Comparative coverage of the Persian Gulf countries is provided by Paul Dresch and James Piscatori (eds.), Monarchies and Nations: Globalisation and Identity in the Arab States of the Gulf (2005); Michael Herb, All in the Family: Absolutism, Revolution, and Democracy in the Middle Eastern Monarchies (1999); Helen Chapin Metz (ed.), Persian Gulf States: Country Studies, 3rd ed. (1994); F. Gregory Gause III, Oil Monarchies: Domestic and Security Challenges in the Arab Gulf States (1994); Anthony H. Cordesman, Bahrain, Oman, Qatar, and the UAE (1997); John Bulloch, The Persian Gulf Unveiled (also published as The Gulf, 1984); and Alvin J. Cottrell (ed.), The Persian Gulf States: A General Survey (1980). Discussions of early regional history include Juan R.I. Cole, “Rival Empires of Trade and Imami Shiʿism in Eastern Arabia, 1300–1800,” International Journal of Middle East Studies, 19:177–203 (May 1987); and J.B. Kelly, Britain and the Persian Gulf, 1795–1880 (1968).
Works on Oman include Carol J. Riphenburg, Oman: Political Development in a Changing World (1998); Miriam Joyce, The Sultanate of Oman: A Twentieth Century History (1995); Francis Owtram, A Modern History of Oman: Formation of the State Since 1920 (2004); Ian Skeet, Oman: Politics and Development (1992); Calvin H. Allen, Jr., Oman: The Modernization of the Sultanate (1987); Donald Hawley, Oman & Its Renaissance, jubilee ed., rev. and reconstructed (1995); B.R. Pridham (ed.), Oman: Economic, Social, and Strategic Developments (1987); Liesl Graz, The Omanis: Sentinels of the Gulf (1982; originally published in French, 1981); John Duke Anthony, John Peterson, and Donald Sean Abelson, Historical and Cultural Dictionary of the Sultanate of Oman and the Emirates of Eastern Arabia (1976); and S.B. Miles, The Countries and Tribes of the Persian Gulf, 2 vol. (1919, reprinted in 1 vol., 1994), which focuses on Oman.
Anthropological studies include Jörg Janzen, Nomads in the Sultanate of Oman: Tradition and Development in Dhofar (1986; originally published in German, 1980); and Fredrik Barth, Sohar: Culture and Society in an Omani Town (1983). The role of women is the subject of Christine Eickelman, Women and Community in Oman (1984); and Unni Wikan, Behind the Veil in Arabia: Women in Oman (1982, reissued 1991). Patricia Risso, Oman & Muscat: An Early Modern History (1986); and Robert Geran Landen, Oman Since 1856: Disruptive Modernization in a Traditional Arab Society (1967), are scholarly treatments of the first and second halves of the 19th century, respectively. Oman’s relationship with East Africa is covered in M. Reda Bhacker, Trade and Empire in Muscat and Zanzibar: Roots of British Domination (1992). J.E. Peterson, Oman in the Twentieth Century: Political Foundations of an Emerging State (1978), gives a political history of the sultanate; and John C. Wilkinson, The Imamate Tradition of Oman (1987), outlines the background of the events leading to the demise of the Ibāḍī imamate in the 1950s. The period before the 1970 coup d’état is described in Ian Skeet, Muscat and Oman: The End of an Era (1974; also published as Oman before 1970: The End of an Era, 1985); while John Townsend, Oman: The Making of a Modern State (1977), gives a general assessment of the challenges facing the state after the coup. Further information may be found in Frank A. Clements (compiler), Oman, rev. and expanded ed. (1994), an annotated bibliography.
1All appointed by sultan; extent of authority is unclear in 2013.
2Many ministries are located in adjacent Bawshar.
|Official name||Salṭanat ʿUmān (Sultanate of Oman)|
|Form of government||monarchy with two advisory bodies (State Council ; Consultative Council )|
|Head of state and government||Sultan and Prime Minister: Qaboos bin Said (Qabus ibn Saʿid)|
|Monetary unit||rial Omani (RO)|
|Population||(2013 est.) 2,950,000|
|Total area (sq mi)||119,500|
|Total area (sq km)||309,500|
|Urban-rural population||Urban: (2011) 73.4%|
Rural: (2011) 26.6%
|Life expectancy at birth||Male: (2012) 72.6 years|
Female: (2012) 76.4 years
|Literacy: percentage of population age 15 and over literate||Male: (2008) 90%|
Female: (2008) 80.9%
|GNI per capita (U.S.$)||(2010) 19,260|