The booming Arab emirate was an irresistible attraction for people from around the world looking for luxury and bling. Life in Dubai was about opulence, luxury and wealth. From The world’s tallest building, most expensive hotel, artificially created Jumeirah Islands in the shape of a palm tree housing the world’s choicest elite, thriving gold markets and so much more, Dubai was the world’s centre of Hedonism. A glaring manifestation of a society built on the foundations of greed and gratification.
The Dubai government has finally declared that extent of the debts crippling Dubai to be around $80bn, though critics argue the actual figure could be double this amount. According to Paul Lewis of the Guardian UK, “A six-year boom that turned sand dunes into a glittering metropolis and, some say, a shrine to unbridled capitalism, is grinding to a halt.
Jumeirah Islands: Guinness Records of opulence…
The real estate bubble that propelled the frenetic expansion of Dubai on the back of borrowed cash and speculative investment, has burst. Many westerners are being made redundant or absconding before the strict legal system catches up with them. Half of all the UAE’s construction projects, totalling $582bn, have either been put on hold or cancelled, leaving a trail of half-built towers on the outskirts of the city stretching into the desert.
Among the casualties is the tower Donald Trump promised would be “the ultimate in luxury”, a $100bnresort complex by the beach, and four huge theme parks and an artificial island developed by the state company Nakheel.” There is news pouring in of well off migrants leaving their cars at the airport before fleeing off to their native lands, of stores putting up 80% sale in the frenzy to maintain costs and of people selling their luxury vehicles to cover for huge debts. What is wrong with indulgence, some would argue?
The Burj ul Arab: World’s 2nd tallest building and the planet’s most expensive hotel.
Simply that, indulgence beyond a certain measure diverts individuals and societies from issues of higher and relevant concern. The attention that should be centered on serving the other, is funneled back onto the self. Can a society survive solely on self obsessed individuals?
Opulence indicates imbalance; the inequitable distribution of wealth clogged at some end. The warning sign of this imbalance in Dubai was the flagrant human rights violations towards the migrant workers by their employees. From domestic workers to construction staff, hundreds of thousands of migrants from developing countries of Asia suffered violence, sexual abuse, forced labour, atrocious work conditions and generally, contempt.
According to a report by the Associated Press in 2008, “Human rights groups have for years decried the harsh conditions of foreign laborers in Dubai and the rest of the United Arab Emirates and oil-rich Persian Gulf. But the problem only drew widespread attention after strikes by thousands of workers this year and last. Some recent protests turned violent; in mid-March, police arrested at least 500 South Asian workers who smashed office windows and set cars ablaze in the small, neighboring emirate of Sharjah.
Dubai officials were embarrassed by the bad press in a city that advertises itself as a world business hub, playground for the rich and home to major horse races and golf and tennis tournaments. But despite promises of reform, there are still problems, The Associated Press found in interviews with government officials and two dozen workers and visits to employer-provided housing:
- Many South Asian workers are essentially indentured servants, borrowing heavily to pay recruitment agents for jobs. They can spend several years paying back debts that can run $3,000 or more, while earning between $150 and $300 a month, lately weakened by a falling dollar and Dubai’s double-digit inflation.
- They work a 60-hour week, with one day off or even just half a day.
- Employers often confiscate their passports, in violation of Dubai law, and withhold pay for two or three months to stop workers from quitting.
- Many have no medical insurance and work outdoors in summer heat of 120 degrees Fahrenheit and stifling humidity.
- Employer-provided housing often means bare, crowded trailers behind barbed wire or on Dubai’s desert fringes. Some are not connected to water or sewage grids.
Overall, human rights groups say, unscrupulous employers and government indifference have combined to create one of the world’s worst cases of systematic exploitation.”
Mall of Dubai: The megalomaniac’s maze!
The United Arab Emirate has also incidentally rejected the United Nations’ recommendations, this year, for better migrant worker rights citing that the recommendations did not enjoy the country’s support owing to social, cultural and legal factors. One wonders how those social, cultural and legal norms are inclusive towards a thriving sex industry in Dubai supported by prostitutes from around the world!
