To what extent does the concept of the ‘rentier state’ account for the continued survival of absolute monarchies in the Gulf?

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In the mid-eighteenth century, the emergence of absolute monarchies in the Gulf States takes root from their traditional royal families that were arbitrarily picked by British imperial interest – Saudi Arabia (the Al Saud family), Oman (the Al Said family), Kuwait (the Al Sabah family), Bahrain (the Al Khalifa family), Qatar (the Al Thani family), and UAE (a federation of seven sheikdoms). After the collapse of the Ottoman Empire, the traditional royal families in the
Gulf States fell under British control, which sought to secure the route to India and pledged to protect the Gulf region from external aggression in return. Moreover, Britain’s imperial policy empowered the royal families’ authorities and gave them a recognized ruling identity. The arrival of
Western oil companies, seeking concessions in the 1930s, further consolidated the authority of the ruling families (Cleveland and Bunton, 2009).
This essay will focus on the impacts of oil-abundance on the Gulf states, which more precisely explain the resilience of incumbent regimes. The concept of ‘rentier state’ accounts for the continued survival of absolute monarchies such that democracy is forgone in favour of an authoritarian regime. The main argument of this essay is, however, that a combination of rentierism; and traditional Islamic culture, which are further reinforced by rentierism, elucidate the survival of absolute monarchies in the Gulf in a more accurate fashion. . The Islamic traditional cultures, such as consultation, consensual relationship, and value of stability have also led to the continuance of monarchical system alongside with rentierism. Case for rentierism will then be countered by modernization theory that monarchy is merely a part of countries’ developmental process, but it will be refuted that rentierism is still valid as impediments for Gulf monarchies to transform into democracy. First of all, the persistence of absolute monarchies in the rentier states in the Gulf is explained in the light of rentierism advocated by many political scientists. A rentier state is defined as a state whose primary function is to distribute revenue derived from the rent of indigenous resources to external clients (Ross 2001). Since the extraction of oil and its export policy are solely controlled by the national government, all the revenue from oil rent flow into the authoritarian regimes’ coffer. With absolute financial autonomy, the ruling monarchs are able to dictate the distribution of oil revenue to the populations. The correlation between resilience of absolute monarchies in the Gulf states and rentierism is that enormous oil wealth enabled the government to make citizens dependent on and thus loyal to the ruling families, by spending their revenue on civil welfare, such as security, free healthcare, education, and the creation of jobs (Gause 1994).
Moreover, oil affluence allowed the monarchs to grant patronage to elites and opposing dissent groups in order to co-opt them, decreasing latent pressure for democratization (Ross 2001).
Furthermore, Ross argues that oil revenue is also used by the ruling class for military consolidation to eradicate the democracy advocates of democracy through coercion challenging the incumbent regimes. Chardhry noted that Mideast governments used their oil revenue to develop programmes that were “explicitly designed to depoliticize the population. . . . In all cases, the governments deliberately destroyed independent civil institutions while generating others designed to facilitate the political aims of the state” (Chaudhry 1994, p19). This demonstrates the desire of the ruling elites who seek to ensure that the political system best serves their interests.
Another component of rentierism is little taxation as a result of the wealth of the royal families from oil revenue. Because the citizens pay little to no tax in the rentier states, Ross argues that, “the public will be less likely to demand accountability from – and representation in – the government” (Ross 2001, pp332). Therefore, citizens are far less demanding in terms of political participation (Beblawi, 1990). Furthermore, the citizens have less incentive to be watchful of how government spends its money. For example, Crystal (1990) found that discovery of oil and the resultant abolition of tax resulted in less accountability to the monarchies in Kuwait and Qatar.
Regarding the notion of “no representation without taxation” (Okruhlik 1999; Crystal 2005), democratic theory argues that in Europe, the demand for representation in government arose in response to the sovereign’s attempts to raise taxes (Tilly 1975). Therefore, the likelihood of regimes being challenged is significantly reduced as representation in government erodes. Summarily, the resilience of absolute monarchies is strengthened by the rentier effects of demobilization of people, elimination of challengers, and no representation due to little tax. As such, the criterion to democratization is seldom apparent, and thus, absolute monarchies remain persistent in the Gulf region. Regardless, the concept of rentierism does not completely explain the peculiar nature of the
Gulf states in contrast with Arab republicans. The rentier theory fails to account for the traditional
Islamic culture that explains the survival of absolute monarchies in the Gulf.
While rentierism claims that the allegiance to ruling families are established through benevolent largesse or military coercion, Gulf-monarchs are, in fact, capable of gaining popular support through their commitment to stay close with the needs and feelings of their citizens. This is due to strong Islamic tradition of consultation and preference in consensual relationship
(Kuramaraswary, 2001). To quote Byman and Green,
To varying degrees, all Gulf ruling families and elites offer access to their citizens by holding regular but informal meetings wherein citizens can air their complaints, petition for redness of grievances, or otherwise try to influence local and national politics . . . By attending local gatherings and simply keeping their door open, ruling families generally have access to public opinion (1999, p79).
This statement demonstrates that monarchical regimes are congenial to the people, and reduce the sense of alienation, both moral and political, which connects the rulers and the people.
Winckler (2002) points out that the benevolent nature and willingness to keep channels open for their citizens set them apart from the Arab republics like Iran. These factors attribute to the establishment of legitimacy in Gulf monarchies.
Moreover, Ghabra asserts that the Islamic tradition of consultation is prevalent within the royal families in the Gulf. He emphasises that respect for social rules and family balances is firmly embedded in Islamic culture (Ghabra 2000, p.12). According to Rubin, this feature provides ideological flexibility within the regimes, enabling them to accept new circumstances and transform into better political systems without challenging the basis of the system (Rubin, 2006). It is important to note that this flexibility leads to regional stability, enabling Gulf regimes to ride out the unrest and upheaval of the Middle East (Rubin 2006). Owing to the stability secured by Gulf monarchies, they enjoy substantial loyalty and legitimacy among their people. Kamrawa (1998) argues that this is further reinforced by the rentier effect through a display of benevolence in the spending of oil revenue. Crystal (2005) notes that even political opposition in the Gulf States are loyal and are mostly content to work with the system within prescribed limits because of substantial legitimacy and widespread support from citizens. Therefore, Crystal (2005) claims that dissents are not aggressive to the extent of overthrowing the current regime. As such, the establishment of legitimacy and extensive support by citizens is accomplished with the respect of Islamic culture while being supplemented by rentierism at the same time, which in turn led to the continuance of absolute monarchies.

