5.1 Introduction

Water scarcity may have adverse effects that include undoing social peace, further disturbing and degrading “natural” systems by encouraging the use of low-quality water for irrigation, and may result in greater aquifer contamination. Suppressed crop yields can result from such practices, and farmers may react by removing marginal lands from cultivation. Disturbing and degrading natural systems also increases the likelihood of irreparable damage to aquifers and soils over time, and the possibility of triggering water conflicts (Al-Jamal and Schiffler, Reference Al-Jamal, Schiffler, Jagannathan, Mohamed and Kremer2009, p. 481) (Figure 5.1). The confluence of environmental, geopolitical, economic, and demographic factors made desalination technology the destiny for the people of the Gulf states. Hydrocarbon wealth facilitated this hydrological independence, but it comes with its own set of risks. This volume argues that the Gulf states face many threats to their water and food security, which require a comprehensive approach, one that embodies technological, political, as well as socioeconomic modifications to current policies that influence foreign workers and water management. It is the socioeconomic reforms that are likely to be the most transformative, and hence controversial.

Figure 5.1 Countries’ divergent responses to water scarcity

Despite the popular image of the Arabian Peninsula as a desolate landscape of endless sand dunes, the region once contained a large number of oases, as well as isolated and sometimes contiguous areas with fertile soils. In Oman, most people are not nomads but “live in towns and villages along the wadi-beds”, and agriculture has the potential to prosper “as irrigation is nearly everywhere possible” (Zwemer, Reference Zwemer1907, p. 601). Writing in 1907, Zwemer (Reference Zwemer1907, p. 603) observes that eastern Arabia up to Qatif, near Dammam, “could be a veritable paradise under a stable government. It is a land of streams and fountains, subterranean but inexhaustible; and even now, with primitive schemes of irrigation, has wide fields of rice and wheat and extensive date-orchards.” In 1951, Douglas D. Crary, an assistant professor of geography at the University of Michigan, Ann Arbor, lamented the popular media's misrepresentation of the Arab Gulf. Crary rejected the media portrayal of the Gulf as a place where a “little American know-how” and a “handful of Texas farmers” who, quoting an American official, taught “the Arabs how to farm” have produced “a land of plenty” that made even the “the sands of Arabia … bloom again”. The author then states, “practically everything Americans know about the basic principles of irrigated agriculture was known to the Arabs two thousand years ago.” Since the first millennium BCE, Arabs and other natives living in the Fertile Crescent and western Arabian Peninsula had developed very complex methods for capturing, channeling, and using runoff (Sherratta, Reference Sherratta1980). Crary (Reference Crary1951, pp. 366–367) credits Americans with the ability to “apply mechanized power, the use of fertilizers, seed selection, and other new knowledge to an age-old agricultural system and thus point the way to increased yields and somewhat greater self-sufficiency. This, in essence, is the objective of the current Saudi Arabian agricultural program.”

An agricultural development project planned “along Western lines” was started in 1937 at Al Kharj, around 100 kilometers southeast of Riyadh. For this program, the Saudi Arabian government imported pumps and mechanics from Egypt and Iraq, a farmer from Palestine, and purchased six tractors. The project took place under the supervision of farmers from Qasim. “It is an interesting fact that this first use of power-driven farm machinery in Saudi Arabia took place before Americans had anything to do with the agricultural program” (Crary, Reference Crary1951, p. 367). It is also interesting that the Saudi government at that time relied on the science, engineering, and farming skills of fellow Arabs, something that has become much less common in recent decades.

