3 Review(s)

Despite their small populations, the Arab states of the Gulf exercise an enormous and global influence. In most academic literature, however, they are treated as if their only importance were as counters on a strategic game board. This book takes a quite different approach. By combining the views of anthropologists, political scientists and others, it explores how the citizen populations of these states define themselves in a wider context. As elsewhere in a supposedly "globalizing" world, local identity is at a premium. The Gulf provides extreme examples, not only because these polities are so dependent on transnational flows of wealth and imagery, but because at home the citizen work-force is often out-numbered by migrant-labour. The resultant identity-construction - little examined until now - embraces an acute yet singular nationalism.