Christopher Davidson - After the Sheikhs - The Coming Collapse of the Gulf Monarchies

There are now many examples of substantial donations from other Gulf monarchies in British universities — again mostly from government-backed entities or influential ruling family members. Qatar’s ruler has paid Oxford University about $3.5 million to endow a new professorship named after himself — the His Highness Hamad Bin Khalifa Al-Thani Chair in Contemporary Islamic Studies [405] 97. Oxford University Gazette , No. 4857, Vol. 139, 16 October 2008. while Oman’s ruler has paid for two endowed professorships at Cambridge University, which again seem to be safely distanced from any discussion of Gulf politics — the His Majesty Sultan Qaboos Bin Said Professor of Modern Arabic Studies and the His Majesty Sultan Qaboos Chair for Abrahamic Faiths and Common Values. [406] 98. Khaleej Times , 26 February 2011. Not to be outdone, in 2008 Saudi Arabia’s influential Al-Waleed bin Talal Al-Saud paid for a $13 million Centre for Islamic Studies, also at Cambridge, [407] 99. The Daily Telegraph , 6 January 2008. and provided comparable funding for setting up the Prince Al-Waleed Bin Talal Centre of Islamic Studies at Edinburgh University. Most symbolic perhaps, is the Oxford Centre of Islamic Studies, which is a ‘recognised independent centre of the University of Oxford’. Founded in 1985, it has a substantial new building nearing completion and many endowed fellowships. Although some of its funding has come from British and US entities and other parts of the Islamic world, the bulk of the funding is believed to originate in the Gulf monarchies. Saudi Arabia alone is believed to have already donated about $30 million to the centre. [408] 100. National Observer , No. 81, December 2009.

Although not a university as such, Britain’s Sandhurst Academy — the elite training school for Britain’s military and the alma mater for several current Gulf ruling family members — has also been receiving substantial donations. In 2009, for example, the UAE was reported to have financed the building of a new hall of residence at the academy to house a hundred cadets. [409] 101. The National , 14 May 2009. Tellingly, the following day it was announced by Britain’s ambassador to the UAE that the Queen’s Household Cavalry would perform at Abu Dhabi’s International Hunting and Equestrian Exhibition later that year — the first overseas display ever performed by the squadron. He also went on to state that ‘The fact is that there is no relationship the United Kingdom has with countries in the Middle East that is more important to us than that with United Arab Emirates’ while a senior British military personality stated that ‘I think that anything we can do to cement the relations between Abu Dhabi and the UK is a good thing’. [410] 102. Gulf News , 15 May 2009.

Similar, although often smaller donations, have been made to universities in other parts of Western Europe and the Commonwealth. At the Australian National University, for example, there exists the Sheikh Hamdan bin Rashid Al-Maktoum Senior Lectureship at the Centre for Arab and Islamic Studies, funded by Dubai’s deputy ruler. In Canada, at McMaster University, there exists the Sharjah Chair in Global Islam, funded by Sharjah’s ruler. And in France, at Sciences-Po, a five year KFAS-funded Kuwait Programme has been running since 2007—much like the KFAS-LSE programme. Such funding has found its way into US universities, too, but the US has historically been a more troublesome recipient given the relative influence of its Israel lobby, which has on occasion sought to block such gifts. In 2000, for example, the Harvard University staff and student body signed a petition to reject an offer of an endowed professorship in Islamic studies from Abu Dhabi’s ruler on the grounds that a think-tank linked to the ruling family — the Zayed Centre for Co-ordination and Follow-Up — was allegedly promoting anti-Semitism and that there were well-documented human rights abuses in the UAE. The original plan for the professorship, which would have been named after the ruler, was to have the usual broad focus, thus allowing the incumbent to circumvent discussion of the Gulf monarchies. [411] 103. According to a Harvard Divinity School press release from 15 September 2000 the appointee was to focus on ‘broad teachings on the history, tenets, and practice of the Islamic faith and their implications for local and global societies’ and provide ‘leadership and direction for the wider, interdisciplinary program of Islamic Studies’. Similarly in 2007 the University of Connecticut pulled out of a relationship with Dubai for much the same reasons. [412] 104. The University of Connecticut had planned to open a branch campus in Dubai, but pulled out on the grounds of alleged anti-Semitism. Gulf News , 7 May 2007. Nevertheless significant donations have still been made over the years, with funds from Saudi Arabia having been channelled to the University of Arkansas (which received $27 million for its Middle East Studies Center), and with Cornell University, Rutgers University, Princeton University, and a number of others also receiving donations. The University of Southern California’s Chair in Islamic Thought and Culture, for example, is named after the former Saudi king, Faisal bin Abdul-Aziz Al-Saud, while Georgetown University’s renowned Centre for Muslim-Christian Understanding was renamed the Prince Al-Waleed Bin-Talal Center for Muslim-Christian Understanding following a $20 million gift from Al-Waleed in 2005. This prompted a congressman in 2008 to question whether the centre had ever been critical of the Saudi government. [413] 105. Washington Post , 15 February 2008.

