Qatar: Small State, Big Politics (12 page)

One of the key lessons to be drawn here is that small states cannot always be relegated to the margins of power politics. With traditional conceptions of power—whether revolving around population size and military strength, or having to do with the appeal of cultural values and products—no longer adequately describing the forces that influence international politics, we cannot assume that small state are invariably on the receiving end of power and influence. Power and influence may manifest themselves in ways that are not always readily observable and apparent. They may be exercised from behind the scenes, arise from a combination of resources and opportunities, and accrue over time as a result of calculated or ad hoc moves that capitalize on preferential positioning in the worlds of global finance and diplomacy. As such, the central resources for the exercise of this type of power become a clear vision of how to achieve preferred positions in institutions that are consequential on a global scale, or at regional levels, or within the domestic arenas of countries; the drive, determination, and situational opportunities of achieving such positions; and the wherewithal and the financial resources necessary to do so. For achieving these objectives, a country’s small size is of little or no hindrance at all. What matter are vision, drive, and financial means.

Neither, it seems, is democracy a prerequisite for achieving a status of power. Nye correctly asserts that how a country conducts its affairs domestically becomes part and parcel of its overall attraction and appeal to those looking at it from the outside.
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That may indeed be the case for the exercise and appeal of soft power. And, assuming that democracy is a universally sought-after value, democratic countries are on the whole more likely to have greater soft power than nondemocratic ones. But insofar as subtle power is concerned, streamlined decision-making processes and more centralized leadership are likely to give political leaders greater agility and responsiveness to emerging circumstances and opportunities as they develop regionally and globally. Particularly in a country with a largely depoliticized population as Qatar, where domestic pressures on the state for political accountability and representation are conspicuous in their absence, lack of democracy has actually served as an asset in the exercise of subtle power rather than a hindrance.

The flip side of the coin is equally valid. Just because a state may be small and nimble, undemocratic, and wealthy, it does not inevitably emerge as a powerful actor in global affairs, or, for that matter, a necessarily consequential actor in international and regional politics. Singapore and Hong Kong both fit the bill, as do, to a lesser extent, Taiwan, which is a quasi-democracy, and Kuwait, whose designation as democratic would be a disservice to the notion.
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These countries may have the resources and the potential for the exercise of subtle power in international affairs. But the missing ingredient in each case is the purposive drive by state leaders to transform potential into actual power. Size may not matter, but agency does.

In this sense, in Qatar’s determined drive to capitalize on its comparative advantage in terms of its resources, its location, and even its size, the sheikhdom stands apart from comparable countries in the Persian Gulf region as well as in the rest of the Middle East. That Qatar is purposefully trying to redraw the geostrategic map of the Persian Gulf and the Middle East through resort to subtle power is not in doubt. What remains unanswered is the extent to which the Qatari drive is sustainable in the long run, especially in light of its domestic social makeup, with some 85 percent of the country’s residents being noncitizens, and a state structure that resembles a family-run business. The country’s location in an ever-changing and notoriously unpredictable region also introduces several imponderable variables. For example, will there once again be a militarily powerful Iraq capable of force-projection within the Persian Gulf region and beyond? What does the future hold for Iran in terms of its chronically fluid domestic politics and its role and position both in its own neighborhood and beyond? Closer to home, will Bahrain’s aborted Arab Spring reignite again, and if so will there be consequences for others in proximity of the divided kingdom? These and countless similar questions cast shadows over the long-term prospects of Qatar’s continued ascent as an emerging regional and global power. For now, however, it seems that the small sheikhdom is indeed succeeding in playing a leading and influential role in both the Persian Gulf and the Middle East.

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Competing with Bahrain and the United Arab Emirates (UAE) as the Persian Gulf’s most attractive business destination and entrepôt, Qatar has managed to carve out an impressive niche for itself in global finance and trade. More important, Qatari leaders have assumed an extraordinarily active diplomatic profile that more than anything else is designed to enhance the country’s stature and diplomatic standing. While Qatar’s “maverick” diplomacy is a product of its hedging, its diplomatic hyperactivism is meant to enhance its branding and soft power. Whereas hedging may have given Qatar self-confidence insofar as its survivability and resilience are concerned, branding and soft power have brought the country visibility in the commercial and diplomatic arenas. In doing so, state elites have enjoyed considerable policymaking leeway and autonomy from potential constraints inside and outside of the country.

This autonomy is rooted in two distinct yet complementary sources: massive revenues accrued from hydrocarbon exports, specifically from liquefied natural gas; and elite institutional cohesion, thus streamlining policymaking decisions and ensuring political and diplomatic agility. This agility is further reinforced by Qatar’s comparative advantage in relation to its neighbors, compared to whom it has an upper hand in one or more key areas: more politically stable compared to Bahrain; more cohesive compared to the UAE; more aggressively self-assured compared to Oman; and far more effective at branding compared to Egypt, Saudi Arabia, or Iran. Providing the larger background and context to all this is the Al Jazeera news channel and its extraordinary influence across the Arab world, bestowing on Qatar a unique source of soft power against which most other competitors have proven far less effective.

