What Explains Qatar's Support for Arab Spring and Jihad at the Same Time?
I. Introduction
Problem Defined
Qatar is a small Arab nation that is ruled by a family dynasty which depends on its hydrocarbon extraction industry for economic sustenance and political power. One would expect that Qatar should be interested in promoting a more stable Middle East region in order to:
- Maintain its own family dynasty safely in power within Qatar.
- Ensure smooth relations with its neighbors, most of which are bigger and more powerful than Qatar.
- Ensure that its hydrocarbon extraction and exports can proceed smoothly.
Yet Qatar is infamously known to get involved in all kinds of activities within the Middle East.
Al Jazeera News Network. Qatar hosts and funds a widely watched news channel Al Jazeera which, despite its pro-Qatari family bias, is nevertheless known for journalistic gravitas and promotes a relatively liberal narrative to the irritation of its neighboring regimes which are similar to Qatari regime in their hegemonic, dynastic and rentier character, as well as recent Arab desert tribal roots. Qatar's ruling family is anything but a representative republic. It seems strange that it would invest in a news channel which, despite refraining from directly criticizing the Qatari ruling family, nevertheless promotes a relatively liberal worldview within the Arab world. Not only would this irritate its neighboring dynastic regimes, but it may also promote a social political awareness that would put pressure on its own ability to rule dynastically.
Islamism. Qatar has been supporting conservative Islamist movements across the Middle East, including Muslim Brotherhood in Egypt, the Islamist factions in the Libyan civil war, and some of the Islamist brigades in the Syrian civil war, among others.
Arab Spring. Qatar's support for some of the Arab Spring movements, if taken to its full implication, would result in a more representative form of government across the region. Although they would range from the liberal multi-cultural ones to the more conservative Muslim Brotherhood type of regimes, they would nevertheless be much more representative then a family dynasty would be.
What explains Qatar's opportunistic regional behavior?
Thesis
Qatar's foreign policy, which includes support for seemingly contradictory forces like the Arab Spring and Jihadism, has less to do with sympathy for either democracy or jihad, and stems from its institutionally-ingrained opportunistic pursuit of regional leverage so as to successfully capitalize on its hydrocarbon resources in light of historical domination by Saudi Arabia.
The way Qatar pursues its interests in the Middle East is driven by a number of factors. Some of these factors are unique to Qatar itself; some are common to how things are done within the wider Middle East region; and some other factors pertaining to the recipient of Qatari support, which range from Arab Spring liberals to ardent jihadists.
About This Piece
This is piece is based on open source research. It should be considered as an educated opinion.
II. Regional Factors
Regional Instability
Middle East is among the most unstable regions in the world for the past century. Regional governments and institutions have developed penchant for playing hardball with each other. Even countries with similarities and seemingly common interests often wound up in conflict. Examples abound like Egyptian-Syrian United Arab Republic which broke up under Nasser's heavy handedness after just a couple of years, the Baath party split between the Syrian and Iraqi branches due to local political factors more than due to any differences in ideology, the inability for the Arab nations to coordinate and sufficiently trust each other in their numerous wars with Israel, Yemen's almost perpetual conflict between its various internal factions, and many other such examples. Even before the Arab Spring and the subsequent Arab Winter, Sunni-Shia conflicts, the Syrian and Iraqi civil wars, Al Qaida or ISIL, there were many other conflicts occurring in the Middle East almost in perpetuity. Constant security concerns incentivize political leaders to pursue leverage where available. Among the most effectively used methods to exert leverage is by using proxies. There is no shortage of proxies to be had given the region's numerous religious, ethnic and sectarian tensions: Sunni vs Shia, Arabs vs Kurds, Arabs vs Persians, Turks vs Kurds, Christians vs Muslims, Jews vs Arabs, secular authoritarianism vs theocracy, Pan-Arab socialism vs Pan-Islamism, etc. There is always some community that suffers from oppression by another community somewhere in the Middle East, and they provide prime context for outside actors who seek leverage. Iran and Syria put pressure on Lebanon and Israel via the Shia sectarian terrorist organization Hezbollah. Syria used to put pressure on Turkey via the Kurdish militant group PKK. Iraq and Iran had pressured each other using each other's respective Kurdish minorities. Various Arab regimes used to use Palestinian populations to put pressure on Israel. Over decades political and security institutions in such an unstable context develop networks and organizational competencies that make playing hardball, whether with proxies or other means, a viable and expected way to achieve regional political goals. Qatar is no exception.