The Dubai fiasco will unravel further with time to come. However it raises some questions for those who care to make the connections.
How many more colossal fiascos will it take for greedy money makers to realize that an individual, an enterprise or a society does not flourish on foundations of reckless greed and selfishness?
Can ‘islands of happiness’ be built by suicidal migrant workers?
Can children with their heads and hearts in the right places be raised in families where migrant nannies are sexually exploited by their employers?
In the stunning dazzle of opulence, where was Dubai’s character? Was it after all, just a sandcastle?
References:
- Lewis Paul. Dubai’s six-year building boom grinds to halt as financial crisis takes hold. http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2009/feb/13/dubai-boom-halt
- Hendawi Hamza. Plight of migrant workers blemishes Dubai’s image. http://www.usatoday.com/news/world/2008-05-25-3622239990_x.htm
- UAE Rejects UN Recommendations for Migrant Workers’ Rights. http://www.migrant-rights.org/2009/03/23/uae-rejects-un-recommendations-for-migrant-workers-rights/
- ‘The Island of Happiness | Human Rights Watch’. http://www.hrw.org/en/node/83110/section/4
- Jumeirah Islands photo: http://www.propertyportal.ae/blog/wp-content/uploads/2007/09/palm_jumeirah.jpg
- Burj ul Arab Photo: http://atlasshrugs2000.typepad.com/atlas_shrugs/images/dubai.jpg
Mall of Dubai photo: http://www.flashydubai.com/images/Dubai_Mall.jpg
Tags: Afia Mansoor, Benevolent Intent, Care and Growth, Dubai, Dubai financial crisis, Dubai immigrant human rights, Dubai immigrant working conditions, Leadership
very well written.
I recently came accross your blog and have been reading along. I thought I would leave my first comment. Nice blog. I will keep visiting this blog very often.
Excellent Afia, so sadly true.
Terrific piece. Very well written and I appreciated, in particular, the attention Afia drew to the plight of migrant workers. I have witnessed a similar situation in Lebanon and, I agree, its a sad situation. Thanks for this enlightening piece.
The article shows the pre-crash glamor and post-crash situation, in crystal clear fashion.
As in with everything on this planet things even minute are connected. Each event seems to always have some consequent impact in the short and long run, creating other events.
But I was wondering if you could explore this mechanism at play in Dubai i.e. how exactly the vile created the present situation?
Thank you Faraz,
Allow me to explain my views in the Schuitema terminology!
To me the story of Dubai seems one of misplaced significance. Dubai seems to have been founded on the premise of serving the ego. The society that views itself as significant and seeks to glorify it with unabashed wealth, is escaping reality; it is the Pharoahnic society that glorifies itself and is arrogant.
Dubai too seems to be a place where the unreal is significant. How else can one explain ridiculous plans of building airconditioned beaches and giant ice igloos in a sun scorched land? The arrogance is manifest with the government’s lack of concern towards the abused migrant workers building this ‘heaven of greed’. There are reports that migrant workers are laid off quickly from worksites before they commit suicide and the employers can be apprehended.
Also, like I wrote, opulence indicates imbalance. Wealth in Dubai has not flowed to fill the gaps of poverty on the planet. In fact dubai is where ill gotten wealth has flowed to make the imbalance bigger.
The lessons from Dubai are numerous should one ponder. A society that is based on serving the ego cannot flourish… even if it means serving the ego of others.
A state where prostitution and megalomania goes simultaneously with ritualistic religious fervour of a ‘conservative’ ruling elite is also a hypocrite society.
Hypocrisy, Greed, Arrogance, Selfishness ruins any society no matter how wealthy.
You write very well,
all of us should,
gather these crucial lessons,
stop and think for moment
indeed ponder on this phenomenon,
this seems only a repeat
of what might have happened in Rome,
once corrupted.
A consequence of the Pharaonic model,
a testament of the weakness of its foundations
in plain sight.