Gulf Futurism (a term coined by Sophia Al Maria) is a cultural and urban
phenomenon marked by an absurd obsession with hypermodernism,
consumerism and technological acceleration that is removed from social
consequences. Modernization is the process of transition from a ‘traditional’
to a ‘modern’ society; modernity, however, is often dictated by or measured
against Western standards.
Gulf Futurism inspires visions of architectural transcendence and
technological advancements that overcome all forms of human limitations.
The seduction of Gulf Futurism comes from its conception of the region’s
future in purely aesthetic terms. In this way, the conditions enabling this
progress are rendered completely irrelevant and invisible. This tends to be
the case with most of our relationships to structures of the future. It is
easier to think of your phone as a means to access information, rather
than a product of slave labor; a symbol of mankind’s technological
progress and future-oriented aesthetics, and not as a manifestation of
corporate exploitation. Larger futuristic projects in the gulf, steel and glass
monoliths in the desert, are erected in the name of modernization: the
region’s transition into an eternity of wealth and unlimited progress. The
ever-changing desert landscape begs the question: how true do the
projects of Gulf Futurism keep to the ideals of modernization?
It is important to realize that a particular country is not considered
modern based solely on GDP or infrastructural development.
Modernization is a complex balance of self-sustaining economic growth 1 ,
public participation in policy 2 , social consciousness and equality. 3 It has
been characterized as the process of social change whereby less
developed nations, for better or worse, adopt the economic structures of
more developed nations. 4 Unfortunately thus far, the capitalist
modernizing project as we know it has historically been devastatingly
costly.
Contemporary historians have debated whether or not the Atlantic slave
trade fueled the Industrial Revolution and the beginnings of capitalism,
which allowed for rapid economic transformation in Europe. Eric Williams
is one such scholar. In his 1944 book, Capitalism and Slavery, he
challenged traditional ideas of economic progress by explaining how
central the transatlantic slave trade had been to the primitive
accumulation of capital which enabled European development. 5