Cultural Lag
One way to view the way Middle East nations deal with each other is that the way political goals have been pursued in the region going back to the Ottoman imperial and tribal times before WWI and before the exploitation of hydrocarbon resources simply continued into the recent times via cultural and political inertia. Prosperity, international trade, higher education, technology and other aspects of modernity are undoubtedly having a long-term effect on the region. But in the short-term, the MO and sensibilities of political leadership are highly influenced by inertia from the old times, especially those whose power derives not from elections but from petro-state largesse that is used to buy off the population's acquiescence. The Gulf monarchies have leaders, many of whom grew up revering recent ancestors, sometimes even grandfathers or fathers, who led tribal lives and approached politics similarly to how things were done going centuries back. Slavery was officially abolished in Saudi Arabia only in 1962. That's not a typo—not 1862, but 1962! In Oman it was abolished in 1970, after the western world had already put a man on the moon. The slavery ban wasn't a minor administrative technicality implemented to comply with UN statues. On the contrary, the ban addressed a real and widely followed practice of keeping people as slaves. Today's migrant labor system in the region, called Kafala, is a big improvement on slavery, but it's still rife with abuse. ISIL's often publicized practice of sex slaves and other abuses don't come out of a vacuum, and indeed are facilitated by social norms that have been considered part and parcel of everyday life in many parts of the Middle East up until the recent times and going back to antiquity. In that context it becomes a bit clearer why there aren't many cultural or institutional barriers to a petro-state like Qatar aligning with regional movements like the Muslim Brotherhood in Egypt, the Arab Spring movements, or Islamists in the Syrian civil war in order to pursue its regional interests. It's an expected way of how politics gets done in the region.
III. Proxy-Related Factors
2-Way Street
A relationship between a proxy and its backer is a 2-way proposition. The relationship depends not only on the backer but also the receiver of support. Qatar’s ability to seek influence via proxies is not just a function of itself but also depends on how these proxies want and need its support. Observation shows that many movements and proxies in the Middle East (and perhaps in most places) are all too happy to receive support from whoever can give it, especially when in desperation. Considering the large quantity of various proxies across the Middle East, it’s not surprising that when a uniquely incentivized opportunistic seeker of regional position comes into the money, like Qatar has with it’s hydrocarbon resources, a lot of spokes are established emanating from it to these proxies.
Receptiveness to Qatari Patronage
It’s not hard to understand why Arab Spring movements would be receptive to support from Qatar, whose Al-Jazeera TV network provides positive coverage to the movements. What's less clear is why Qatar’s support also extends to extreme Islamic militants. One would expect that a violent jihadist, who on first glance is an uncompromising indoctrinated acolyte, would stay away from allying with a regime like Qatar's, which besides enjoying modern luxuries also hosts western military bases. A closer look at the history shows that jihadists, despite their espoused extreme doctrines, are often as opportunistic as Qatar's ruling elite regarding soliciting support from various types of sources, even those that do not perfectly align with their doctrines.
It Takes More Than Men + Motivation
Terrorist organizations of all kinds, from underground networks like Al Qaida or aboveground entities like ISIL, require not just cadres of people who will fight for the cause, but also need other means of support, usually obtainable from rich and powerful elite, in order to achieve political aims through violence.
- Money. Ironically enough, money is key to maintaining a jihadist movement in many ways, including:
- Materiel. It takes cold hard cash to procure arms and supplies on the black market.
- Travel. Traveling requires money. Even driving oneself in a dilapidated old car across a dirt road requires money to buy gasoline.
- Tactical Influence. To gain advantage in contexts that aren't amendable to doctrinarian sympathies. For example, to buy off civil servants or politicians who may pose an obstacle but will turn a blind eye if given a bribe.
- Expertise. Sustaining an extremist movement requires sophisticated knowledge that is often obtainable from powerful backers.
- Terror Tools. For example, how to build bombs.
- Recruitment. How to recruit cadres and expand the network.
- Propaganda. How to engage in media campaigns, including modern social networking channels and slick design tools.
- Communication. How to securely communicate with others in the network using couriers, communication technology, and other means.
Survival
Although extremist movements on the surface seem like purists with high levels of indoctrination, they are often at the same time practical and will compromise when necessary. Otherwise many of them wouldn't survive as an ongoing concern. For example, during the Soviet–Afghan war the Afghan mujahideen received aid from Saudi Arabia, the US and Pakistan, countries which don't align with the Islamist mujahideen ideal. Before that aid was provided the mujahideen were faring badly against the Soviet forces and would have most likely lost the war. Extreme individuals often sacrifice themselves in an uncompromising dedication to their doctrine. But extreme organizations and leaders historically display a high degree of flexibility when necessary. Allying with outside backers who may not conform to their doctrine is one such compromise.
