‘Holistic Sustainability’ Policies: Preserving Local Cultural Identity in the UAE in the Face of Globalisation

Background

The area, now known as the UAE, has been a regional trading thoroughfare between East and West for several thousands of years (Alsayegh, 2001). Artefacts found in dug sites around the county originated from ancient civilisations of many regions of the world including India, Greece, Rome, Persia, Africa and China (Goulding & McEwin, 2008; Jasim, 2012; Mansour, 2013).

Despite the meagre natural resources available in the harsh desert environment, the inhabitants of this area maintained a relatively healthy living through trade, mainly based on pearling, and income from tolls imposed on traders and travellers using the waterways. However, this scenario changed in the late 18th century when ‘partly out of misunderstanding and partly out of arrogance, the British refused to pay these tolls’, for which the local inhabitants retaliated by raiding the British ships, ‘an act the British considered piracy’ (Onley, 2005, p. 30).

Dr Sultan AlQasimi (1988), the ruler of the Emirate of Sharjah, and a noted historian and author, wrote The Myth of Piracy in the Gulf using official documents of the time illustrating that British captains, political agents and other writers, including Lorimar, Kelly, Wainwright, Bartlett, Warden and others, often reported conflicting and distorted accounts. According to AlQasimi, the goal was to ‘present or rather misrepresent, the Qawasim [local inhabitants] as pirates whose depredations posed a serious threat to all maritime activities in the Indian Ocean and adjacent Ocean’ (p. xv). Onley (2005) concurred that the ultimate British objective was to rule the waterways by ‘informal control if possible, formal control, if necessary’ (p. 33). The goal was achieved when the local rulers were pressured to sign the Perpetual Maritime Truce in 1853 granting the British control of the waterways and creating the British Protectorate called the Trucial States, although the region was often referred to as the Coast of Oman. This was followed by the Exclusivity Treaty of 1892, denying inhabitants of the area ‘any rights to receive representatives from any foreign powers other than the British’ without the British pre-approval (Alsayegh, 2012, p. 253). This policy effectively isolated the Trucial States from the developments occurring in the rest of the world at the time.

One group that was allowed to enter the Gulf region were missionaries from the American Mission, also known as the Arabian Mission, who under the guise of providing much needed medical care and education to the underdeveloped area, intended to ‘infiltrate the Arabian Peninsula and evangelise it on the basis that it was once an important part of the Christian world’ (Alsayegh, 2012). Timothy Harrison, son of Paul W. Harrison, the missionary doctor, remarked that the mission sought to ‘go inland and make converts among the Moslems in central and Western Arabia, …“the goal of our hearts desire”’ (Harrison, 2008). To do this, the Mission employed wives of male missionaries with medical training to gain access to the Arab Gulf society by gaining access to the women (Alsayegh, 2012).

Dr Hoda Elsaadi (2012), an Arab historian, stated that missionary accounts usually portrayed Arabian Gulf women as ‘uneducated, economically inactive and oppressed in ways unknown in the West … shackled by unchanging social norms based on a conservative religion and traditional values’ (p. 151). Dr Amira Sonbol (2012), supported by AlQasimi (2011), Alsayegh (2012) and Elsaadi (2012), maintained that caution should be exercised when using missionary accounts, travel writings and political documents to understand the history of the Gulf. Although helpful in providing detailed descriptions of everyday life of the region, many contain serious biases and contributed to the perception of life in Arabia as backward and uncivilised. ‘Eastern Arabia has been dealt with as an area history-less before the modern period’, so the orientalist imagery, perhaps exaggerated, was eagerly accepted by readers. Sonbol gave the example that when using non-textual representations of events, like period photos or sketches, drawn by an observer, researchers often found ‘surprising results, often in stark contrast to the conclusions reached by the very [person] who told the story’ (p. 8).

Dr Fatima Alsayegh, an Emirati historian, used period documents including missionary reports and political documents to write historical accounts of life in the Trucial States from the 1880s to the early 2000s. Alsayegh (1998) noted that in the early 1900s, despite the isolationist practices of the British, the region experienced an economic boom as the trading hub shifted from the Arab towns on the Iranian side of the Gulf to the emirates of Sharjah and Dubai. To increase the benefits to the region, Shaikh Maktum, the ruler of Dubai at the time, ‘took progressive measures to encourage local businesses and attract foreign trade by abolishing taxes’ (ibid., p. 90). The economic boom attracted ‘great human migrations in the form of labourers and settlers to the area’ (Alsayegh, 2001, p. 18). However, under the protectorate system, all trade was allocated only to ‘local Arab, Persian, and Indian merchants with trading houses’ approved by the British government in India (Onley, 2005, p. 37).

