Finance of the United Arab Emirates
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The Central Bank of the United Arab Emirates was established in 1980, with Dubai and Abu Dhabi each depositing half of their revenues in the institution. The bank also issues the UAE dirham, the emirates’ national currency. There are commercial, investment, development, foreign, and domestic banks as well as a bankers’ association. In 1991 the worldwide operations of Abu Dhabi’s Bank of Credit and Commerce International (BCCI), partly owned by the ruling family, were closed down after corrupt practices were uncovered, and the emirate subsequently created the Abu Dhabi Free Zone Authority to develop a new financial center. The emirates’ first official stock exchange, the Dubai Financial Market (Sūq Dubayy al-Mālī; DFM), was opened in 2000, followed by the Dubai International Financial Exchange in 2005.
The United Arab Emirates is a leading force in the development of modern Islamic finance, financial practices that comply with Sharīʿah laws of transaction. Dubai Islamic Bank (DIB) was incorporated in 1975 as the world’s first commercial Islamic bank. As more Islamic banks opened and the popularity of Islamic finance increased, the government began passing legislation regulating Islamic finance in 1985. In 2007 the DFM became the first stock exchange to comply with the standards of Islamic finance. Because the United Arab Emirates is an international financial and commercial hub, its Islamic financial institutions have become a particularly attractive market for Islamic organizations worldwide.
Meanwhile, the United Arab Emirates’ geographic location, high traffic in international business, and liberal business and finance regulations have made financial institutions in the United Arab Emirates an attractive target for money laundering, terrorist financing, and other illicit financial activity. This problem is believed to be exacerbated by the presence of informal financial networks and practices (known in the Arab world as ḥawālah) originating in the region’s Silk Road trade networks that predate formal finance regulation. As such, the country has made significant efforts in the 21st century to tighten regulation, combat illegal financial activity, and push ḥawālah networks into the formal market.
Trade
Trade has long been important to Dubai and Sharjah. Even before the discovery of oil, Dubai’s prosperity was assured by its role as the Persian Gulf’s leading entrepôt. (It was known especially as a route for smuggling gold into India.) In 1995 the United Arab Emirates joined the World Trade Organization and since then has developed a number of free-trade zones, technology parks, and modern ports in order to attract trade. The large free-trade zone of Port Jebel Ali was developed during the 1980s and has done much to attract foreign manufacturing industries interested in producing goods for export.
Exports are dominated by petroleum and natural gas. Imports consist primarily of machinery and transport equipment, gold, precious stones, and foods. Major trading partners include China, India, Japan, and the United States. A large amount of trade is in reexports to neighboring gulf countries.
Services
The service sector, including public administration, defense, tourism, and construction, has played an increasing role in the economy since the late 1990s, especially as the country attempted to attract tourists and foreign businesses. In order to develop its tourism and business sectors, the government has encouraged major infrastructure projects, especially construction of accommodation and transportation systems—hotels, resorts, restaurants, and airport expansion.
Labor and taxation
Expatriate workers constitute about nine-tenths of the labor force, and more in some private sector areas. Conditions for these workers can often be harsh, and at the beginning of the 21st century the state did not allow workers to organize. Like other Gulf states that depend heavily on foreign workers, the emirates have attempted to reduce the number of foreign employees—in a program called Emiratization—by providing incentives for businesses to hire Emirati nationals.
In the early 21st century the expatriate labor issue persisted despite landmark developments. New laws were instituted that ban work during the heat of the midday hours in summer and that prohibit the use of children (largely expatriate) as jockeys in camel races. In addition, a number of strikes and protests in 2005 by unpaid expatriate laborers against a major construction and development company were resolved in favor of the workers. Early in 2006 the government announced the drafting of a new law permitting the formation of unions and wage bargaining; later that year, however, it instead passed a law permitting the deportation of striking workers, and worker organization remained illegal. The government gradually granted additional protections and rights to workers over the years, though it was not until 2017 that the United Arab Emirates’ labor laws met the minimum standards of the International Labour Organization.
There is no income tax in the United Arab Emirates, and corporate taxes are only levied on oil companies and foreign banks. The bulk of government revenue is generated from nontax incomes, largely from the sale of petroleum products, but the government has begun supplementing its revenue with consumption taxes. An excise tax on carbonated beverages, energy drinks, and tobacco products was implemented in 2017. In 2018 the United Arab Emirates, in coordination with other Gulf countries, implemented a value-added tax for most goods and services.
Transportation and telecommunications
An excellent road system, developed in the late 1960s and ’70s, carries motor vehicles throughout the country and links it to its neighbors. The addition of a tunnel to the bridges connecting Dubai city and the nearby commercial center of Deira facilitates the movement of traffic across the small saltwater inlet that separates them. The cities of Abu Dhabi, Dubai, Sharjah, Ras al-Khaimah, Fujairah, and Al-Ain are served by international airports. A second airport opened to serve Dubai in 2010. The older airport at Dubai is one of the busiest in the Middle East. The federation has a number of large and modern seaports, including the facilities at Dubai’s Port Rāshid, which is serviced by a vast shipyard, and Port Jebel Ali, situated in one of the largest man-made harbors in the world and one of the busiest ports in the gulf. Of the smaller harbors on the Gulf of Oman, Sharjah has a modest port north of the city. In September 2009 the first portion of a remote-controlled rapid-transit metro line—the Gulf region’s first metro system—began operations in Dubai. Additional public transit projects, including monorail service in Abu Dhabi and linkages to the Saudi rail networks, have been planned as well. Construction of a railway connecting all seven emirates began in 2012; the section between Abu Dhabi and Dubai was completed in 2022. A Hyperloop system is likewise planned to connect Abu Dhabi and Dubai.
