Page 239 - Histories of City and State in the Persian Gulf_Neat

City and countryside in modern Bahrain 219

Arab nationalism to make inroads into Shi‘i rural society did not turn
former villagers into Al Khalifah supporters but sowed the seeds of the
renewed sectarian conflict which unfolded in the 1970s. The threat posed
to the government by land grievances is also suggested by the relentless
public ceremonies staged by the Department of Rural Affairs in the 1960s
to mark the distribution of title deeds to villagers. 70

Conclusion
The outcome of state intervention and oil modernisation in Manama can be
measured by the growing economic, political and social distance between
Bahrain’s new capital city and its historic agricultural hinterland. The
contrast between the urban and rural landscapes of modern Bahrain reveals
the uneven transformative powers of oil, besides pointing to a degree of
continuity with the nineteenth century. In Manama state centralisation had
an unprecedented influence on urbanisation and urban life. Immigration
and nationality laws, in particular, transformed the position of urban resi-
dents vis-à-vis the state. In contrast, the old agricultural villages survived as
a mere appendix of the new political and economic order. By the 1960s, this
new urban–rural divide started to be expressed through traditional ideals of
Shi‘i political and social emancipation, suggesting the continuation of the
fractured political culture which had become apparent after the Al Khalifah
occupation of Bahrain in 1783. Under modern conditions Shi‘ism did not
cease to provide an ideology of rural ‘resistance’ against state power,
testimony to the profound inequalities enforced by the modern state.
The land policies enforced by the government demonstrate the ways in
which the rhetoric of social and political development championed by
Belgrave failed to bridge the gap between urban and rural society. Title
deeds were the symbols of social progress and ‘civilisation’, a corrective to
the abuse of authority perpetrated by the ruling family, by tribal land-
owners and by the urban propertied classes. In Manama, the fixing of
rights of private property partially achieved this goal. Title deeds granted
security of tenure to large segments of the city’s informal communities
and integrated the shanty towns of the pearl boom into the modern city. In
contrast, the land regime enforced in the villages ultimately protected the
interests of the Al Khalifah and hindered the creation of a land market,
also contributing to the demise of Bahrain’s agricultural economy. Land
policies provide an illuminating example of how the practices of the
modern state failed to empower of Shi‘i rural society.

70
‘Bahrain’s Newsletter’ n. 3, 9 February 1958, FO 371/132756 PRO.