Shards and Stages: Migrant Lives, Power, and Space Viewed from Doha, Qatar

Abstract

Qatar has been projecting power through a series of spectacles, investments, and interventions. These include the new Doha skyline; ownership of the tallest building in Europe (London's Shard); Al Jazeera media; involvement in the Libyan and Syrian civil wars; and, importantly, hosting global events such as the 2022 soccer World Cup. Qatar also holds 14 percent of all known natural gas reserves and boasts the world's highest per-capita income. Our article relates Qatar's global visibility and presence to processes of power and accumulation in its capital city, Doha. We do this through a focus on migrant workers who, in this highly urbanized state, make up 89 percent of the population. Their lives and labors provide a window on the relationships between different stages of power and accumulation: the spectacle and the work and labor that sustain it. Intersecting geographies of foreign labor and the urban spectacle require scrutiny through sharpened critical and postcolonial lenses on diversity and urban modernity.