The state-controlled Emirates Telecommunications Corporation, known as Etisalat (Ittiṣālāt), is a major telecommunications provider in the country. Radio, television, telephone, and cellular telephone service is prevalent and widely used. In 2000 Etisalat began providing Internet service, and the emirates soon had one of the largest subscriber bases per capita in the Middle East. In 2005 a second licensed operator, Emirates Integrated Telecommunications Company (du), began providing telephone and high-speed Internet service, and in 2006 they reached an agreement with Etisalat to link their networks.
Government and society
Constitutional framework
The highest governmental authority is the Federal Supreme Council, which is composed of the quasi-hereditary rulers of the seven emirates. The president and vice president of the federation are elected for five-year terms by the Supreme Council from among its members. The president appoints a prime minister and a cabinet. The unicameral legislature, the Federal National Council, is an advisory body made up of 40 members appointed by the individual emirates for two-year terms. A provisional constitution was ratified in 1971 and was made permanent in 1996 by the Supreme Council.
Local government
The United Arab Emirates has a federal system of government, and any powers not assigned to the federal government by the constitution devolve to the constituent emirates. Generally, the distribution of power within the federal system is similar to those in other such systems—for example, the federation government administers foreign policy, determines broad economic policy, and runs the social welfare system—and a significant amount of power is exercised at the individual emirate level, notably in Abu Dhabi and Dubai.
Justice
The constitution calls for a legal code based on Sharīʿah (Islamic law). In practice, the judiciary blends Western and Islamic legal principles. At the federal level the judicial branch consists of the Union Supreme Court and several courts of first instance: the former deals with emirate-federal or inter-emirate disputes and crimes against the state, and the latter cover administrative, commercial, and civil disputes between individuals and the federal government. Other legal matters are left to local judicial bodies.
Political process
On the whole, leadership in each emirate falls to that emirate’s most politically prominent tribe (an agnatic lineage group composed of a number of related families), and the paramount leader, the emir, is selected by the notables of the ruling tribe from among their number—this is usually, but not always, a son of the previous emir. Each tribe, however, has its own leader, or sheikh, and a certain degree of political pluralism is necessary to maintain the ruling family’s position. This is largely facilitated by the institution called the majlis, the council meeting. During the majlis the leader hears grievances, mediates disputes, and disperses largesse, and, in theory, anyone under the leader’s rule must be granted access to the majlis.
There are no political parties in the emirates, and, until the beginning of the 21st century, no elections were held. An electoral college meets every four years to select half of the membership of the advisory Federal National Council; the other half is designated by appointment. Beginning with the 2019 elections, half of the council members must be women. The electoral college has expanded rapidly: it consisted of fewer than 7,000 citizens when the first election was held in 2006; by the third election in 2015 the electoral college included more than 224,000, about one-third of voting-age citizens; and by 2019 the number had expanded to 337,000 and for the first time included slightly more women than men.
Security
The emirates’ defense forces were merged in 1976, but the forces in Dubai and Abu Dhabi have retained some independence. The Supreme Council has made the right to raise armed forces a power of the national government. In 2006 the Supreme National Security Council, which included the president, prime minister, and chief of staff of the armed forces, among others, was formed to deal with the emirates’ security needs. The number of uniformed military personnel is high for a country the size of the emirates, as is total military spending per capita. Most personnel are in the army, but the emirates maintain a small navy and air force, and a large number of expatriates serve in the military.
Health and welfare
Hospital services are free to nationals, and medical services are concentrated in Dubai and Abu Dhabi, which have numerous hospitals, child welfare clinics, and other health facilities. In the late 1990s the emirates began privatizing health care, which led to a significant rise in the number of hospitals and physicians. The government subsidizes health insurance for its citizens, and thus public spending on health care has also increased alongside the increase in privatization.
Housing
A considerable proportion of government spending, at both the federal and local levels, is devoted to constructing and financing housing and to developing civil infrastructure such as power, water, and waste removal. The federation government makes housing available to citizens through direct low-interest loans, subsidies on rental units, and grants of housing at no charge, and thousands of Emiratis have taken advantage of these programs.
Education
Education in the emirates is free and mandatory at the primary and secondary levels for all children from age 6 to 18. There are a number of fine institutions of higher education in the emirates, and both boys and girls attend public school. Female students far outnumber males at the United Arab Emirates University, which opened at Al-Ain in 1977, and at the Higher Colleges of Technology system (1988) throughout the emirates. Zayed University (1998) was established to provide women with technical education, though in 2008 it began admitting men as well. Overall, women make up approximately 70 percent of university graduates at Emirati universities, although men are much more likely than women to go abroad for university study. By the 2010s the vast majority of the population was literate.
Cultural life
The cultural traditions of the United Arab Emirates are rooted in Islam and resonate with the wider Arab world, especially with the neighboring states of the Persian Gulf. The federation has experienced the impact of Islamic resurgence, though the practice of Islam in the emirates is generally less austere than in Saudi Arabia. Tribal identities in the United Arab Emirates remain fairly strong, despite urbanization and the presence of a large expatriate community, and the family is still considered the strongest and most cohesive social unit.