Compared to the other regional actors in the Persian Gulf, Qatari diplomacy is characterized by an unusual level of hyperactivism. This is partly due to the built-in agility of the state and the comparative efficiency of its foreign policymaking process. In addition to the structural dynamics that enable greater state responsiveness to emerging opportunities, there are also the goals and priorities of policymakers that distinguish Qatar from the rest of the pack. For one reason or another, none of Qatar’s regional counterparts engage in quite the same level of diplomatic activism.

A detailed treatment of the foreign policies of other states of the Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC)—particularly the smaller states of Oman, the UAE, Bahrain, and Kuwait—is beyond the scope of this chapter. At the broadest level, however, none engage in hedging, at least not nearly to the same extent that Qatar does as a regular feature of its foreign policy. Insofar as the UAE is concerned, the country’s primary focus has been
economic
rather than
political
development, with policymakers across the Emirates placing much greater priority on economics rather than politics or diplomacy.
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Within the context of a highly pragmatic diplomacy conducive to entrepreneurial pursuits, the country has long identified Iran as a primary threat to its security, a perception Emirati leaders shared about Iraq prior to 2003.
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As such hedging has not been perceived as a viable option, at least between Iran and the US camp, and the UAE has therefore placed itself squarely within the American security orbit.
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Similar concerns have shaped the foreign policies of Bahrain and Kuwait, for both of whom the United States and Saudi Arabia have been seen as primary protectors. Comparatively resource-poor, Sunni minority-ruled Bahrain’s solid security alliance with Saudi Arabia and the United States can be explained on structural grounds.
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Conversely, Kuwait is not resource-poor—by 2010 having foreign assets in excess of $277 billion.
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Yet its leaders have opted for close alliance with Saudi Arabia and the United States instead of hedging. This is as much a product of policy preferences by Kuwaiti leaders as it is derived from the country’s geographic proximity to primary sources of perceived threats, namely Iran and Iraq. Of the group, Oman has pursued a much more nuanced, finely calibrated, independent foreign policy in which close security cooperation with the West and the GCC is balanced with continuously cordial relations with Iran.
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This is a reflection of the preferences of Oman’s ruler, Sultan Qaboos, and the regional and global roles he has envisioned for his country since assuming power in 1970.
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By way of comparison, it is important to note that Qatar’s foreign policy in the contemporary era has been informed by four general sets of dynamics. The first set has had to do with the history of the country’s relationship with Saudi Arabia going back to the preindependence era and into the 1970s and 1980s, during which the former emir, Shaikh Khalifa bin Hamad Al Thani (r. 1972–1995), sought to guarantee his country’s safety by seeking shelter in the Saudi security umbrella. In return, the emir frequently paid homage to his Saudi protectors, thus alienating younger Al Thanis who resented their country’s treatment as a perceived feudal vassal by the Saudis.
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In the meanwhile, the first Gulf War exposed the Saudis’ inability to protect themselves and their allies from regional threats, driving home the need to more firmly anchor Qatar’s security within the US protective shield. Hence a second dynamic came to influence Qatari foreign policy, namely an increasingly in-depth reliance on the United States since the early 1990s to provide military protection against external threats. The imperative of US-provided military security directly touched on a third concern of Qatar’s foreign policy, namely the nature of the country’s relationship with a revolutionary—and often threatened and thus unpredictable—Iran. At the same time as it sought to balance its relations with Iran and the United States, Qatar decided to put its massive wealth to use to break out of the Saudi shadow. It aimed to compete with other regional upstarts such as the UAE, Bahrain, and Kuwait, and—through initiatives such as Al Jazeera television and conflict resolution efforts—to make its presence felt regionally and globally. The last aspect of Qatari foreign policy—its financially fueled diplomatic activism—has enabled it to behave quite unlike most other states of its size and stature. As a small state in a rough neighborhood, Qatari leaders have crafted foreign policy with the country’s physical and political security paramount in their minds. In the process, they have transformed survival strategies into sources of influence and perhaps even power.

Qatari foreign policy behavior offers a textbook example of hedging. In fact, Qatar’s successful employment of hedging, buttressed by an efficient and streamlined foreign policymaking process and considerable self-confidence, has resulted in the state emerging as one of the most influential players in the Persian Gulf region.

