By hosting a Formula 1 race in 2012, the Bahraini government was angling for attention on two fronts, positive publicity and economic benefit. Instead, they received mainly critical attention driven by human rights activism and popular outrage. Much less attention came when the International Monetary Fund (IMF) published its annual economic assessment known to market watchers as the infamous ‘Article IV’ report. The report’s top line was that Bahrain suffered a slowdown of its economic growth of some 1.8 percent in 2011. Looking back on the past ten years (assuming the IMF got its estimates right) GDP performance was the poorest in more than a decade, with a full four-percentage-points discrepancy from the past 10-year averages. But on questions whether the slowdown was a symptom or side effect of change, a mere fallout of the protests, or a result of other global and regional pressures, the IMF was decidedly ambiguous.
