Political reform in the Gulf: the case of Qatar

Abstract

There appears to be a conventional wisdom among students of the Gulf that a combination of economic and social developments is stimulating far reaching change in the political structures of the Gulf oil states. The end of the oil boom, the need to integrate into the globalized economy, along with the pressures of globalized culture, are interacting with rapid demographic change to undermine the established rentier state bargain of 'no taxation and no representation'. The emergence of a variety of pseudo-democratic structures in the states of the Gulf Co-operation Council (GCC), suggests that a causal link can be made between socio-economic change and a gradual transition from authoritarian rule towards broader political participation.' However, the causal link is much more indirect than has sometimes been assumed. This article uses Qatar as a case study to demonstrate how a policy of political reform may be adopted for reasons that have little to do with economic necessity. Since Emir Hamad's coup in 1995, Qatar has portrayed itself as an increasingly open and participatory political system. However, this policy has not been forced on the regime by economic necessity. Rather, it has been consciously chosen for reasons of foreign policy and domestic dynastic politics. Moreover, the Qatari case demonstrates that, however much political reforms may be trumpeted, they will have little structural effect on the political system unless they are combined with reforms of state finances. At the end of the century in which the majority of Arab states achieved independence, most remain predominantly authoritarian. Although a number of states have experimented with controlled democratization, in all states the authoritarian power structure is centred around what has been labelled dimuqratiyyat al-khubz (democracy of bread) - the tacit social contract in which the regime provides social and economic welfare in return for political loyalty.2 This bargain has been reinforced by coercion (the mukhabarat state) and by ideology (in the form of Arabism, anti-Zionism,