Crary (Reference Crary1951, p. 383) astutely observes “the critical and most frightening aspect of the expansion of agriculture in Saudi Arabia is the relationship between mechanical power and the potential water supply.” He adds that the development of large-scale agricultural farms increases the pressure on water supplies and observes that this phenomenon is so common that, in some arable areas, an “enormous amount of power has recently been applied to obtaining water from the ground, and already ground-water levels have sunk.” Saudi Arabia then started to have power-operated drilling rigs and diesel-driven pumps “delivering a thousand gallons of water a minute” while donkey wells could only deliver two or three gallons in the same amount of time (Crary Reference Crary1951, p. 383). Technological diffusion brought the mechanical pump and modern drilling techniques to the Saudis in the 1950s and helped them, especially the farmers, enjoy better lives and more steady incomes through secure yields from irrigated farming. However, this very technology had an almost immediate adverse effect on the water table. Crary (Reference Crary1951, p. 383) concludes his study by warning, “should the water supply fail, Saudi Arabia would return to the desolation whence it came.” This 60-year-old observation, while made before the oil boom had transformed the Gulf state, holds true today. At that time, the water supply could have failed if groundwater was exhausted beyond the reach of residents or if the water pump was to break down and could not be repaired or replaced. Today, the continued supply of freshwater from mega desalination plants is central to peace and stability in the Gulf states.

The Gulf states were incentivized to revive farming abroad as a result of regional instability, the politicization of food and trade (e.g. sanctions), and food export restrictions that were imposed by a few countries during the 2008 global food crisis. In the mid to late 1970s, the Arab world was pinning its food security hopes on the massive area of arable land of their fellow Arab country of Sudan. Of this area, only some 10 percent was under cultivation. The United Nations named Sudan (along with Canada and Australia) as being able to help “counteract the world food shortage”. Arab countries, especially Saudi Arabia and Kuwait, invested large sums of money to develop Sudan's farmland. The government of Sudan agreed to undertake 100 projects that would, in the span of ten years, supply 40 percent of the Middle East's food imports at a cost that exceeded $6 billion (Kaikati, Reference Kaikati1980, p.122). Subsequently, coups in Sudan and regional political developments undermined that agreement and the food plan was abandoned. Since 2008, the Gulf states’ food security efforts included agricultural investments in Sudan, but went far beyond to include many other countries in Africa and on other continents. Qatar chose the slightly different path of investing in some agricultural corporations in developed countries, and more so in farming-related scientific and technological innovations in an attempt to have some degree of food self-sufficiency. The Gulf states most recent water–food configuration is similar to the behavior of autarkic states that strategically prioritize their efforts at establishing greater levels of self-sufficiency through a certain degree of vertical integration (i.e. acquisition of farmland abroad), and national water-supply systems (i.e. desalination). This effort of partial withdrawal or relative disengagement from the international trade system is intended to offer the Gulf states greater assurances that their food and water-supply venues are more secure.

5.2 Science, engineering, and national security

In 1957, B. K. Blount, British chemist and government administrator of scientific and engineering research, argued that the “decisive factor in the politics of our age is science and its practical applications in engineering projects of all kinds” (Sprout, Reference Sprout1963, p. 205). A country's “systematic application of scientific knowledge and engineering techniques” will help it build its political power and influence. This is dependent on strategic variables, the first being the number of highest-caliber scientists relative to other nations; the creative and bold thinkers who would propose daring projects, and have the capacity to convince politicians and policy makers of their ideas (Sprout, Reference Sprout1963, p. 205). The second variable is the presence of a much larger number of scientists and technologists of ordinary caliber. Finally, the degree of awareness among decision makers of the key role that scientists and new scientific knowledge could play in enhancing the future of the country and their readiness to seek the advice of scientists is also crucial (Sprout, Reference Sprout1963, p. 206). The last point is particularly challenging because if decision makers are not open to research and development, they tend to “underestimate the rate of increase of scientific knowledge and its engineering application” (Sprout, Reference Sprout1963, p. 193).

