Oman: the invisible mediator of a regional chaos

di SIMONE BELLETTI

“To pick a side is always wiser than trying to be neutral”, as Nicolò Machiavelli once said in “The Prince” (1513), referring to those that prefer to stay aside from disputes thinking they would rather benefit from it. Accordingly, in the previous centuries, neutrality was seen as an act of cowardice, but the paradigm seems to have changed in the contemporary era, as neutrality is regarded as a wise geopolitical asset.
This article offers a well-rounded vision of the Oman’s strategy of neutrality applied to critical crises involving its neighbouring countries and the international actors that exert a direct influence in the Middle East: it will specifically try to compare advantages and drawbacks of Oman’s longstanding foreign policy techniques, commonly used to safeguard a general balance of power.