Qatari Foreign Policy Hedging

Located at the mouth of the Straits of Hormuz, at the heart of the Persian Gulf waterway, Qatar has found itself between two belligerent powerhouses—Iran and the United States—not shy of frequent bellicosity. Although military tensions between the two powers declined markedly after the end of President Bush’s tenure in office, the possibility of an open eruption of hostilities between the United States and the Islamic Republic remains ever-present, especially as the animosity and the resulting mutual threats of military action between Iran and Israel show no signs of abating. The fact that tens of thousands of American troops are in the immediate vicinity of Iran, and that Qatar houses one of the largest US airbases in the world, keeps tensions between Iran and the United States high and perpetuates Qatar’s perilous position in the eye of the storm should one erupt.
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The warnings implicit in Iran’s repeated assurances that its response to any American or Israeli attacks will be decisive and far-reaching has not been lost on regional leaders, especially those whose countries house US troops and equipment.
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Qatari leaders perceive another potential threat to their rule, this time from transnational identities in general and Shi‘ism in particular. In this sense the ruling Al Thani family is not that different from the Persian Gulf’s other ruling families in its perception of the primary threat to regime stability—the salience of transnational identities that transcend relatively recent, and largely arbitrary, national borders. Gregory Gause has identified these transnational identities—Arab, Muslim, Shi‘a, Sunni, tribal, etc.—as “the most important and distinctive factor in the Gulf regional security complex” because they are “seen as threats by leaders to their own regimes’ stability.”
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The Iranian Revolution heightened Shi‘a self-awareness and identity across the Persian Gulf and the Arabian Peninsula, from Iraq in the north to Yemen in the south. Correspondingly, the revolution magnified the sense of concern and fear that each of the region’s Sunni-ruled states felt toward its own Shi‘a population. No sooner had fears of a spillover of Iranian revolutionary fervor subsided then the political rise of Shi‘a politicians and parties in the chaotic politics of post-Saddam Iraq renewed regional fears of another supposed Shi‘a revival. Soon after the fall of Baghdad, scholars and policymakers the world over began wondering whether “the Shi‘a revival in Iraq may well lead to other regime changes in the region.”
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The ensuing state reactions ranged from one of watchful neglect to outright and violent repression, in Oman and in Bahrain, and Saudi Arabia, respectively. Along with the UAE, Oman, and Kuwait, Qatar represented one of the few Gulf Arab states that chose to monitor and scrutinize but not repress its Shi‘a population.
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In Qatar, the relationship between the ruling family and the country’s Shi‘a minority has generally been a positive one. In fact, unlike most other parts of the Arab world, the Shi‘a are comparatively well integrated into Qatari society, have never been among the rulers’ opponents, and, as the career of the long-time Finance and Economy minister Yousef Kamal (1998–) exemplifies, they often participate in the various institutions of the state at the highest levels.
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Qatari Shi‘as represent some of the country’s wealthiest families, with the Al-Fardans and their empire of luxury car dealerships, real estate holdings, and multiple other commercial ventures being a prime example.
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The Al-Fardans and most of the other Shi‘a immigrated to Qatar from the Iranian side of the Persian Gulf either at the end of the Qajar era in the late 1800s or around the 1960s and 1970s. Most Qatari Shi‘a either trace their ancestry back to Iran, or they are popularly seen—at times mistakenly—as having Iranian roots.
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Tellingly, until its renovation for the 2006 Asian Games, Doha’s main bazaar was known as the Iranian Souq. Despite their integration into Qatari society, the state appears reluctant to test the loyalty of its Shi‘a population if the need arises. Interestingly, the Shi‘a presence in the country, unofficially estimated at around 15 to 20 percent of the total population,
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is not captured in any of the state’s official statistical publications.
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In fact, insofar as Doha’s Shi‘a mosques are concerned, the state keeps a distant, respectful, but nonetheless watchful eye on them. Although Qatari Shi‘a are not popularly perceived of as an Iranian fifth column—as they sometimes are in Dubai, for example—they do figure into state calculations concerning domestic policies and international relations. The state’s inability to predict the voting preferences of the Shi‘a, for example, is often cited as one of the reasons for indefinite delay so far in holding elections and convening a parliament as stipulated in the 2004 constitution.
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In foreign policy, the Shi‘a factor figures prominently with regard to the country’s relations with Iran.

Qatar, then, needs to craft its foreign policy with deliberate care and caution, with an eye toward the Iranian behemoth in the north, the Saudi giant in the south, and the American empire that is omnipresent. A small state with no meaningful armed forces or other military force projection abilities of its own, Qatar finds itself between a rock and a hard place. Its leaders firmly committed to remaining within the Western economic and diplomatic orbits while doggedly unwilling to abandon those causes or entities—such as the Hamas or Ahmadinejad’s Iran—to whom the West strenuously objects.
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The three other smaller sheikhdoms of the Persian Gulf also find themselves facing a similar predicament. But each of these three has given more weight to the security alliance with the United States on these and other contentious issues rather than to try to proactively balance out countervailing forces and agendas.
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Conversely, Qatar has chosen to pursue a carefully calibrated policy of hedging—taking big bets one way and smaller one another—particularly when it comes to the two archenemies of Iran and the United States. Where its safety is concerned, Qatar has placed itself firmly at the mercy of the United States. At the same time, it actively maintains cordial relations with actors with interests inimical to those of the United States, chief among which are Iran and the region’s various shades of Islamists. The US government, or at least its diplomats in Doha, are aware of this, predicting in 2010 that Qatar will continue to support what they perceive as “problematic players” such as Hamas, Hezbollah, and Syria, while at the same time maintaining close ties with both the US and the GCC.
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“Qatar will continue to pragmatically pursue relations with Iran,” claimed a US embassy cable in 2010, “pleasing as many players as possible.”
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