As noted elsewhere in this book, the Gulf states’ ambitious development projects required them to import guest workers, including professionals, to run many of the specialized infrastructures and to oversee complex engineering projects. However, if a terrorist group in the Gulf states were to behave like the so-called Islamic State in Syria and Iraq in 2014, by beheading foreign workers, host countries would likely experience a significant exodus of expatriates. This could jeopardize the business continuity in vital sectors like oil production and refining, operation of desalination plants, wastewater treatment plants, and the like. Such issues have been on the minds of decision makers who have been sending a growing number of locals to study abroad and specialize in fields related to the continued functioning of their countries’ critical infrastructure. This is a realistic option for Saudi Arabia but not for Qatar; it would be a very ambitious goal for the United Arab Emirates (UAE) and other Gulf states to work towards.

In 2011, King Saud University in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia, initiated the region's first graduate-level degree program in desalination (Alawsat, Reference Asshaykhi2011). Oman hosts the Middle East Desalination Research Center (www.medrc.org), a think tank with a regional scope. Politics, however, has gotten in its way. Given that its creation is related to the yet-unsettled Arab–Israeli conflict, most Gulf states are unenthusiastic towards this internationally funded center. On the other hand, King Saud University actively works with international institutions such as the World Bank, and with various arms of the United Nations such as Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) and the United Nations Development Program (UNDP) on desalination and related environmental issues. For instance, in 2012 the United Nations Educational, Scientific, and Cultural Organization (UNESCO) funded a Water Desalination Research Chair position at Saudi Arabia's King Saud University. This position will focus on planning for the kingdom's water desalination needs in the medium and long terms, and on recommending the most suitable locations and technologies for expanding existing facilities or establishing new ones. The problem is, however, that a very high percentage of nationals leave school at a young age, and that humanities, including theology, continue to attract a large number of majors. Despite its small population size (one million locals), the Dubai-based Knowledge and Human Development Authority reports that some 25 percent of Emirati boys fail to complete high school (Hamdan, Reference Hamdan2013).

Rentier states create national and regional programs that distribute revenues to citizens from natural resources, an act that blurs the distinction between public and the private spheres. This distributive model is evident in the extensive social welfare programs that the Gulf states have for their nationals. In exchange for access to these services, governments expect political acquiescence. Such institutional catering creates a “rentier mentality” (Beblawi, Reference Beblawi1987; Moore and Salloukh, Reference Moore and Salloukh2007). Because of this, Niblock (Reference Niblock2007, pp. 1–2) argues that the government of Saudi Arabia uses its natural resource wealth to coddle the local population who are “living in a cocoon created by apparently unearned income, divorced from the problems facing other peoples”, creating a mindset which “sets a population apart from the global community – creating attitudes and mentalities out of touch with international realities.” The country, he concludes, needs to develop a non-hydrocarbon-based economy.

This rentier mentality is strongest among wealthier countries like Qatar and the UAE, and is relatively weak among poorer ones like Bahrain and Oman. While it is entrenched in Saudi Arabia, it is slowly changing. The existing extensive government programs include subsidies for utilities and water for irrigation, a practice that tends to be quite expensive. Between 1980 and 2005, the Saudi government spent about $85 billion on subsidies for wheat farmers (Jones, Reference Jones2010). Change in Saudi outlook, as mentioned in earlier chapters, can be gleaned by the government's decision to essentially end the wheat-growing program by removing irrigation subsidy for the crop. The new fiscal realities that emerged after oil prices started their downward trend in the fall of 2014 will likely force governments to reduce certain subsidies, especially those that impact guest workers or industries (and largely spare locals).

