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signed in 1880. The treaty forbade Bahrain from holding treaties with foreign states

without the British Government’s prior approval. In addition, Bahrain was not

allowed to let any other state establish a consulate without British consent. The
15

treaty was followed by another in 1892 that added a further clause in which Bahrain

would forbid the sale or occupation of its property to other foreign states, apart

16
from Britain.
With these treaties Bahrain became part of Britain’s informal empire, a

phrase traced to Dr CR Fay in the Cambridge History of the British Empire in 1940.

The phrase was further explored and developed by historians John Gallagher and

Ronald Robinson in their article The Imperialism of Free Trade in 1953. Gallagher

and Robison believed that Britain’s industrialisation ‘necessitated linking

underdeveloped areas with British foreign trade’ with a policy of extending power

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to these regions ‘informally if possible and formally if necessary’. Informal empire

as viewed by historian Ian Brown can be

characterized as a deliberate attempt on the part of a metropolitan
power to determine the economic policies of another state in its own
interests by any means short of out-right annexation.
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The Persian Gulf Residency administered the affairs of the Arab Gulf States

under British protection. The head of the Residency (the Resident) oversaw the

operation of his representatives in the Gulf and handled with His/Her Majesty’s

15 IOR/L/PS/20/C158D, Translation of Agreement Signed by the Chief of Bahrain, 22 December
1880.
16 IOR/L/PS/20/C158D, Exclusive Agreement of the Shaikh of Bahrain with the British Government,
13 March 1892.
17 J. Gallagher and R. Robinson, ‘The Imperialism of Free Trade’, The Economic History Review, 6.1,
(1953), 1-15 (7 and 13).
18 I. Brown, ‘British Financial Advisers in Siam in the Reign of King Chulalongkorn’, Modern Asian
Studies, 12.2, (1978), 193-215 (214).

© Hamad E. Abdulla 4