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Planning for Sustainability in Non-democratic Polities: The Case of Masdar City

Laurence Crot
Urban Stud 2013 50: 2809 originally published online 6 February 2013
DOI: 10.1177/0042098012474697

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Urban Studies at 50
50(13) 28092825, October 2013
Article

Planning for Sustainability in

Non-democratic Polities: The Case of
Masdar City
Laurence Crot

[Paper first received, November 2010; in final form, September 2012]

Abstract
This paper addresses the pursuit of environmental sustainability by an autocratic,
neo-patrimonial regime and examines the implications of such a political environ-
ment for sustainable initiatives. The city of Abu Dhabi has recently adopted planning
schemes aimed at forging a new path towards urban sustainability. Among these,
Masdar Citya flagship development portrayed as the worlds first sustainable
cityhas become the paragon of Abu Dhabis new urban vision. The findings pre-
sented here, however, reveal that on-the-ground implementation has so far failed to
live up to Masdars initial ambitions. To account for these diminished expectations
and the prospects for sustainable urbanisation in Abu Dhabi, the author draws on
an analytical framework borrowed from the political science literature on neo-
patrimonial societies in the Middle East. The analysis suggests that the social con-
tract between Abu Dhabis rulers and the local population constitutes a challenging
context for the pursuit of environmental sustainability.

Introduction
Following the spread of the sustainable
development paradigm, agendas aimed at
environmental sustainability are now being
pursued by a variety of political systems
ranging from liberal democracies to long-
standing authoritarian regimes. However,
the procedures linked to sustainability
objectives rest on political values and prac-
tices commonly associated with democratic
institutional arrangements such as govern-
ance, public participation, political account-
ability and a transparent bureaucracy
(Meadowcroft, 1997; Stiglitz, 2002; Lafferty,
2004; Whitford and Wong, 2009). As
Midlarsky observes
Theorists and policy-makers have been eager
to put forward the virtues of democracy as a

Laurence Crot is in the Institute of Geography, University of Neuchatel, Espace Louis-Agassiz 1,

Neuchatel, 2000, Switzerland. Email: laurence.crot@unine.ch.

0042-0980 Print/1360-063X Online

2013 Urban Studies Journal Limited
DOI: 10.1177/0042098012474697
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2810 LAURENCE CROT
benign political influence on the environment,
especially in contrast to the obvious environ-
mental degradation under Communism that
became obvious after its fall (Midlarsky, 1998,
p. 341).
Indeed, if some early debates in the field of
environmental policy have sought to deter-
mine whether authoritarian solutions might
be more efficient at tackling environmental
problems (Walker, 1988; Barry, 1999), it
seems that a consensus has been reached
whereby democratic forms are deemed nec-
essary for reducing environmental impacts
(Dryzek, 2000; York et al., 2003; Ward,
2008).
The most common argument in rejection
of non-democratic attempts at environmen-
tal sustainability rests with the conviction
that authoritarian rulers lack incentives to
adopt sustainable policies (Ward, 2008).
Autocratic leaders, the argument goes, are
unlikely to prioritise sustainable develop-
ment goals because
Their control of a high fraction of societys
resources encourages them to pay off mem-
bers of their relatively small support coalition
by allowing them to pillage the ecosystem
(Ward, 2008, p. 386).
If this were the case, however, then how do
we explain that a number of authoritarian
governments still choose to adopt policies
and initiatives aimed at pursuing more sus-
tainable forms of urbanisation? In the fol-
lowing pages, I try to answer this question
by considering the case of Masdar City in
Abu Dhabi, the capital of the United Arab
Emirates (UAE). The aims are twofold: first,
to examine the motivations of Abu Dhabis
autocratic state in establishing and fostering
environmental sustainability objectives; sec-
ondly, to discuss the implications of this
particular political environment on the pur-
suit of such objectives.
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Before presenting the structure of the
article, a preliminary remark should be
made here regarding the use of the ambigu-
ous concept of sustainable development
(Jacobs, 1999; Davison, 2008; Connelly,
2007)while more will be said later about
its contestedness. Although sustainable
development is a widely used concept in
academic and policy discourse, there is no
consensus about its exact meaning and
contents (Mebratu, 1998). In the scholarly
literature, it is generally seen as encompass-
ing three dimensions of sustainability
economic, social and environmental.
However, in policy-making, the relative
weight attributed to each dimension very
much depends on local features and insti-
tutional arrangements. In Abu Dhabi, the
interpretation of sustainability is clearly
skewed towards the search for a combina-
tion of economic success and environmen-
tal progress. To reflect this reality, the use
of the term sustainability thus refers in
this paperunless stated otherwiseto the
economic and environmental dimensions
of sustainable development.
The next section provides an overview of
Abu Dhabis most pressing environmental
challenges, as well as an introduction to an
initiative expected to contribute to tackling
these problems: Masdar City. I then attempt
to account for Abu Dhabis recent engage-
ment with environmental sustainability by
calling upon an institutionalist approach to
the politics of regime survival in neo-
patrimonial societies. The third section dis-
cusses the progress and pitfalls of Masdars
implementation to date. In the last section,
I consider the paradox whereby the Abu
Dhabi government is adhering to environ-
mental sustainability objectives while con-
tinuing to subsidise unsustainable lifestyles
among the local population.
The empirical material draws upon a
three-year research project funded by the
MOVE Network, a collective research