Another factor that rentierism fails to account for in explaining the survival of absolute monarchies is civic propensity towards stability. Unlike the Arab republics like Iran, Iraq, Syria and
Egypt that characterise “the rhetoric of revolutions” for democracy, the Gulf states have never experienced radical challenges to their system (Kirby 2000, pp10). According to Herd (1999), the underlying reason is, because the gulf people believe that the process towards democracy should be slow and cautious since chaotic, unstable and rapid political change is not favoured in the Gulf
States. Herb (1990) calls this Gulf type of stable and resilient monarchy “dynastic monarchy”, which, Ben-Meir (2006, p329) states, “provide an opportunity to reduce resistance to democratic ideals, eventually win over sceptics, and prevent a serious backlash that could stifle future progress”.
Therefore, while oil wealth in the Gulf prolongs the monarchical system, it does not dismiss the possibility of democracy (Herb 2005). Summarily, a convergence of national behavioural preference to stability and stability deriving from ideological flexibility remarkably resulted in persistence of monarchical system in the Gulf.
Collectively, absolute monarchy as a form of governance, enforced by Britan, was initially suited for traditions of Islamic culture. Since the discovery of vast oil resource, rentierism helped royal families to gain loyalty and legitimacy, on top of their own commitments motivated by their tradition. As such, rentierism has consolidated the political institution of monarchy in the Gulf states, having impeded the transition of these political regimes towards democracy.
Nevertheless, there are views by several academics, claiming that absolute monarchies, rather than a product of rentierism, are just one of the inevitable developmental stages that any countries are bound to go through in order to attain democracy. In this regard, modernization theory states that, “democracy is caused by a collection of social and cultural changes – including occupational specialization, urbanization, and higher level of education – that in turn are caused by economic development” (Ross 2001). Ross also argues that in the process of development, the necessities for nation building, state formulation, and economic growth can be effectively accomplished by traditional absolute monarchies. After domestic stability is attained, in accordance with modernization theory, states transform from absolute into constitutional monarchies, and then into democracy along with the accumulation of liberalization (Anderson 2009). This progress has been historically seen in Europe throughout the age of absolutism, in Brazil and Japan in the 19th century, and it appears again in modern Middle East (Anderson 2009). In the case of Gulf states,
Alan Richard argues that the current level of economic freedom and education is “certainly high enough to guarantee a vibrant democracy – if the critical barriers can be overcome” (2005, p32).
Despite the fact that most of developed countries followed the path of modernisation theory, the

