Diskussionspapiere
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Edited by:
Steffen Wippel
The discussion paper series Economics, Society and Geography in the Middle East was established in 1990 at the Department for Middle Eastern Economics of the Freie Universität Berlin, Germany. The series has an interdisciplinary and transregional character; it comprises short contributions which critically analyse processes of economic development and closely related social and cultural issues in the Near and Middle East, the Gulf region and North Africa as well as in bordering world regions.
Topics
Based on Egyptian President Abdel Fattah Al-Sisi’s huge and prestigious building project, Patrick Loewert shows how the interests of powerful decision-makers become interwoven with a project to urbanize the desert. In this work, the author uses an approach that combines strategic spatial construction with action theory.
Starting with the video "The Destruction of the CDU" by the YouTuber Rezo (2019), Bettina Gräf analyzes the reporting on drone killings in German-speaking media. She addresses the responsibility for drone killings in countries with which neither Germany nor NATO are at war and suggests undertaking a media and cultural studies examination of the phenomenon of drone killings within the fields of Islam studies and area studies.
Most disciplines in the social sciences and humanities attempt to identify the world using clear categories. This process is based on the idea of linear borders. Using the example of the Mediterranean Sea, this volume places the thought model of linearity within its historical, political, and cultural context by taking an ethnological perspective and contrasting it with the idea of borders as zones of transition.
In 2006, the United Arab Emirates initiated the Masdar City project, which was a pre-planned eco-city concentrating on the development and promotion of renewable energy, water and waste management, sustainable building, transportation, and material efficiency. It was the flagship project of what the government considered to be a widespread environmental reform process. This study examines the Masdar City project applying the analytical framework of "ecological modernization" with the help of five "factors", which help to investigate the ongoing reform process. The study finds that Masdar City is more accurately described as an outcome of the Abu Dhabi government’s economic diversification strategy. The project is subject to the political and economic interests of the emirate’s ruling family. Environmental groups operating within the emirate are connected to the government and pursue policy targets determined by the government.