In 2006, and in an effort to conserve groundwater resources, the government of the UAE phased out its support for the cultivation of the water-thirsty Rhodes grass, the most favored animal fodder in the country, and decided to import different types of hay, which it made available to farmers at subsidized prices (MAF and ICBA, 2012). Gulf News (2012) reported that Rhodes grass consumed more than 59 per cent of the irrigation water used by the emirate of Abu Dhabi each year. And, of the 16,000 farms in this emirate, over 10,000 have already stopped cultivating the grass. Also, an increasing number of farms are installing modern, more efficient irrigation technologies. Buffel grass is replacing some of the Rhodes grass, which means that fodder farmers will use up to 80% less water, depending on the efficiency of irrigation technology that is being used. Buffel grass species, which tolerates poor soil, is indigenous to the Arabian Peninsula and is used as fodder in various countries around the world (Detrie, Reference 145Detrie2011). Also, the UAE is exploring the use of Distichlis spicata, also known as seashore saltgrass, and Sporobolus virginicus, plants that can be used as animal forage or in golf courses, and can thrive on moderately salty water (Drummond, Reference Drummond2011; MAF and ICBA, 2012). Oman is also taking steps to conserve water, especially in the agricultural sector (MAF and ICBA, 2012). The policy changes that Saudi Arabia, the UAE, and Oman have put in place are indicators of the fact that decision makers in the Gulf states have developed a more ecologically-friendly attitude towards water resources management, one that also serves their strategic and security needs. It is important to note that these measures don't require sacrifices of citizens as the vast majorityFootnote ¹ of them are not directly affected.

The cost of desalinating a unit of water has dropped steadily over the years. Between the 1960s and the 2000s, the cost of multi-stage flash (MSF) distillation desalination technology has decreased by an average of 44 percent every ten years (Alkaraghouli et al., Reference Alkaraghouli, Rene and Kazmerski2009). In the future, this impressive price trend is not likely to continue – at least not at the same pace. Global economic downturns and growth in alternative energy sources may put downward pressure on oil prices, impacting the Gulf states’ ability to maintain their high and growing reliance on energy-intensive desalination. This, as well as the finite nature of hydrocarbon resources and Iran's controversial nuclear program, is leading some Gulf states to initiate nuclear programs for purposes that include energy generation and desalination.

Historically, MSF desalination plants were dominant in the Middle East, and the majority of those plants remain operational today. Ten years ago, a World Bank Report (2004a, p. 58) found that the MSF “process is well understood, reliable and has served the Gulf states well. It has given the Gulf states security of supply.” The contemporary security challenge, however, is that many MSF plants have “increasingly taken advantage of economies of scale” (Alkaraghouli et al., Reference Alkaraghouli, Rene and Kazmerski2009). This could pose a security threat because if a mega desalination plant were to fail or break down for an extended period of time, it would create significant social dislocation and political instability.

One of the real threats to water security in the region is a radioactive spill into the waters of the Persian Gulf. This may occur as a result of a natural disaster – for example, the Bushehr nuclear plan is in an active seismic zone – or due to possible military confrontations with Iran regarding its nuclear program. The Carnegie Endowment and the Federation of American Scientists, two American think tanks, described the Bushehr reactor's location at the intersection of three tectonic plates as “ominous”. They also reported that “Iran is the only nuclear state that is not a signatory to the Convention on Nuclear Safety, and its nuclear materials and stockpiles are some of the least secure in the world” (Vaez and Sadjadpour, Reference Vaez and Sadjadpour2013). In the spring of 2013, a 6.3-magnitude earthquake struck some 90 km southeast of the port of Bushehr, where it flattened small villages, killed 37 people, and injured hundreds more. The head of the Islamic state's Atomic Energy Organization said that the quake had “no impact” on the Bushehr nuclear facility, and that it has been “designed to withstand earthquakes of more than 8.0 on the Richter scale” (Torbati, Reference Torbati2013). This was barely reassuring to the Gulf states whose relationship with Iran is one of mutual distrust, verging on animosity.

The security dilemma for the Gulf states is that many of them have taken concrete steps towards the development and use of nuclear energy. About four decades ago, Abdul Fattah (Reference Abdul-Fattah1978, p. 183) argued “slow and careful introduction of nuclear energy in Saudi Arabia is practical” because it would provide for economic diversification in the country. He added, however, that the research agenda should include an investigation of the feasibility of cleaner, alternative sources, like solar and geothermal, to power desalination plants. Subsequently, Kutbi and Al Suliman (Reference 150Kutbi and Al Sulaiman1994) found that nuclear desalination is appropriate for Saudi Arabia because it is cheaper and cleaner than fossil fuel. Currently, a new report by the World Nuclear Association (2014) posits “small and medium-sized nuclear reactors are suitable for desalination, often with cogeneration of electricity using low-pressure steam from the turbine and hot seawater feed from the final cooling system. The main opportunities for nuclear plants have been identified as the 80–100,000 m³/day and 200–500,000 m³/day ranges.”