Pearling expeditions were mostly funded by Hindu merchants, as money lending for profit was not allowed in Islamic religion. The Hindu investors settled in their own separate communities along the coastal areas in Sharjah and Dubai. Indian investors and merchants imported products that could not be produced locally, such as textiles, jewellery, spices, tea, other food items and luxury goods, from India and distributed them, along with cash advances, as loans against the pearl receipts at huge profits. According to Alsayegh (2001), ‘Indian influences as imparted on ladies’ clothes, cuisine, and adornment items … all left their mark’ but the two communities did not integrate as they had differing belief systems, history, customs, languages and cultures (p. 19).

The indigenous Arab inhabitants retained their own cultural identity and tribal social structure with each group of extended families supporting each other socially and economically. An elder male was the family leader with less senior males serving important familial functions and women significantly contributing to tribal affairs although ‘mostly from behind the scenes’ (ibid., p. 19). Large families were desired as child mortality by age 4 was high at around 12 per cent, while the average life expectancy was low at approximately 40 years old (p. 21). Marriage was encouraged at the onset of puberty with girls as young as 12 years old marrying boys as young as 17 years old. Divorce was not considered a shame, and multiple remarriages after divorce were common for both men and women. Widowhood was not considered a virtue, with widows encouraged to re-marry after the proscribed waiting period. Polygamy was common among rich men, seeking to secure their social status. Children learned to read Arabic in Quran schools operated by local inhabitants usually in the mosque or under a tree for boys or in homes for girls (Alsayegh, 2012; Elsaadi, 2012).

Although according to local perspectives and Islamic teachings, women were afforded elevated status wielding enormous influence in the home and managing the family during the extended absence of men, women were characterised by female missionaries in the derogatory terms (Alsayegh, 2001; Elsaadi, 2012). One missionary woman remarked, ‘During my stay in Arabia, which was around 16 years, I have not seen a single Arab house in which the relationship between man and woman was such as a Western woman would tolerate’ (Alsayegh, 2012). Such examples sent back to common people in Western countries were designed to elicit a specific negative sentiment towards the region and justify the extended intervention of foreign powers (AlQasimi, 2011).

Life in the prosperous time of the early 20th century was characterised by relative abundance. The income from trade and pearling allowed for the purchase of necessities of life that were not producible in the harsh desert environment (Alabed, Vine, Hellyer, & Vine, 2008). In the cities, commoner women often worked in public alongside the men, while upper-class women managed their households from seclusion with an abundance of servants to perform the routine chores. At this time, most women produced most household items from raw materials found in the environment, such as palm fronds used to make houses, mats and textiles made from camel hair, and food items such as fish and milk products from goats and camels, in a unique, sustainable manner. In the desert-dwelling communities, women and the work they performed were considered essential for the continuation of the tribe as most men were away for up to 6 months at a time every year during the pearling season (Alsayegh, 2001; Elsaadi, 2012).

During this period, wealthy merchants in the commercial centres of Dubai, began to ‘initiate educational development aimed at improving social awareness’ (Alsayegh, 1998, p. 91). For example, around 1903 pearl merchants founded the Taimiyyah traditional school, where students attended at no cost. In the Al-Ahmadiyyah school, featuring proper writing desks and foreign teachers, students paid a small fee. Merchants attended the ruler’s Majlis (Council) and contributed in the decision-making process. Modern medicine, provided mainly by missionary doctors and nurses stationed in Oman, made an appearance for the first time (Harrison, 2008).

According to Alsayegh (2001), in the late 1920s, the economy plummeted in the after-effects of the First World War, the Great Depression and the decreased demand for natural pearls after the Japanese developed a cheaper synthetic alternate. As pearl merchants went out of business, many men, expatriate and indigenous, lost their livelihoods, causing them to leave the country in search of work and ‘stories of women forced to dive in exchange for their dead [or absent] husbands’ debts were reported’ (p. 21). Poverty, illness and illiteracy spread as the economy declined.

In the 1930s, new sources of revenues were found for the rulers of the Trucial States in air concessions with the first air station opening in Sharjah in 1932 (AlQasimi, 2012). Having found oil in the neighbouring countries of Saudi Arabia and Bahrain in the 1932 and 1933, respectively, foreign oil companies paid fees to start searching for oil in the Trucial States. The meagre income generated ‘enabled the rulers to carry out some badly needed social services’ but was not enough to begin building a modern social and physical infrastructure (Alsayegh, 2001, p. 23).

