Eleventh Global Studies Conference

Abstract

Migrants have been deeply implicated in processes of state-building and development in the Arab monarchies of the Gulf. In the absence of a national workforce educated to assume the tasks necessary for the development of Gulf economies, the six states of the Gulf Cooperation Council imported armies of foreign workers to supply the necessary manpower and technical expertise for the modernisation of the Gulf’s physical and social infrastructure. What was the contribution of these migrant workers to the consolidation of stable institutions and political order in the Gulf countries? This paper contextualises labour migration according to three “logics” derived from state-building theory. In the first paradigm, drawn from neoliberal institutionalism, the role of migrant workers is relegated to the technical operation of markets and Gulf private sector growth according to market rationality. In the second, neo-Weberian, perspective, the availability of a non-native labour force is tied to the emergence of institutional autonomy in the Gulf, as the exigencies of labour migration allowed state elites in the Gulf to overcome the challenge of late development and “the King’s dilemma.” A third perspective drawn from Gramscian theory situates migration politics in a narrative of political mobilisation, whilst showing how migrants have been part of a historically specific coalition of social forces sustaining a carefully constructed hegemonic order.