The eventual depletion of hydrocarbon resources and the current extremely high per capita consumption of oil make it easy to understand why the Gulf states are pursuing the nuclear option. In the very least, it can be viewed as an energy insurance policy for future generations. However, these states have pursued the path of least resistance by simply “pouring money” on the problem of wasteful consumption. Like water, mandated energy conservation is a politically delicate policy approach because locals have come to view themselves as part-owners of their countries’ energy resources. For leaders, resource subsidies are financial “carrots” that help keep the population pliant and governable. These sociopolitical factors have painted the Gulf states into a corner, leading them to turn to the nuclear option as a reasonable path forward. However, given the instability in the region, transnational terror networks, and the social embers in some Gulf states, nuclear desalination technology exposes these states to unprecedented risks that will likely create new and significant political fissures in a fragile social setting.

Gulf leaders are not oblivious to the above-mentioned risks. Their governments are taking some major and serious steps towards the development and use of renewable energy sources. Bassi et al. (Reference Bassi, Tan and Goss2010, p.736) argue that because of the nexus between water and energy, greater reliance on renewable energy sources such as wind and solar will mitigate greenhouse-gas emissions and water pollution from power-generation plants, and “can lead to potential reduction in consumptive water use.” They add that the development of renewable technologies “in the energy sector may also contribute to the sustainable management of water resources.” For example, alternative and renewable energy sources require significantly less water to produce per kilowatt hour than nuclear or hydrocarbon sources (Table 5.1). The Gulf states need to confront their dynamic water problems, and integrated water resources management needs to include the following perspectives (after the WEF, 2009):

1. 1. Science and engineering offer insights and skills that deal with the balancing of water demand and supply, reliability and delivery, and conservation.

2. 2. Economics provides measures that help in managing the economic and financial resources that are needed to implement the projects prescribed by water scientists and engineers.

3. 3. Political economy speaks to the incentives, institutions, and water governance issues that need to be considered, and the economy-wide trade-offs that may be needed to achieve different policy objectives.

4. 4. Institutions that are well-conceived and structured are needed to enable the delivery of solutions developed by technical and economic perspectives.

Furthermore, effective and sustainable management of water, especially in arid and hyper-arid countries, is an important component of the national security calculus. Water security should be perpetually informed by carefully targeted research into risks and uncertainties, and a country's management approach should be regularly recalibrated to benefit from increased understanding of socioeconomic, political, and environmental conditions at home, in the region, and abroad. Sustainable water management infrastructure needs to be flexible to respond to new information gained from experiences at the community, national, regional, and international levels (Figure 5.2). This clearly requires an open political system that welcomes input from all stakeholders – a political climate that is largely lacking in Gulf states, except for Kuwait (Freedom House, 2014). Management of scarce water resources is “seen as a cornerstone of national security” and the water infrastructure is “regarded as a public good and receives financing from the national budget” (Jagannathan, Reference 149Jagannathan, Mohamed and Kremer2009, pp. 40–41).

Figure 5.2 Interdisciplinary perspective on water and food security at varying geographic scales

Water management planning has many potential benefits such as:

• more reliable water supply, even during droughts;

• better use of existing water supplies;

• higher crop yields;

• reduced operating costs;

• water-conservation pricing;

• higher revenues for water providers;

• farmers switching to crops that are less thirsty and have a higher market value;

• better management of groundwater's quality and abstraction levels;

• diminished and delayed need for developing new water sources; and

• sustained campaigns to raise the awareness of the public.

