Will Donald Trump Change The Middle East?

Forbes

17-05-2025

PARIS, FRANCE - APRIL 10: Saudi Arabia's Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman arrives at Elysee Palace ... More on April 10, 2018 in Paris, France. Crown Prince of the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia Mohammed bin Salman, is on a three-days official visit to France. (Photo by Stephane Cardinale - Corbis/Corbis via Getty Images)
It is likely that many of the people protesting for Palestine in US universities will have read Edward Said's book 'Orientalism', or at least will have an idea who he was. It is also likely that they will have heard of Donald Trump, whose ire at these protesters has led to an unexpected fiscal crackdown on many prominent US universities including Columbia, where Said used to teach (see our recent note 'University Challenge').
In brief, the tack of Orientalism was to criticise the construction of a superior, Westernised view of the Middle East (the term was coined by navigators in the US Navy), that is then internalised by members of the Middle Eastern elite. At this broad level the theory was attractive, but runs into many practical difficulties such as Said's downplaying the role of women, and the failure of many Middle Eastern countries to develop economically and to nurture the kinds of open society that Said liked to live in.
As with many facets of the debate around the Middle East, 'Orientalism' has become a badge of honour for many, and a contentious identifier for others, and there is a risk that many people who hold the 'Orientalist' view, have not updated their outlook for say the rise of Al Qaeda in the broad region and the effective domination in the last decade, of Palestinians by Hamas.
I doubt that Donald Trump has read 'Orientalism' (I think his speechwriter might have though) but in the light of the Western perspective of the Middle East, his visit to Saudi Arabia was striking in two respects.
First, like any clever politician, he confirmed the view that several countries in the region want to have of themselves
– 'this great transformation has not come from Western interventionists … giving you lectures on how to live or how to govern your own affairs. No, the gleaming marvels of Riyadh and Abu Dhabi were not created by the so-called 'nation-builders,' 'neo-cons,' or 'liberal non-profits,' …instead, the birth of a modern Middle East has been brought about by the people of the region themselves'
To a degree, Trump's view is not correct. The economies of the UAE and KSA were built on Western know-how (see David Mulford's 'Packing for India' for example), and many of the financial institutions at least have mimicked those in the US and UK. Also, a large number of army officers from the region have been trained in imperialist bastions such as Sandhurst.
At the same time, the miraculous growth of these countries can be ascribed to local vision and leadership, on a scale only matched by Lee Kuan Yew in Singapore. And, consistent with the 'Orientalism' thesis, many people in the West do not acknowledge the rising institutional role that Abu Dhabi plays in the region, or the extent to which Mohammed bin Saman has become a hero for the youth in his country. In that regard, we might say that the model the Middle Eastern countries have followed is the 'Sinatra Model' ('do it my own way') with a slight American twist.
The President's address struck a chord because in the Emirates and the KSA in particular, there is a growing pride and independence in what these countries have achieved economically, and on my last visit there a few months ago, I found that there was little patience on the part of government officials to for example, have EU regulatory standards imposed on joint investment projects. In a note I wrote at the time I flagged how locals had developed their own acronym of the West (W.E.N.A.), surely proof that the ideas in 'Orientalism' are dated.
Trump's speech will be a big disappointment for those who believe in institutions and the idea of nation-building, and in that regard will turn on its head the efforts of so many in the State Department and other institutions. Neither does it augur well for current day American institutions.
The speech also brings into focus what Prof. Afshin Molavi refers to as the existence of 'two Middle Easts', namely a geopolitical one (sustained by American defence agreements) and an economic one. Chillingly in the context of the annihilation of Gaza, the Trump speech has tilted the momentum towards the economic version, and I feel that many people in Europe vastly underestimate the focus that governments in the region have on the economic prize, as opposed to the humanitarian catastrophe.
Various countries in the region from Qatar to Syria, may now find themselves the beneficiaries of Mr Trump's lack of attachment to history and the democratic model, and it is very likely that the region known broadly as the Middle East will be one of the very few in the world to profit from his presidency, and will spearhead a move towards a model of materialistic, technocentric non-democracies, that some of Mr Trump's supporters have in mind for the USA.
The emergence of the 'Fourth Pole', a prospective multipolar zone that will become the beneficiary of trade tensions between the 'older' multipolar zones (US, EU, Asia), is still very much on track, but as it develops it will increasingly need institutions, markets, rules and means of binding people to the region, none of which Mr Trump can help with.