Abstract

Economic development based on oil export has produced a pattern of autocratic family regimes sustained by the large scale import of technology, capital and labour. Family monopoly control over the state, bureaucratic and military apparatus has been reinforced by close economic and political alliances with the Western states. These family autocracies, among which are some of the wealthiest states in the world - measured by per-capita income - have sought to protect themselves against the impact of massive social change and population growth by attempting to preserve a political and cultural integrity which celebrates an indigenous culture and distinct national identity. Wealth, far from being the basis for political and economic integration of the Arab states, has generated strategies of defence of privilege based on the segregation of those who are entitled to share the wealth as citizens from those who are legally regarded as merely sojourners.

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