critical barriers in the Gulf states – rentierism for Richard – raise four reasons why democracy is impeded and as a result perpetuate Gulf monarchies.
First, Tessler and Gao explain that unilateral imposition of democracy by the West, without respect to Islam, hinders the process of democratization despite the Muslims’ aspiration for democracy. Abdelwahab El-Affendi points out that, “Muslim communities have responded positively both to democracy and to most aspects of liberalism. Limits on state authority, the separation of powers, and constitutionalism in general, has traditionally found strong support in
Muslim circles” (2003, p. 36).
Second, Esposito and Mogahed argues that separation of church and state, and secularism – requisites for democracy – are unacceptable in Islamic society as majority of citizens want Sharia,
Islamic law, to be a “source of legislation” (2007).
Third, while liberalization has been taking place to a varying degree, democracy is perceived to be outside of the elites’ interests. Therefore, as rentier theory notes, democratization is prevented by their vigorous attempts to eradicate emerging social dissents. Brynen, Korany and
Noble explain that liberalization is a means for regimes to gain loyalty from the people, whereas democratization is the “expansion of political participation in such a way as to provide citizens with a degree of real and meaningful collective control over policy” (1995).
Fourth, despite the increased wealth, rentier effects offer little incentive to change incumbent regimes, leading to quiescent citizens including oppositions for democratization.
The first and second reasons illustrate that Islamic culture admires and seeks democracy regardless of their conventions or beliefs. Ironically, in spite of the vigorous attempts by the West to democratize the Middle East, it has in fact prolonged the authoritarian regimes, showing that antiwesternization in the Gulf is also a catalyst for the resilience of absolute monarchies. The third and fourth reasons show that despite attaining an adequate social standard required for democracy, development in rentier states ceases at the extent whereby liberalization does not trigger democratization as a result of the absence of motivation. In fact, it may denote that the Gulf people are content enough with the rentier system to pursue more gains, given that their standards of living are sufficiently high. For instance, Qatar citizens enjoy the 2nd highest GDP per capita in the world
($102,700 est.), UAE 10th (48,500 est.), and Kuwait 19th ($40,700 est.) (CIA Factbook, 2011).
For instance, Singapore, a country with no natural resources, developed rapidly under benevolent dictatorship, successfully transiting to democratic government in recent years (Lee,
2000). The contrast is that while Singapore generates revenue through the promotion and

participation of international competition, most of the Gulf states’ revenues come from effortless accrued oil rent (Beblawi, 1987). Clearly, the motivation the former is more likely to increase political participation and to encourage a transition to democracy, whereas the motivation of the latter is less likely to encourage democratization. As previously mentioned, the delay in democratization is explained by the pursuit of stability. However, rentierism has undoubtedly led to the delay.
To conclude, the concept of ‘rentier state’ has had profound influences on the continued survival of absolute monarchies in the Gulf, through benevolent or coercive distribution of oil wealth that allowed monarchs to gain loyalty, as well as to reassure and co-opt dissent groups.
Abatement of political participation was also fulfilled by negligible taxation in the Gulf States. The explanation for continuing monarchies is, however, not fully accounted by rentierism, but rather a combination of rentierism and Islamic culture that stems from the deep tradition of royal families.
Absolute monarchies are congenial to Islamic cultures, and thus allegiance to the ruling families also arises from traditional customs to consult the citizens and sustain harmony within the royal family. On the contrary, modernization theory argues that countries inevitably achieve democratization as liberalizing economy and politics. Yet, the cases of rentier states in the Gulf invalidate modernization theory and instead strengthen authoritarianism, impeding political liberalization. The Arab uprising, which has provoked since December 2010, is evidence of a possible real-world occurrence of the aforementioned transition theory. The wave of the uprising has, however, yet to arrive in the Gulf States. The reasons may lie on cultural perspectives; that the top priority for the Gulf people is stability, or that they are content with the incumbent stable regimes.
Alternatively, it may be argued that the Gulf rentier states are transforming from an authoritarian to democratic government, slowly and cautiously, at a calculated pace in order to ensure that their population reap the benefits of the changes while preventing radical dissents from emerging.
However, up till today, since the discovery of oil, rentierism has significantly facilitated the resilience of authoritarian regimes in a way that demobilized people socially, economically, and politically. Albeit it neglected certain cultural aspects in the Gulf, rentierism conclusively accounts for the continued survival of absolute monarchies.

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