Abstract
Editor's note: This is the edited text of a lecture delivered to the Royal Institute for International Affairs, Brussels, September 30, 2003, on the occasion of the first formal bilateral Omani-Belgian negotiations. The lecture was originally unconnected to the project. It has not subsequently been adjusted to take account of the other contributions. Rather, the realization, at the time of its delivery in Brussels, of the striking parallels with – and illustration of – some of the analysis in the present volume (then near completion), and the light shed on Omani foreign-policy thinking in particular, led to the editor's request for it to be included. Apart from minor editing, it was decided to preserve the original lecture format, so that it could also serve as a primary source document.