The strange world of the Euro-Gulf

Stay informed with free updates

Simply sign up to the Life & Arts myFT Digest – delivered straight to your inbox.

Waiting for the Tube, I see a poster for a high-end gym chain. Places? “City of London. High Street Kensington. Dubai.” What a shame to choose an environment that is so disfigured with bad taste and clueless expats. However, the city and Dubai branches should be top notch.

Shortly after, I am in Doha, and again the Euro-Gulf link is inevitable. The emir of Qatar has returned from a state visit to Great Britain, where the hosts were looking for a trade agreement. Switzerland-based FIFA has just awarded the World Cup hosting rights to Saudi Arabia. Even in skyscraper-free Muscat, where alleys that might be rationalized elsewhere in the Gulf twist freely behind the Corniche, three restaurants in my hotel are outposts of Mayfair brands.

What a shame the word “Eurabia” is taken. And from such cranks. (It’s an extreme right-wing term for a supposed plot to Islamize Europe.) Because we need a word for this relationship. The Arabian peninsula has what Europe lacks: space, natural wealth and the resulting budget surpluses to invest in things. For its part, Europe has “soft” assets that the Gulf states must acquire, host or emulate to achieve a post-oil role in the world. This is not the deepest outer connection of the Gulf. Not while 38 percent of people in the UAE and a quarter in Qatar are Indians. But it could be the most symbiotic, if I understand this word correctly.

It is true, the United States has a defense presence in all six states of the Gulf Cooperation Council. This includes the Saudi imprint that Osama bin Laden was not super-stoked about. But the daily contact? America is a 15 hour flight. Their goods are either harder to buy or less desirable. Its citizens have little tax incentive to live in tax havens, since Uncle Sam charges them at least part of the difference.

It doesn’t take long for Europe’s exposure to the Gulf to age as badly as its former porosity to Russia.

In the 1970s, when OPEC profits poured into London, Anthony Burgess wrote a dystopia in which big hotels became “al-Klaridges” and “al-Dorchesters”. What a mental shock it was for even the most worldly Europeans to see – no need to beat around the bush – non-white people with more money than them. However, they could condescend to the Gulf as they are not a place to live. Half a century later, his grandchildren called that copium. In fact, his grandchildren could literally live there for economic opportunities. (Al-Dorado?) As a banker friend explains, the time zones allow you to sleep late, trade the European markets, then dine late, so it’s the young people who do a Gulf stint, not the burnouts that are mine years old. .

For how long, though? It is the sheer improbability of this encounter, between a culture of universal rights and monarchical absolutism, between a mainly secular continent and the native peninsula of an ancient faith, that sets it apart from anything I can think of. A relationship can be necessary and unsustainable. It wouldn’t take much—some intra-GCC violence, say, that seemed imminent in 2017—for Europe’s exposure to the Gulf to age as badly as its previous exposure to Russia. If Abu Dhabi-owned Manchester City is found to have made a financial mistake, part of Premier League history will be tainted. Because it is “just” sport, I feel that people are not prepared for the reaction.

And it is parochial to assume that the relationship could always break only at one end. It is the Gulf side that will make the most awkward cultural adjustments. Because Europeans associate 1979 with Iran and perhaps with Margaret Thatcher, they sometimes pass over the capture of the Great Mosque in Mecca by zealots who thought the House of Saud had grown into Western habits. The governments of the region certainly do not forget.

How much a place can liberalize without tripping a cultural thread occupies (and is answered differently in) each state, or emirate. Everyone is very fond of “Mister Janan” in his Doha hotel. But the metal scanners that must be passed at each entrance to the building are like a reminder of the stakes here. I wonder if Europe and the Gulf throw so much into their relationship out of a niggling doubt that it can last.

Email Janan at janan.ganesh@ft.com

Find out first about our latest stories – follow FT Weekend on Instagram and Xand sign up to receive the FT Weekend newsletter every Saturday morning