Investments in conservation are cheaper and more worthwhile than investments in yet another desalination plant. Conservation, especially when it includes an educational component that is culturally sensitive, will gradually change attitudes and social norms towards how and when water is used. Abu Dhabi has been soft-peddling “estidama” (sustainability) principles by encouraging new privately or publicly owned buildings, be they residential or commercial, to install water-saving technologies. They, for example, install “estidama-compliant” faucets that have a flow rate of 6 liters per minute, which is impressive when compared with conventional faucets whose flow rate is 20 liters per minute (Abdulkader, Reference Abdulkader2011). What is significant here is the emirate's effort to give sustainability a local flavor that resonates with local culture. Estidama comes from the root words dama and dawm whose meaning is associated with water. One of the meanings of the former is “continuous rain.” The word deema is derived from dama which means gentle, continuous rainfall that is free of lightning or thunder (Baheth.info). That is to say, the chosen Arabic word for sustainability, estidama, should resonate with Arabic speakers, especially with those in the Gulf states, because of water challenges that they face. Moreover, they are embracing the idea of sustainability at many different levels, the benefits of which will be long-lasting – affecting successive generations. The discrepancy is that the Gulf states encourage, but don't legislate, water conservation. They take politically safe measures such as mandating water-saving measures in public mosques and government buildings, and lifting subsidies off very few water-intensive, low-value crops, but avoid banning flood irrigation and similar wasteful practices.

The Arab world has a growing number of environmental organizations that have sprouted over the last few decades. For example, the Arab Forum for Environment and Development (afedonline.org) is a multi-national non-governmental organization that is active in conducting studies in the region, raising people's awareness on natural environmental issues, and in starting new initiatives. Cairo is home to an extensive Arabic language sustainability magazine (estidamh.com) that covers environmental news and events from across the Arab world and was founded by the Arab Union for Sustainable Development and Environment (AUSDE). In addition to the magazine, it has a sustainability radio network. There are also environmental organizations throughout the Gulf states such as the Saudi Environmental Organization, which is based in King Abdul Aziz University and works closely with the central government in Riyadh.

In addition to desalination, the Gulf states are pursuing a multitude of other technological approaches to help manage their limited water resources. Water-saving technologies for irrigation or domestic use are gradually being embraced. Soil moisture sensors measure the amount of moisture in the soil and tailor irrigation schedules based on plants’ needs. Shutoff devices which turn off irrigation systems when they sense rainfall are in use in some areas. Farms are beginning to integrate sprinkler heads that are more efficient in delivering water and thereby can reduce water loss due to evaporation or wind. Drip or micro–irrigation systems that “deliver low volumes of water directly to plants’ roots, minimizing losses to wind, runoff, evaporation, or overspray” are also in use (EPA, 2014). Amongst these technologies, the last is the most efficient yet it is limited by the cost of the infrastructure, and of applying it on uneven or steep terrain.

Arab countries initiated cloud seeding in order to increase precipitation in the 1950s. They resorted to science and technology to modify the weather so as to enhance precipitation. They mostly used aircraft, and in some cases helicopters and ground generators, to inject seeding agents such as silver iodide (AgI) in the winter season, from October to April (Al-Fenadi, Reference Al-Fenadi2007). According to Al-Fenadi (Reference Al-Fenadi2007), the earliest cloud-seeding efforts were in collaboration with Western countries. The French colonial government conducted Algeria's first cloud seeding in 1952, and Libya's was in collaboration with the California-based Sierra Research Corporation. It started in 1971, shortly after Muammar Qaddafi came to power in Libya. The Gulf states were late (Table 5.2) to embrace this technology, with the first cloud-seeding efforts being in Saudi Arabia, followed by the United Arab Emirates (UAE) (Al-Fenadi, Reference Al-Fenadi2007). A report by the United Nations Environmental Program (UNEP, n.d. a) states: “The estimated additional rainfall attributable to cloud seeding ranged between 7–16 percent of the natural annual rainfall” and “the use of this technology is in an experimental stage in the other Arab countries, but generally is exhibiting encouraging results.”

