Dubai: A Model for Economic Success
It’s the kind of transformation one could have only dreamed about a century ago. Dubai turned itself from what was essentially a desert village, reliant on the productivity of its pearl fishers and local merchants and the demand placed by Persia on their goods, into the preeminent economic center of the middle-east. The transition saw Dubai morph from a state of almost meaninglessness in the Gulf region to a state of financial dominance and significant influence on the economies of not only its middle-eastern neighbors but the world as well. This paper will investigate Dubai’s economic development from a historical perspective and how it succeeded, both by way of its own devices and the actions and policies of other nations which assisted in its growth, and look at the current state of the emirate’s economy and abundance of wealth.
Dubai makes no reservations about showing off how wealthy it is. Dubai is home to the tallest building in the world, the Burj Dubai, and also the world’s only 7-star hotel, the Burj Al-Arab, glaring symbols of the wealth present in the emirate. Other examples of Dubai’s wealth include world’s largest mall and a police force largely made up of expensive supercars. Dubai’s mall is by far the most extravagant shopping center in history: it is 12.1 million square feet in size, holds 1,200 retail outlets, and hosts 75 million visitors each year, 40% of which are tourists. Tourism is on the rise in Dubai as well. Dubai’s airport has seen passenger traffic grow by 15% each year since 2002, full of European tourists looking for sun and tax-free shopping as well as the growing Indian middle-class. Dubai also plans to build the world’s largest entertainment complex, call...
... middle of paper ...
...y characterized by the developmental investments made by the city’s rulers to create a sustainable economy, including two new major ports and the Dry Docks. The globalized era shows that Dubai is consistently taking advantage of the opportunities of globalization, attracting Foreign Direct Investments via the DIFC and real estate. These processes have created a financially stable Dubai with a high GDP and average personal income, and a very low unemployment rate. Critical junctures in Dubai’s history and the decisions made amid them, influenced by the key parameters of the city’s developmental model, have resulted in a Dubai that has established itself as financially dominant in the Gulf region, a center for economic success and opportunity. It’s the dreams and vision of the rulers of Dubai, begun a century ago, that endure today and continue to shape its success.
The city shown in the background of the photograph is Dubai, the second largest city in the state of United Arabs Emirates. However, one may be wondering, how a city came to be in that desert environment. The answer is in the natural resources the country has. The oil boom in the Middle East has led to great economic growth making some Arabian nations to become more westernized and industrialized.
Dubai – the land of dreams, lavishness and vivacity, has always beguiled tourists, travelers, vacationers and backpackers from across the world. From the majestic high-rises like Burj Khalifa to vacant desolation, from the scorching desert to the snow skating rink, Dubai has always offered a wide range of opportunities for someone looking. However, travelling around Dubai and witnessing its rich heritage takes more than paying to the local travel agent. Further, not doing enough research will only disappoint your for the price you pay.
Since UAE is a great layout to apply some of the stratification such as Bourdieu’s theory of Habitués and Weber’s the theory of Typology of classes, and Marx’s theory of class division based on economy, the productive system is significant and the deterministic to all other aspects in the society (Chan & Goldthorpe, 2007). I will use UAE citizens as a case study to see whether the economic powers are given and created to the UAE Citizen to expresses their economic powers through the economic opportunities (the instruments) or if the UAE citizens have a cultural influence into creating their economic identity segmentation as the way to distinguish themselves from the others.
It is basically registered as one of the leading tourist city in
Dubai is not the only place in our modern society that has great architecture and an example of Aréte. There are tons of places in the United States that have that. For an example, the Golden Gate Bridge. The Golden Gate Bridge is in San Francisco, California. The height of this bridge is 746 feet high, while the length is 8,980 feet long. The bridge was built by Michael M.
In total contrast to the cultural architecture are the newly build high tech office buildings, which dominate some parts of the city. The World Trade Centre is proof of international business taking place. It is also an industrial centre, here being manufactured the cheapest drugs in Europe. All the cabs are yellow, giving a busy crowded look to the city. Brand new stylish cars and people walking dressed up in business suits around the city show that Iasi is a city of financial opportunity.