Most recently, in 2011 the College of William and Mary, one of the oldest higher education institutions in the US, accepted a gift from Oman’s ruler to establish an endowed professorship — the Sultan Qaboos bin Said Academic Chair of Middle East Studies. Meanwhile Harvard University now appears to have accepted a $1 million donation from the Abu Dhabi Crown Prince’s Court, despite its earlier rejection of Abu Dhabi ruling family funds. The gift, made out to Harvard’s John F. Kennedy School of Government, has helped set up a graduate training scheme at Harvard for Abu Dhabi’s top public officials, while also helping to ‘advance the mission of the School’s Middle East Initiative, a nexus for convening policymakers and scholars on the region’. Upon signing the agreement, the Abu Dhabi crown prince’s court stated that ‘this… echoes President His Highness Sheikh Khalifa Bin Zayed Al Nahyan’s steadfast belief that the progress of nations is built on education, and Crown Prince His Highness General Sheikh Muhammad bin Zayed Al-Nahyan’s unwavering commitment to education and the constant development of the future ranks of leaders’. [414] 106. Harvard University press release, 29 September 2010.

In an almost mirror image of the funding of cultural institutions strategy, the Gulf monarchies’ funding of Western universities and research programmes has now also been taking place in reverse, with several leading US and British higher education institutions having been invited to set up branch campuses in the region. It is important to differentiate, however, between those Western universities (usually mid-or low-ranking institutions) that have set up campuses in free zone operations — such as those in Dubai’s Knowledge Village — which have sought commercial success and have usually not received financial inducements from the governments involved, [415] 107. For example Michigan State University which closed down its campus in Dubai in 2008 after serious financial losses. New York Times , 27 March 2012. and those higher ranked institutions that have been building much larger, more lavish campuses — most notably in Abu Dhabi and Qatar. It is the latter category of universities which matter, as these are receiving massive funding from the governments in question and are now tied in to these monarchies’ soft power strategies. After all, if a monarchy can claim to have a working and highly visible relationship with a big brand university from one of the world’s most established democracies, one with a powerful military, then any reputational price that is being paid — no matter how high — is certainly deemed to be a wise investment. In Abu Dhabi both New York University and La Sorbonne have established operations, with one of Abu Dhabi government’s key personalities now sitting on the former’s board of trustees back in New York. [416] 108. Khaldun Khalifa Al-Mubarak, the chairman of Abu Dhabi’s Executive Affairs Authority and in some respects the crown prince’s right hand man. While in Qatar a whole host of universities are establishing themselves in ‘Education City’—a giant complex funded by the Qatar Foundation, the aforementioned vehicle of the ruler’s wife. Described as ‘five star universities imported profectus in totum from abroad’, [417] 109. Fromherz, Allen J., Qatar: A Modern History (London: IB Tauris, 2012), p. 2. these currently include Georgetown University, Texas A&M University, Virginia Commonwealth University, the Weill Cornell Medical College, Carnegie Mellon University, Northwestern University, and University College London. In many cases, with generous salaries to offer, they have attracted leading academics in their given specialities. It is difficult to ascertain the real running costs of these campuses; however it is likely that Education City’s total cost is about $33 billion dollars, with the individual campuses costing between $100 and $200 million each. [418] 110. As reported by the Qatar-based management consultancy firm Almaras. While there are very few UAE national students attending NYU [419] 111. In the 2011 academic year only ten of the 161 NYU Abu Dhabi students were UAE nationals. Khaleej Times , 20 September 2011. or La Sorbonne in Abu Dhabi, [420] 112. La Sorbonne claims to have 33 per cent of its student body being UAE nationals. New York Times , 27 March 2012. there are at least a modest number of Qatari nationals attending the various Education City institutions. [421] 113. Northwestern, for example, claims to have 36 per cent of its student body being Qatar nationals. New York Times , 27 March 2012. However, most students are expatriates (either those from families resident in the Gulf states or the wider region or, in Abu Dhabi’s case, those flown in on very generous scholarships), [422] 114. NYU Abu Dhabi students, if accepted, are offered full fees, accommodation, flights, and a $2000 allowance. Bloomberg , 15 September 2010. and with the exception of Georgetown University [423] 115. Georgetown Qatar’s Center for International and Regional Studies has convened a number of international workshops in recent years which have focused on the Gulf monarchies. These have discussed the region’s political economy, the nuclear question, international relations, and migrant labour. It is notable, however, that discussions on political reform, human rights, or democracy in the Gulf monarchies have not been held. very little academic attention is currently being paid to the Gulf monarchies themselves — especially in the field of political science.