Globalization and Economy in the Arab Countries of the Persian Gulf

Increasing importance of economic globalization and efforts at leading statist and command economies towards free market economies in spite of the presence of rentier economies in the Persian Gulf region can illuminate many regional issues. This paper deals with the economic conditions in Kuwait, the United Arab Emirates, Qatar, Saudi Arabia, Oman and Bahrain, using the rentier state analytical framework and an analysis of the impacts of globalization on the regional economic situation in four aspects including the reduction in the size of the state, economic liberalization, privatization and attraction of foreign investments. The hypothesis of the paper includes that the Arab states of the Persian Gulf, in spite of huge rentier revenues have moved to reduce the size of the state and to establish a free market economy as affected by the economic globalization.