5.3 People-centered security

In 1904, Leopold S. Amery disagreed with a prominent political geographer, H. J. Mackinder (Reference Mackinder1904) about his criteria for a globally dominant power. Projecting forward, Amery argued that location and geographical attributes are losing their importance while those who “have the industrial power and the power of invention and of science will be able to defeat all others” (Wilkinson, Reference Wilkinson, Holdich, Amery, Hogarth and Mackinder1904, p. 441). In the twenty-first century and the information age, the challenge is less one of technology and know-how and more one of social organization and institutional building. Much of the necessary knowledge is readily available, and in other cases can be obtained at a price that the Gulf states can afford.

Some 100 years ago, foreign companies led the exploration and discovery of oil in the Gulf states. These initial steps towards globalization radically transformed every aspect of life in that region. The sleepy communities felt invaded by the cultures and ideas that waves of foreign workers brought with them; locals eventually introduced stringent rules that severely limited their rights and period of employment, even though some found ways to stay for decades. Globalization is the gradual, continuous “expansion of interaction processes, forms of organization, and forms of cooperation” across regions and continents. This “spatial re-organization of production, industry, finance … causes local decisions to have global repercussions and daily life to be affected by global events” (Cha, Reference Cha2000, p. 392).

Rosenau (Reference Rosenau2003) argues that in a globalized world, there is an organic tendency for individuals and societies to integrate across boundaries, and that tendencies towards splintering are steered by local resistance to transboundary activities. In other words, globalization is integrative boundary-broadening while its counter-force, localization, is boundary-heightening, which hinders interactions (Rosenau, Reference 154Rosenau2006). The intense and sometimes novel interactions of globalization processes have generated new challenges that require innovative and unconventional thinking.

In this new security environment “the state remains central, but no longer dominates either as the exclusive referent object or as the principle embodiment of threat” (Buzan, Reference Buzan1997, p. 11). The grievances that guest workers and some Shia natives pose structural challenges to the state system, requiring a break with static policies of the past and the exploration of innovative pathways forward.

Adverse events like natural hazards or acts of terrorism result in corrosive, culturally determined fear that does not lend itself to objective, technical responses. Such responses are likely to separate people and make them more suspicious of one another. People's responses and reactions to adversity and threats are informed by their cultural norms and “behavioral formulae which have come to be part of their everyday behavior and thought” (Giddens, Reference Giddens1991, p. 44). People respond to disasters in a way that corresponds to their own perceptions and priorities, potentially explaining “why they do not do what ‘we’ want them to do” (Cannon, Reference Cannon2008, p. 356); in other words, “they will behave ‘culturally’ in ways that do not seem to fit” with forecasted norms of rationality (Cannon and Muller-Mahn, Reference Cannon and Muller-Mahn2010, p. 625).

Durodie (Reference Durodie2004, p. 266) argues that “Real resilience requires bringing people together with a sense of common purpose.” This is important because in emergencies, the general public are the “real first responders” and as such “it is vital that they be fully integrated into, and engaged by, a set of broader social aims and values.” People develop trust and a sense of purpose through “active, political engagement in society.” This primarily political, long-term project “cannot be short-circuited by technical means or information campaigns” (Durodie, Reference Durodie2004, p. 266). For instance, technological disasters that were once widely interpreted as Acts of God are now associated with human irresponsibility or malice; the latter are believed to have multiple corrosive effects such as increasing anxiety among the people, as well as aggravating economic problems and social conflicts (Furedi, Reference Furedi2007). This differentiation is especially poignant in the Gulf states where some locals and most unskilled guest workers do not have relationships of trust with the government. They feel a certain degree of cultural subjugation is inflicted upon them by the hegemonic power of the native population. Furthermore, robust confidence in the system is necessary at the commercial level because an organic relationship between national security and business firms would help prevent an extended disruption of certain services. Prevention of a major interruption of water supply, as well as response and recovery efforts, would require operators of desalination plants to have an extraordinary level of coordination with the local authorities and the people themselves.