Strategic Cooperation
Extremist organizations are often willing to return the favor to its supporter when he gets into trouble, even if such return of favors is not in line with the organization stated goals. Examples abound.
Hezbollah. Hezbollah's stated reason for existence is to resist Israel in Lebanon. Israel withdrew from its occupation of southern Lebanon years ago, except for a small piece of sparsely populated land called Sheba Farms, which is not even clear whether it belongs to Lebanon at all depending on historical records. Yet Hezbollah continues to maintain its military capabilities and institutional infrastructure. Moreover, it is currently fighting along the Assad regime in the Syrian civil war against other Syrians and non-Syrians, none of which are aligned with Israel.
PLO. The participation of various PLO offshoot organizations, formed originally to pursue the interests of the Palestinians within the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, in various inter-Arab conflicts as proxies provide further examples of extreme organizations willing to get involved in contexts that have nothing to do with their original stated goals as a quid-pro-quo to maintain the favor of their backer.
ISIL. ISIL's tacit cooperation with Assad's secular regime against the moderate rebels is another glaring example of a purist extreme organization willing to make strategically advantageous deals that are less than pure and contradict their stated doctrine because despite running counter to their ideology such flexibility makes strategic sense in the short term.
IV. Factors Unique to Qatar
Multiple countries in the Middle East have historically provided support to jihadist causes. But Qatar's level of opportunism is unique. It gets involved not only in specific situations for immediate strategic reasons, but pursues alliances with whatever entity is on the ascent in any given location for maximum leverage across the whole region, including in places as far as Libya, which is quite far from its home base in the Persian Gulf. Such outsized dogged pursuit of political leverage in the wider region relative to the size of the country is unique to Qatar. In effect, its small size, among other factors, are contributors to Qatar's regional calculus.
Small Size + Big Money = Incentive to Buy Leverage
Small Population
Qatar had the lowest population of any country in the Middle East up until a few years ago. Excluding migrants, it still has the smallest population of just around 300,000 citizens.
High Per Capita GDP
Qatar has the highest per capita GDP of any country in the world. Especially in terms of Purchasing Power Parity, it’s per capita GDP is well over $100k/person for the past few years.
Leverage Through Wealth
Being such a small country, Qatar cannot ensure its own interests in the region militarily or diplomatically. Therefore, it has to rely on its wealth.
Unviable Option: Military. Even if Qatar had the latest military technology and training, the most that its small core citizenry can produce is several thousand soldiers. Such a small military poses little challenge to anyone in the region. If the military included its migrant population in its ranks, then they could pose a risk to the regime. In a country where power is obtained via non-representative means, giving a lot of power to the unrepresented is a risky move, especially when that would involve giving them weapons. An aggrieved migrant in an isolated context poses little threat to the state, but if the same aggrieved migrant gets weapons and is part of an organized group, it’s a whole different story. Bottom line, Qatar’s tiny size precludes it from being able to rely on hard power to project influence in the region.
Unviable Option: Diplomacy Without Hard Power. Without hard power diplomatic efforts have little influence, especially in the Middle East region. Being small and weak but rich may be an acceptable circumstance for small countries in less volatile regions, such as Luxembourg within Europe. If Luxembourg would voice strong opposition to any specific direction that EU takes, then its council would be given credence even though Luxembourg isn't able to get its way in Europe militarily. But in a more unstable region like the Middle East resigning to being small and rich but otherwise without ability to coercively influence outcomes is a recipe for disaster.
Viable Option: Use Wealth to Buy Influence. Being small and with little inherent ability to wield leverage, Qatar cannot ensure its own interests in the region militarily or diplomatically. Its wealth is the key. Hence the large investments in a popular Al Jazeera media network, seeking opportunistic alliances in the region, and backing ascending movements that will give it influence in the region.
