Dubai Development

In a city like Dubai, often referred to as "development on steroids," it's interesting to consider the structure and growth of the city in the context of trends in development studies. Amartya Sen's book "Development As Freedom" considers freedom as both the means and the ends of development and in the process reconfigures the notion that rising GDP and national income are the sole indicators of successful development.

While Sen's analysis is too complex and nuanced to summarize here (he did when a Nobel Prize after all), one aspect of his book related to "Lee's thesis" deserves to be highlighted in reference to Dubai. This thesis, named after Lee Kuan Yew, the former prime minister of Singapore, argues that rapidly adopting political and civic liberties in developing countries risks hampering economic growth and development. Sen disagrees with this claim, arguing that Lee's perspective is too narrow (mostly derived from his experience in Singapore and perhaps considering China and South Korea's experience) and doesn't hold up when broadened to a more global study.

The Dubai case is a compelling one for Sen to consider against Lee's thesis and his overall theory of development as freedom. This is partly because of Dubai's youth and the fact that Dubai's story has yet to be studied extensively. But Dubai is also interesting because it contains variables which aren't addressed much by Sen's study. Dubai's majority expatriate population, Islamic heritage and pre-existing oil wealth are three very distinct factors which I believe would complicate Sen's analysis. As the majority of Dubai workers lack citizenship and the presence of oil revenues limits the need of the state to tax its population, the Dubai model injects a new set of variables into this important discussion.