Khaleeji-Capital: Class-Formation and Regional Integration in the Middle-East Gulf
The countries of the Gulf Cooperation Council (Bahrain, Kuwait, Oman, Qatar, Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates) are most typically understood from the perspective of their position as the world’s key oil- and gas-producing states. This essay explores the largely-overlooked processes of class-formation in the GCC, and argues that very profound tendencies of capital-internationalisation are occurring alongside Gulf regional integration. The circuits of capital are increasingly cast at the pan-Gulf scale, and a capitalist class – described as khaleeji-capital – is emerging around the accumulation-opportunities presented within the new regional space. The formation of khaleeji-capital represents the development of a class increasingly aligned with the interests of imperialism and has important ramifications for understanding the region’s political economy.