Soft Power: Al Jazeera News Network. Al Jazeera news network has become very popular among Arabic-speaking viewers. It is both journalistically impressive yet biased at the same time. If Al Jazeera was a typical rote mouthpiece for its regime, without quality programming, then it wouldn't be popular. Without reaching a wide audience, its regional influence and benefit to the Qatari regime would be much reduced. So precisely in order to benefit the regime that funds its existence, Al Jazeera has to provide high quality content to its viewers, including hard-nosed coverage that would impress many news networks in the west, but in a way that benefits the Qatari regime. One would be hard pressed to find content on Al Jazeera that criticizes the Qatari regime. But content that criticizes the nefarious practices of other regimes abound. A viewer would be more informed about the Syrian civil war, the brutality of the Assad regime and how it puts pressure on its own population via secret police, torture methods, propaganda and the like, by watching Al Jazeera then by watching many western news sources. Al Jazeera is also known for award-winning coverage of the Arab Spring movements, the bravery of its foreign correspondents who often go into dangerous areas that many other news sources, especially the likes of Russian mouthpiece RT, or the Chinese Xinhua, or the North Korean government controlled news outlets, wouldn't care or dare to go to. But pursuing impressive modern journalistic coverage of selective topics doesn't change the fact that Al Jazeera's highest organizational imperative is not journalism for its own sake, or even to make a profit, but first and foremost to act as a strategic tool of the Qatari regime in the Middle East region.
Hard Power: Alliances with Ascending Movements and Proxies. Qatar seeks alliances with any regional movement that would benefit from Qatar's largesse and would give Qatar additional influence in the Middle East region. The types of movements that it supports very greatly. It supported the rebels against Qaddafi in Libya, especially the Islamist factions. It supported the moderate and secular opposition in Syria, namely the Free Syrian Army and the National Coalition, against the brutal Baathist Assad regime before providing support to the more Islamist factions after the moderates proved unable to topple Assad. Qatar supported the Muslim Brotherhood movement in Egypt after Mubarak’s authoritarian regime fell. Whether it's the liberals or the extremists, Qatar has shown itself willing to support whatever power is on the ascent in any given part of the Middle East by providing financial support to buy arms, supplies, and influence.
Low Risk of Arab Spring Spillover
From the perspective of the Arab Spring movements, it’s not hard to understand why they would be more than happy to receive support from the backer of a TV channel, Al Jazeera, which provides positive coverage of Arab Spring developments. If someone who shows you with praise wants to provide backing for your efforts, it’s easy to accept. What isn’t obvious is why would Qatar be willing to do that? After all, Arab Spring was all for democracy, whereas Qatar is anything but. Shouldn’t Qatar be worried about its own citizens agitating similarly at home instead of supporting it elsewhere nearby? The answer lies in Qatar’s combination of small size, large wallets and regional context.
Core Citizens Are Few and Depend on Status Quo
Qatar’s core citizenry is very small, wealthy and dependent on government largesse for it’s cushiony jobs and benefits. Making up a total of only 300k people (12% of a total 2.5m population), they are like the patrician class in ancient Rome whose interests are aligned with the political status quo. There is very little risk that they would agitate for a change in Qatar’s political system a-la Arab Spring because that would jeopardize the hand that feeds them. In turn the non-citizen class, which make up the vast majority of the population, are recent economic migrants who moved to Qatar within the past few decades seeking economic opportunities ranging from construction laborers to school teachers, and as such are in no position to demand political changes.
Non-Citizens Are Economic Migrants With Little Leverage
The non-citizens of Qatar, which make up the vast majority of the country’s population, have little leverage within the Qatari socio-political system. There is no easy path for them to receive Qatari citizenship. There are no cultural norms or institutions to facilitate any kind of naturalization process, and the core citizenry doesn’t have the incentive to provide it to the non-citizens as that would dilute their portion of the state’s economic benefits. A recent migrant who works as a nanny for a rich family is not a good recruit for political causes when her passport is kept for “safekeeping” by either the family or the nanny agency, who has few rights within Qatari institutions, and is subject to deportation.
Political Risk from Economic Migrations < Political Risk From Established Populations
All else being equal, recent migrants present much less political risk then established populations because there hasn’t been the opportunity for self-perpetuating historical mass grievances to materialize against any Qatari group of people based on ethnicity, class or religion. In Qatar’s case this is especially true, as its top 3 sources of non-citizen migrants are India, Nepal and Bangladesh--countries whose migrant populations have little vested interest in the historical tensions of various regions of Middle East.
Strategic Weakness vis-a-vis Saudi Arabia
Borders
Geographically Qatar is a peninsula surrounded by sea, except for a small land border with Saudi Arabia which is the largest and most powerful Gulf nation. Any land oriented strategic consideration—such as natural gas pipelines and border security—will depend on Saudi cooperation. As a result, Saudi Arabia by default has a lot of strategic leverage over Qatar.