During the Second World War (1939–1945), even this meagre income was stopped as all civilian flights were cancelled, allowing only British military planes to use the Sharjah Air Station for refuelling (AlQasimi, 2011). Oil exploration, and concession fees it produced, also ceased ‘causing severe disruption to the social and economic fabric of the Emirates’ society’ (Alsayegh, 2001, p. 23). Alsayegh (2001) stated that after the Second World War, with worldwide economic recovery underway, oil and air concession revenues resumed, and the development of the first social services structures emerged. Al-Maktum Hospital opened in Dubai in 1949 and Sarah Hosman, an American missionary, set up a modern maternity hospital in Sharjah. Interest was renewed in modern education with a few new schools opening for boys and girls. During this era of development, women educated in the 1950s began working in the 1960s, but concerns over the perceived negative effects of female employment—delayed marriage resulting in fewer children per woman and children being raised by someone other than their mother—caused many women to opt out of employment (ibid.).

In 1968, when the British announced their intention to turn over the protectorate to its inhabitants, the rulers of the individual Emirates led by the Shaikh Zayed Al-Nahyan, ruler of Abu Dhabi, and Shaikh Rashid Al-Maktoum, ruler of Dubai, united to form a federation. After nationalisation in 1971, the leadership set out to establish a modern country that was uniquely Arab and Islamic, yet at the same time modern and integrated into the fabric of the global society (Ahmad, Al Rostamani & Matthew, 2011).

Pictorial and textual accounts bore witness to the early stages of development including The UAE Formative Years 1965–75: A Collection of Historical Pictures by Ramesh Shukla (Bhatia, 1995); The Rise of a Nation: 30 Years in Pictures (Ahmad, Mathews, & Al Rostamani, 2010), Building a Nation: 40 Years in Pictures (Ahmad et al., 2011), Faces of the Emirates: An Arabian Album A Collecton of Mid-20th Century Photographs (Codrai, 2001) and Arabian Sands (Thesiger, 1994). These accounts gave pictorial and textual evidence of the massive number of initiatives intended to develop every aspect of modern physical and social infrastructure, providing municipal services such as electricity, water, sewage and waste collection to individual homes. Transportation systems were built for the use of commercial vehicles and passenger cars. Communications systems were established so that basic telephone and television services were available. Public schools were built in every neighbourhood, and education was made compulsory and free of charge to all national boys and girls up to grade 10. A public healthcare system was put into place, providing basic health care services free of charge to nationals. Other benefits provided to UAE nationals included land granted to qualifying male nationals who entered the workforce and assistance to help cover the cost of marriage, provided both bride and groom were nationals (Ahmad et al., 2010, 2011).

By the late 1990s, UAE citizens had settled into a sedentary rather than transient lifestyle in rural or urban areas to take advantage of the subsidies and benefits of citizenship including housing, education, healthcare and municipal services (Alsayegh, 2001). Public sector jobs were plentiful and offered generous salaries and benefits, requiring short working hours (from 7:30 am to 2:00 pm) and less than a high school education (Toledo, 2013). The high rate of economic growth at this stage enabled the public sector economy to absorb many Emiratis who desired to enter the workforce, and yet foreign labour was needed at every level in both the public and private sectors (AlAli, 2013).

By the early 2000s, the basic infrastructure was in place, and almost all Emiratis had electricity, running water, air conditioning, a landline phone, access to acceptable transportation and access to basic healthcare and education. By the mid- to late-2000s, technology had been integrated in the Emirati society as most had high-speed Internet access at home, at least one smart phone, at least one computer or iPad per family and at least one car per family (ibid.). At the same time, the public sector had reached its capacity to absorb Emiratis with approximately 80 per cent of all working Emiratis employed in the public sector (Sharif, 2013).

The Demography of the Arab World and Middle East from 1950s to 2000s: A Survey of Change (Tabutin & Shoumaker, 2005) summarises important changes that were occurring in the region as a result of the newfound wealth and prosperity. In the oil-producing Gulf region, healthcare improvements reduced infant, child and maternal mortality rates, producing larger families with less children per woman. In the UAE, the youth population (age 15 and younger) reached more than half (51%) of the total Emirati population and elderly lived longer with life expectancy rising to more than age 70, nearly twice the life expectancy of the previous generation.

