@asayeed@interfluidity@BenRossTransit Yeah, but the Gulf states are resource exporters, not industrial exporters (the UAE is a partial exception, but its economy is a combo of oil and professional services to nearby oil exporters). The lionization of such regimes is mostly because they have so much rentier income they spend it on bribing foreign institutions to say nice things about them. Comes from the same place that instead of building their own universities, they do NYU-Abu Dhabi.