented, and tried to implement, security sector reforms recommended by the independent commission and UN bodies. In this context the paper will also draw on the reform experiences – successful and otherwise – of countries with similar authoritarian legacies. The paper will draw on the author’s direct engagement in recent years with Bahraini officials and political opposition figures concerning these issues. Documentary support includes interviews and relevant correspondence with Bahraini officials and court documents from trials of persons charged over the course of the past four years with criminal offences in connection with political unrest, both opposition figures and security officials (all quite low-level to date) charged with unlawful protester killings and mistreatment of detainees.

2011 and 2012 brought the most widespread popular protests the Sultanate of Oman experienced since the end of the Dhofar war in the 1970s. The depth of the social malaise in the country was illustrated in particular by a series of two month-long peaceful sit-ins between February and mid-May 2011 – in front of the governor’s office in Salalah and of the Consultative council in Muscat; and at Sohar’s Globe Roundabout, on the Muscat-Dubai motorway – and by the massive crackdown on bloggers, intellectuals and human rights activists that punctuated the second half of 2012. In this perspective, this paper aims at understanding the strategies employed by the Omani regime to answer the challenges posed by these popular mobilizations. Since the 1970s, Sultan Qaboos’s legitimacy has relied on the double assimilation of all Oman to the state which remains master craftsman of economic and social development, and then of the state to the person of Qaboos himself. This political work on history has been aimed at “naturalizing” his rule. The extreme personalization of Oman’s political system since 1970 has accustomed many Omanis to the idea that their fate depends on Qaboos’s goodwill. In 2011 and 2012, the long-proven combination of relentless crackdowns and cosmetic reforms to quell dissonant voices allowed the regime to get the situation back under control in the short term and to prevent the implementation of substantial political changes. However the impact of the protests in the long run has proved as massive as these events were unexpected by many Omani officials. In particular, the authorities’ responses to these challenges are revealing of their disarray in the face of a development they had failed to anticipate and, even more, of the limits of the strategies of autocratic legitimization so far used. This paper is primarily based on the results of personal interviews with political, economic and social actors conducted in Oman since 2003, including fieldworks conducted in Sohar and Muscat in October 2011 and in November 2012.