Challenges

According to Hassane and Abdullah (2011), these demographic shifts contributed to deep-felt social changes. The average marriage age for female Emiratis increased as women entered college and the workforce in growing numbers, and increasing number of couples chose to live in nuclear families away from parents and elders. The increased use of English in education and business prompted the leadership to officially designate Arabic as the national language and sparked debate about adopting more stringent guidelines regarding the level of Arabic that was expected to be taught in public educational institutions. Finally, according to recent studies including Policing the Internet in the Arab World (Abdalla, 2009), ‘The internet, fixity, and flow: Challenges to the articulation of an imagined community’ (Allagui & Breslow, 2011) and From Tribe to Facebook (Salem, 2013), the use of technology, which in many cases made many aspects of life easier and many processes faster, isolated and confused members of the elder generation who witnessed tremendous changes during their lifetime.

Despite the challenges, forward thinking and inclusive nature of the leadership were noted by Herb (1999) as the main reasons that enabled the governments of the Gulf States, including the Emirates, to not only survive the challenges of rapid development but also to thrive. Herb pointed out that by incorporating the tribal aspects of consensus, negotiation, inclusion, and spreading the wealth to include all citizens, the nations of the region have established peaceful transitions of leadership and have earned the loyalty of their people.

Recent studies (Daleure et al., 2013, 2014) have compared the lives of UAE nationals in four different generational categories according to stages of development each has experienced: youth cohort—not yet graduated high school (less than 16 years old), young adult cohort—college-aged generation (from 16 to 25 years old), mature adult cohort—completed college, likely working, likely married and raising a family (from 35 to 55 years old) and grandparents’ generation—memories of life before nationalisation (older than 55 years old). Table A1 lists the categories and specific attributes of each. Over the lifetime of the eldest generation, social changes have taken place that produced a very different living environment for each consecutive generation.

According to Hussane and Abdalla (2011) among others, the generations are becoming more disjointed. Concerns have been expressed among social service entities that younger Emiratis may be drifting away from the core values that have made the country strong—the values that contribute to the notion of holistic sustainability and that have supported the rapid development. The Ethnography Study captures glimpses of the elders’ lives and recollections, giving clues to past successes and insights into ways to promote future successes.

Description of Participants

A total of 50 Emirati elders were interviewed with the relationship to interviewer, as shown in Table 1.

Table 2 shows that grandmothers were interviewed nearly twice as frequently as any other category, although the participants were nearly equally divided between males (26) and females (24). Ages ranged from 41 years old (born in 1973) to 85 (born in 1928). Participants lived in Sharjah, Ajman, Umm Al Quwain, Al Ain, Ras Al Khaimah, Fujairah and Dalma Island.

In the mostly subsistence economy, most work was unpaid and consisted of making or obtaining food. Duties were arduous for males and females.

2. Culture

Nearly half of the participants chose to speak about their informal educational experiences learning Arabic and other basic subjects at the local mosques, open areas or in private homes. These educational experiences reinforced the cultural values that are important to the people.

3. Society

A recurrent theme in most narratives was the emphasis on family closeness and neighbours, helping each other as exemplified by the following excerpts:

Our life, my son, was something indescribable … we were all in one house and helping each other. It was difficult to live in more than one house so you would find a grandmother, grandfather, father, mother, and children all in one house (EN4). Each neighborhood population did not exceed 20 families and they knew each other well and treated each other as family. The most beautiful thing is that each family gathered together for lunch, no one would start until the whole family was gathered together. Life was simple and uncomplicated for people because they were interested in a secure living. Family members struggled side by side (EN5).

One ethnographic narrative is related to an incident in which a thief stole from a shopkeeper. The shopkeeper demanded the maximum penalty which was removing the hands of the thief and hung the hands over the door of the shop. There was not a single reported act of thievery in the neighbourhood for the next 30 years.

4. Environment

Several of the narratives mentioned aspects of environmental sustainability in daily life activities. Narratives mentioned that with scarce resources, little was wasted. Water brought from the well and used for drinking water. Water that was meant for washing, and therefore not fit to drink, was used to water the animals. Food was scarce, and much had to be imported, but most families had their own goats and chickens to obtain fresh eggs and milk on a daily basis. The other major food item was seafood caught fresh daily or salted for preservation using traditional methods.

 Little pollution and waste was generated.