Dependence on Natural Gas
Qatar regime's political power depends on its ability to capitalize on its vast energy reserves. Unlike other gulf states, whose energy exports are mostly in the form of oil, Qatar's main energy export is natural gas. That matters because until recently the transport of natural gas was economically viable mostly by overland pipelines, whereas oil could be transported by both land and sea. Oil export was more flexible, whereas natural gas transport was more dependent on overland considerations. Being a peninsula state surrounded by water with the only land outlet being via Saudi Arabia, Qatar was strategically dependent on Saudi Arabia. Other gulf states, such as the United Arab Emirates (UAE) were less dependent because their energy exports were more weighted towards oil and their land borders were not shared only with Saudi Arabia, but also with Oman. Saudi Arabia had more leverage over Qatar then the UAE. By now technology has advanced to the point where natural gas can be transported not only by overland pipes but also by sea tankers in the form of Liquefied Natural Gas (LNG). But its historical experience with Saudi Arabian domination from the days when it depended more on overland transport has taught Qatar to be weary of Saudi Arabia and seek levers of influence with which to resist Saudi domination.
Leverage for Future Projects
Despite LNG's viability as a form of flexible natural gas export, it is still a more expensive way to transport gas than by overland pipes depending on the distance and terrain. So for future export opportunities Qatar may still require Saudi Arabian cooperation. The current proposed pipeline from Qatar to Turkey via Saudi Arabia is one such example. For Qatar it's useful to have as many geopolitical levers of influence as possible to secure favorable negotiation outcomes with Saudi Arabia for dividing the proceeds from such a pipeline in the future. Otherwise, without such leverage Saudi Arabia would be able to extract terms favorable for itself as it was able to do in the past to the detriment of Qatari interests.
Iran
Qatar's natural gas reserves are located in a gas field that is shared with Iran. Since Iran is Saudi Arabia's main regional rival, Qatar's ability to maintain productive relations with Iran requires it to successfully resist going along with Saudi interests against Iran. Such a strategy requires the ability to project influence in the Middle East region, especially in resistance to Saudi Arabia.
Comparison Case Study: Bahrain
The case of Bahrain's relationship with Saudi Arabia provide a useful analogy to how Qatar would be vulnerable to Saudi pressure if it didn't have levers of resistance. Bahrain and Qatar are two small Persian Gulf nations that are small in both geography and population. They are situated near each other in the Persian Gulf next to the regional giant Saudi Arabia. At first glance there don’t appear any reasons why these 2 nations should behave so differently within the Middle East region. But their regional MO and relationship with the giant neighbor is almost diametrically the opposite of each other. Understanding the underlying factors that result in such differences in behavior is key to understanding Qatar’s regional calculus, including it’s support for Islamist groups.
Hydrocarbon Resources
Bahrain has few hydrocarbon resources relative to Qatar's reserves. Therefore, Bahrain's cost-benefit calculation for resisting Saudi Arabia is different from Qatar's. For Bahrain, going against Saudi interests present high costs but little benefit. On the other hand, for Qatar being able to resist Saudi domination has high payoff in being able to capitalize more on its hydrocarbon resources vital to it’s domestic political system, and so may be worth doing things that may risk displeasing Saudi Arabia. In fact, in order to wield a lever of influence, sometimes strategically poking Saudi Arabia in the eye is indeed part of the strategy. If Qatar didn’t depend on its hydrocarbons for political strength, it’s calculus in challenging Saudi Arabia would probably be closer to Bahrain’s.
Foreign and Domestic Policy
Bahrain's foreign policy is strongly influenced by Saudi Arabia. It's rare to see Bahrain going against Saudi interests in either the Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) or in any other context. Domestically within Bahrain, Saudi Arabia was able to flex its muscle by leading a military intervention to suppress the small nation's Arab Spring protests. But Qatar needs room to act more independently, and therefore seeks the ability to influence Saudi interests to wield as leverage. Case in point is Qatar's support for the Muslim Brotherhood, which Saudi Arabia detests because it poses a social and political challenge to Saudi dynastic regime. Unlike Qatar, which is able to buy political acquiecense from its small core citizenry, Saudi Arabia is starting to face limitations to such a strategy because its population is much larger and has increased almost 10-fold in the past few generations to over 30m people, whereas Qatar’s core citizenry is only 1/100th of that and is more easily able to make them happy. Being more vulnerable to popular discontent, Saudi Arabia’s regime is threatened more then Qatar’s regime by any type of domestic political organization, even by those that share Saudi Arabia’s Islamic in character like the Muslim Brotherhood, because despite that commonality the latter presents itself as a political alternative to the former. If Qatar didn’t stand to benefit from challenging Saudi Arabia specifically, its relationship with Saudi Arabia would probably to close to the one that Saudi Arabia has with Bahrain.