The Kingdom of Saudi Arabia is a petrostate. It is a petrostate in the sense that the oil sector dominates the national economy and international exports. (Colgan 226) This is due to Saudi Arabia’s one crop economy, oil. (Ali 100) Oil accounts for 70-80% of the state revenue as well as roughly 95% of export revenues. Before the discovery of oil in the 1930s, the economy rested on Islamic pilgrims. Containing the Grand Mosque, Al-Masjid al-Haram, Saudi Arabia gets a large influx of believers every year for the Hajj, one of the Five Pillars of Islam. During this time of year, income was made by food and shelter sold to the travelers. This was enough to support the state, but not enough to make it the monetary power it is today. What allowed for Saudi Arabia’s climb in the world economic ladder was oil. Oil has been a valuable industrial resource since the beginning of World War 1. Since then the demand for oil has progressively become higher and higher amongst industrial nations, allowing for oil rich states to receive large amounts of affluence. Among these oil rich states is Saudi Arabia, the region with the highest capacity for oil production out of the entire Middle East. From their remarkably high oil production, Saudi Arabia was able to gain considerable amounts of wealth and political significance. Oil in Saudi Arabia politically affected the Saudi government in both their foreign and domestic policy by providing economic power, the ability to fund wars, the ability to use economic diplomacy.
Dubai has received prodigious attention for its enormous and rapid urbanization. As one of the seven emirates in the United Arab Emirates, the city has strived to become the world’s most global city that attracted plethora of tourists and businessmen from all over the world. The construction boom that rendered emblematic architectural buildings, soaring high-rises, and artificial islands caught the whole world’s attention. While people often discuss about its experimental architecture and they talk very little about its public spaces. Public spaces serving as gathering spots and as transitioning pathways between buildings are as important as each buildings. This paper is about these public spaces in Dubai that are often ignored and intended to identify the reasoning behind this phenomenon.
Dubai is famous for its artificial islands, skyscrapers and shopping malls, as a center for business, tourism, luxury homes and extravagant consumption. Since 2002 Dubai has been developing, now it is one of the most visited cities in the world. Since then, over 800 buildings have been constructed (Lobel).
In the last couple of years, Qatar has prospered with continued high real GDP growth. The real GDP growth rates for the previous three years were respectively 6.6%, 13% and 16.7%. Qatar recorded the lowest unemployment rate among the population in the Arab world by 0.5% during 2012. The overall Qatar’s revenue in 2012 was $69.76 billion and its expenditure was $49.32 billion. The inflation rate was 1.9% (2012 est.). All these information show that Qatar has a good wealth as it is mentioned before and this wealth is expected to grow sharply due to the Qatar Bahrain causeway and the World Cup which is going to be in 2022.
After the crisis UAE’s economy suffered from 2008-2009 the economy has diversified itself and does not depend solely on oil anymore but also on other sectors such as tourism. The inflation rate of Dubai is 0.33% which is also significantly low (Dubai Statistics Centre,2016).The small medium enterprise does not want to take a risk where there are fluctuations in price level thereby effecting the buying power of people and also the demand and supply of the Al-Simpkin’s product. Furthermore,the government encourages foreign investment and besides the agent there are free zones such Jabel Ali which is the largest
Malls in Dubai are faced with security issues as they are one of the most visited malls in the world and every year more than 13.2 million tourists visit these malls. Besides tourists, local residents and residents of nearby emirates (Abu Dhabi, Sharjah, etc) visit these malls on a daily basis. The majority of the crowd is attracted to Dubai Mall which is the largest shopping mall in the world with many attractions for visitors, such as the aquarium, the dancing fountains, the waterfall and the retail and food outlets they have. Other famous malls are Mall of The Emirates, Ibn Batuta Mall, City Center Mall and Burjuman Mall.
The UAE does not occupy any specific industrial field in the world, they may manufacture some petrochemical product, but they do not manufacture like European countries. Also, they depend much on oil revenues as source of money, and a lot of political scientist consider the UAE a rentier state. 6
Samarai M.A. Qudah L.M. 2007. Planning Sustainable Mega Projects in UAE. World Housing Congress. Pg 1 – 20.
We decided that we would head out and explore what Dubai had to offer to us. We went to have breakfast and decided to go take a city bus tour. On our way there we decided to walk around and just take in the image we were seeing. The sun was shining in the sky, the wind was blowing its natural AC, no cars were honking, and it was just utterly peaceful. Continuing walking, we stumbled upon one of its famous malls. This mall was completely different than the one back home. One of the biggest malls that I have ever seen. This mall was three stories tall, with a movie theater with movies that haven’t come out yet in the U.S. An aquarium filled with different fish, crabs, sea horses, stingrays, and even sharks. This mall, even had a lower level as well with more stores and even a ski lounge right in the middle.