5. Other topics

Some narratives described how the inhabitants used natural medicines before modern medical care was available in the region. Other narratives related interesting and sometimes humorous stories of being introduced to new things like the first time an elder used a telephone or drove a car.

UAE Policy Challenge: Bridging the Generation Gap and Rapid Global Emersion

Three broad themes, namely family closeness, education and women’s contribution to society, were chosen to examine in greater detail. The themes link elder generation perceptions to modern issues with examples of recent policies, legislation or governmental activities aimed at overcoming the challenges.

The notion of family closeness originating from the tribal nature of society has been carried through UAE development policies. The UAE National Charter 2021, Emirati Families states that ‘the UAE government believes in the family system and that it is the nucleus of society’ (UAE Government, n.d.). This belief was extended to include the following: marriage among Emiratis to facilitate transference of cultural identity from one generation to the next, frequent dialogue among the generations, that is, children, parents and grandparents, position of respect for elders in Emirati families, support for the empowerment of Emirati women grounded in respect for Emirati traditions and protection from discrimination against Emirati women in all spheres of society including the workplace. To monitor the progress towards achieving these objectives, the Ministry of Community Development has developed the Family Cohesion Index, a composite indicator attempting to measure social bonds between family members. In 2013, the index was used for the first time, and the rating was 86.4 per cent, although the aims are to achieve 100 per cent by 2021.

The notion of family closeness was further extended to all Emiratis, enabling all citizens to benefit from the revenues generated by oil. The leadership provides generous benefits to nationals such as healthcare subsidies, housing and land subsidies, marriage expense subsidies, free education in government primary and secondary school and up to 6 years of post-secondary education for eligible nationals. Emerging Emiratization policies have started providing incentives for private sector companies to hire Emiratis. Rulers hold regular Majlis meetings to get a feel of the opinions of the public in their respective regions and tailor policies to maximise effectiveness. Taking the Majlis concept a step further, the UAE has had a parliamentary institution, called the Federal National Council (FNC), since 1972, the year after nationalisation which served to advise the President. In 2005, the FNC was allocated more powers through the Tamkeen [Empowerment] programme, and in 2006, eligible Emiratis experienced voting for the FNC members for the first time. In 2011, several Emirati women ran for FNC and were elected (Salem, 2013).

Education was highly valued in the UAE even as a traditional society in which children, both males and females, were taught by the neighbourhood Mutawaa in informal settings or by ladies in the homes of the girls. Technological development is the focus of the federal post-secondary institutions with innovative practices being rewarded. In most traditional societies, members often do not have even basic math and literacy skills. The respect for education is carried through to modernisation as expressed by the official UAE government website ‘Education is the constitutional right of every citizen. The UAE Government recognises the role of education in building a knowledge-driven economy for the post-oil era’ (UAE Government, n.d.). The UAE leadership has exemplified this by providing education free of charge to nationals and developing educational institutions with separate sex campuses from K-12 up to college to accommodate cultural sensitivities and to assure that females have equitable access to education.

The contribution of women to Emirati society was notable in elder society. Women were acknowledged as the backbone of the family and society with survival attributed to their efforts. This idea has been incorporated into development with special care given to accommodate cultural sensitivities regarding women’s preferences for segregated educational institutions and work environments. According to one international study comparing the well-being and development of women in 134 countries, the UAE scored the highest (UAE Ranks First, 2014). This score was earned again in 2016 in the World Economic Forum (2016, p. 15). Emirati women are afforded generous maternity benefits, reduced workdays when breastfeeding, extended bereavement leave if the unfortunate death of their husband occurs and gender-based salary discrimination is illegal. Emirati women can be seen working in the highest positions including Federal National Council members, diplomats, college chancellors, company directors, or other high-ranking positions.

The elements of Emirati inter-generational experience serve to strengthen society as a whole, yet they may provide unexpected challenges, including youth unemployment. When young people are well-cared for and have so much social support, they may develop a tendency to rely on familial and social support in excess. One initiative to counteract that tendency, compulsory national service for men, optional for women, was instituted in 2014. During national service, Emirati males are not only trained to defend their country but also given additional skills that enhance personal development, develop cultural identity and heighten their sense of responsibility to family and country. Simultaneously, the government began a downsizing and outsourcing programme to reduce government spending and refocus Emiratis on gaining employment in the private sector rather than the public sector. Recent labour law modifications allowing part-time work, reducing minimum working age to 16 years old and granting private sector holidays are encouraging more Emirati women to join the workforce (Daleure, 2017).