McDonald (2005, p.25 cited in The Newzealand Productivity Commission (2015) defines planning as ‘the better use of land, shaping space, community and safety’, while considering urban planners as a “post-modernist, moderator, politician, rationalist, advocate, realist, economist, critic, risk-taker, developer, healer, geographer, sage, critical thinker, environmentalist, urbanist, manager, technocrat, strategist, statistician, negotiator, economist, ruralist, deconstructionist, internationalist, administrator”.
Cities, then, are gaining in importance in academic literature – but the social and physical pressures which these cities must grapple with also face urban planners. New policy approaches which address sustainable development through relational planning is, therefore, important. McCann and Acs (2010) highlight the three centuries of economic globalisation from the beginning of the seventeenth century to the twentieth century: a period characterised by increasing industrialisation, urbanisation, trade and economic growth. The fourth phenomenon was an agglomeration effect, in which modern cities, such as London and New York, emerged as engines driving the development process. The first half of the twentieth century was characterised by the slowing down of urbanisation processes, associated with the difficult global economic environment.
According to the UN Habitat (2016), urban history views cities as sites of innovation: where new economic ideas crystallise and heterogeneous groups of people learn to co-exist as neighbours. It concludes that cities are a platform for global and local changes; hence, urban landscapes are spaces economic, cultural, political and ecological convergence. Global flows of people, money, innovations, images and ideas have changed public expectations regarding living standards and how they envisage cities. Thus cities have become sites of structural transformation. Cities that plan and project the future based on past trends bring the public and private sectors together along with their communities. Principles of new urban planning should address sustainable development, integrated planning, budgets, partners and stakeholders, meet the subsidiarity principle, promote market responsiveness, ensure access to land, develop appropriate planning tools, and recognise cultural diversity.
50 emergence of new urban landscape for global cities is referred to as ‘scape of flows’ as stated by Appadurai (1990) cited by Salama (2013). The five scapes referred are Ethnoscapes that include interaction of diverse cultures and are activiated by transporation technology. Movement of people due to migration, tourism, travel or refugees are reasons of production of the landscape. Mediascapes that are evolved due to revolution in information technology as a source of information and knowledge. Finanscapes are landscapes that are created due to flows of capital. Technoscapes that impact contemporary life through communication and network tehnology. Ideascapes that represent the ideologies spreading with revolution in modes of communication. These five scapes discussed by Appadurai (1990) are becoming features of “world cities as they reflect the intensity of flows in an urban context.
Migration and the Growth of Cities in the Gulf
National Geographic Society (2005) states that migration has occurred throughout human history, involving the movement of people from one place in the world to another for the purpose of permanent or semi-permanent residence, across a political boundary. Migration has occurred at various scales, including intercontinental, intracontinental, and interregional. The report identifies various reasons for people moving, of which rural to urban migration has been most significant, as people search for job opportunities in cities. The push factors include food shortages, war, and flooding; while pull factors include a better climate, freedom and opportunities.
In the Arab region, migration is not a new phenomenon. It began in the late 1930s following the discovery of oil, which started on a small scale and continued to grow. Rapid economic expansion fueled by oil wealth created millions of jobs for migrant workers in the Gulf. Bahrain, Kuwait, Oman, Qatar, Saudi Arabia and the UAE, which together, form the Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC), have a higher proportion of foreign nationals than anywhere else in the world: an average of more than 50%. In the UAE and Saudi Arabia, the largest numbers come from India: India-UAE and India-Saudi Arabia were the fourth and ninth most significant migrant corridors in the world respectively in 2010.
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Figure 2.18: Migrations to Gulf countries (Source: King et al., 2010)
Figure 2.19: Gulf Cooperation Council migrant workforce 1990-2010 (Source: King et al., 2010)
52 Globalisation connects to the dynamics of migration and social mobility. Figure 2.18 shows the migration to the Gulf countries and Figure 2.19 indicate the migrant workforce for every 10 years time since 1990. Sidaway and Mohammad (2012) study the Gulf cities, which promote themselves as world cities and centres for trade, culture, finance and tourism as they embody dynamic socio-spatial change. The oil economy in the Gulf has attracted workers from across the globe, with Gulf cities nodes on the global map of urban flows and connection. Mohammad and Sidaway (2012) state that GCC countries were transformed into ‘rentier states’ due to the surge in oil prices and production, with oil accounting for 80% of these countries’ revenue. A dual market began to form: with nationals represented in the public sector, and foreign workers employed in the private sector. The political implication of the rentier state was, therefore, ‘no taxation and no representation’.
Dubai: A Historical Overview
Dubai is the commercial hub of the Gulf region and financial capital of the UAE. Dubai is sometimes referred to as the ‘Pearl of the Gulf’, which achieved prosperity only in the last 50 years. Dubai was a pearl-diving town with a population of just 1200 in 1822; and when, in 1841, smallpox broke out on the creek side, people moved to Deira, where houses started to be built. At the beginning of the twentieth century, Dubai became a major trade centre for the Arabian Gulf, yet the pearl industry remained its main economy.
With the advent of the pearl industry in Japan in 1930, the pearl trade declined in Dubai, resulting in economic depression. The population migrated to adjoining countries for employment opportunities. Later, when Sheikh Rashid Bin Saeed Al Makhtoum, founder of modern Dubai, became the ruler, various infrastructure-related activities began. These projects involved airport construction, transportation between the various parts of the city, bridges to connect both sides of the creek, roadworks and other developments.
The discovery of oil in 1966 transformed the economy of several Gulf states; not least the UAE. Huge amounts of manpower were required to satisfy the demands of the new oil industry. Migration has therefore been an integral aspect of all Gulf states; though even before the oil discovery, foreigners were employed as seasonal workers in the pearl industry. The British Empire had a series of treaties between 1820 and 1960 with the Sheikhdoms of the Gulf, which preserved the exclusive British presence. A nationality clause, however, requested all oil
53 companies to employ local nationals, and foreign workers only if more skills were required. There has always been a preference for workers from neighbouring Asian countries, rather than Pan-Arabs, due to manageability, cost of labour and ability to work. The total number of Indian expatriates has always been highest when compared with those from the Phillipines, Pakistan, or Bangaladesh. While managerial jobs were offered to British nationals, skilled and semi- skilled workers were employed from the Indian sub-continent (Errichiello, 2012, pp.294-395, 403).
In 1971, the union of seven emirates which form the UAE was established. Dubai is the most important city in the UAE as well as the Gulf region. It quickly experienced dramatic urbanisation and development. Later, the UAE started to shift from an oil-based economy towards new business sectors such as real estate, tourism, world class sporting events, finance, and construction. This has been supported and encouraged by the government, which has implemented economic reforms and streamlined foreign investment regulations: affording a multicultural lifestyle to nationals and expatriates alike, which has helped bolster the UAE’s rapid growth (Grant, Golawala, & Mckechnie, 2007).