While financial constraints have been almost non-existent in the Gulf states in recent decades, a time will come when bottom lines become important. The increasing world supply of oil has helped depress prices in the latter half of 2014 to levels that have not been seen in six years. Oil prices are not expected to rebound until at least 2016. Also, in recent decades, Bahrain's reliance on oil revenue has been significantly curtailed as its reserves have become depleted. All hydrocarbon-dependent countries are vulnerable to cyclical commodity prices and to declining reserves. Similarly, given that attacks on the infrastructure are rare, some threats may be difficult to discern and preempt. A study published by the United States’ National Academy of Science (Auerswald et al., Reference Auerswald, Branscomb, LaPorte and Michel-Kerjan2005) argued that “sustaining watchfulness and the ability to deal with low-probability, high-impact events is the single most difficult policy issue facing critical infrastructure providers and homeland security agencies today.” It added that protecting critical infrastructure requires the development of “organizational antibodies of reliability that enable society and its constituent parts to be more resilient and robust in the face of new, dynamic, and uncertain threats”. This poses a particular challenge for Gulf governments; national security goes far beyond deploying an endoskeleton network of spies among nationals and expatriates, and tougher exoskeletons around critical infrastructures. Security measures that are primarily anchored in technology offer partial, perhaps even temporary, solutions to the national security threats that face the Gulf states; these are the main measures that they have been pursuing. This, however, avoids the more complex, controversial, and time-consuming challenge of recasting the social structures and attitudes of nationals towards “others” in society.

In Israel, it is near-impossible for Palestinian-Israelis to work in “‘strategic’ state industries such as energy and water” (Economist, 2008a). While Palestinian-Israelis are ostensibly equal before the law, their Christian and Islamic religious beliefs have in effect disqualified them from working in jobs that affect the Jewish state's critical infrastructure. While Israel has qualified Israeli Jews to fill such “strategic” positions, the Gulf states do not have alternative choices. They have long feared that some of their Shia population with ties to Iran may carry out acts of violence and sabotage.

5.4 Conclusions

There is a discrepancy in the Gulf states’ attitudes to water and food security. Many of them have taken steps to reduce their dependence on food imports by acquiring farmland abroad, but are not perturbed by dependence on imported desalination technology. As Leopold S. Amery observed in the early 1900s, scientific prowess and inventions endow countries with significant power. The Gulf states have used their strategic resource, oil, to produce water in the homeland. This has enhanced their water and national security, and in turn has helped boost their quality of life and political stability. The technology, however, is mostly imported from Western countries, which could use it as a political leverage to pressure a Gulf government if relations between them were to deteriorate. They need to domesticate their desalination technologies by generating their own scientific and engineering knowledge that has local and regional relevance and application. Gulf societies need to find a suitable formulation that will harness local and other scientific knowledge to advance and entrench sustainable water security in the region. Over five decades ago, it was noted that the geographic distribution of technology and its evolution over time is a “strategic political variable” (Sprout Reference Sprout1963, p. 193).

At the sociopolitical level, the Gulf states do not allow foreign workers to settle permanently in their midst; they want to protect their national identities and cultures. This policy, however, carries elements of risk that the relevant literature on the subject has not considered before. People sometimes act on their grievances, and when they do, they may target a country's (energy) infrastructure. Furthermore, in times of natural or manmade disasters or emergencies, the response to fear is culturally dictated; there are numerous cultural groups in the Gulf states that are deliberately isolated from the local culture, and the majority of the low-income, unskilled workers speak neither Arabic nor English. They may be the first respondents in times of emergencies. The national security of the Gulf states is better served when foreign workers are given political rights and are integrated into the larger culture; this is a vital step towards forging societies that are cohesive and content, with residents who are committed to the welfare of the countries in which they live.