endeavour involving several Swiss universi-
ties. The author conducted fieldwork in Abu
Dhabi in FebruaryMarch 2010. The data
visual, oral and written materialwere col-
lected through qualitative research methods
including various visits to the Masdar build-
ing site; 14 semi-structured interviews with
officers at the Masdar Initiative, local plan-
ners, real estate agents and environmental
experts; and several additional informal dis-
cussions with the same informants and
others. It must be noted that, although free-
dom of speech in the UAE is theoretically
guaranteed by the Constitution, discourses
and behaviours which do not please the
authorities can have unpredictable conse-
quences. As a result, it can be challenging to
have genuine conversations with informants
on the record and I found that some of the
most enlightening information was obtained
in informal discussions rather than during
interviews. In order to respect my infor-
mants peace of mind, all references to their
views and statements have been kept as
anonymous as possible.
Abu Dhabi: From Petro-urbanism to
Urban Sustainability
Since the discovery of vast oil reserves in
the early 1960s, followed by independence
from British rule and the creation of the
UAE Federation in 1971, the city of Abu
Dhabi has undergone one of the most rapid
and grandiose processes of urbanisation
ever witnessed in modern times. With juris-
diction over approximately 90 per cent of
the UAEs total oil resources (8 per cent of
global resources), the then ruler of Abu
Dhabi, Sheikh Zayed bin Sultan Al Nahyan,
was able to transform the Emirate from
rags to riches (Al Fahim, 1995) in less than
30 years by undertaking massive construc-
tion programmes in urban housing, infra-
structure and services.
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PLANNING FOR SUSTAINABILITY 2811
While Abu Dhabi has experienced faster
development than many other cities in the
Gulf, it nonetheless exhibits political, socioe-
conomic and environmental patterns of
petro-urbanism (Riad, 1981) that are char-
acteristic of the regions self-proclaimed oil
societies. First, on a political level, whereas
support for the sheikhs was traditionally
based on tribal allegiances, the magnitude of
oil revenues has enabled the rulers to secure
popular endorsement by providing the pop-
ulation with widespread material well-being.
Urban areas have disproportionately bene-
fited from this pattern of developmental
patrimonialism (Kelsall and Booth, 2010),
with the emergence of
the traditional sheikhs as benevolent distri-
butors of oil wealth and the builders of cities
with their modern welfarism and good life
(Khalaf, 2006, p. 245).
Secondly, from a socioeconomic perspective,
the deep demographic changes generated by
the new oil-based political economy have
profoundly altered Abu Dhabis demo-
graphic profile. These changes have been
marked by tremendous population growth
and ethnic diversification. While the citys
population has grown from a few thousand
in the late 1960s to over one million today,
Emirati nationals constitute only about 20
per cent of the total. The other 80 per cent is
composed of an impressive mix of migrants
from all over the world, although predomi-
nantly from South-east Asia and the Indian
sub-continent (Heard-Bey, 2005). This situa-
tion is believed to harbour a number of possi-
ble problems for future urban development,
most notably with regard to the ways in
which exclusionary practices towards differ-
ent migrant groups have been expressed spa-
tially in the UAE (Khalaf, 2006; Elsheshtawy,
2008). The various population groups are
generally kept apart in segregated housing
quarters through a conspicuous pattern of
2812 LAURENCE CROT
state-devised socio-spatial segregation, a
practice regarded by Emiratis as a necessary
means towards preventing their cultural heri-
tage from being swept away by an overflow of
foreign customs. To support this politics of
differentiation, landownership by non-
Emiratis is forbidden by law, except for a few
designated investment areas. Many of my
informants in Abu Dhabi identify this as a
major impediment to encouraging greater
environmental awareness among foreign resi-
dents, for their inability to own land in physi-
cal terms also engenders a lack of ownership
in symbolic terms. Indeed, combined with
the fact that the legal status of foreign resi-
dents defines them as visitors and precludes
them from obtaining citizenship regardless of
the time spent in the country, these restric-
tions exacerbate their sense of transience and
make it difficult to convince them to pre-
serve and protect a land in which they have
no stake (personal interview with an envi-
ronmental expert, 18 February 2010).
This takes us to the third dimension of
petro-urbanism, the environmental dimen-
sion. Precipitous urbanisation driven by oil
revenues has come at a heavy environmental
price in Gulf countries. According to the
World Wildlife Fund, the UAE has the worst
carbon footprint in the worldover five
times greater than the global averageand
the highest rate of greenhouse gas emissions
per capita (WWF, 2008a; Davidson, 2009).
The Emirates also feature among the worlds
major producers of waste. Abu Dhabis
annual waste per household is almost 30 per
cent higher than the OECD average (Khaleej
Times, 2010). To make matters worse, the
availability of cheap oil has made the use of
private cars a fundamental lifestyle trait in
the Emirates, with planning policies aimed at
facilitating driving. Reliance on private
transport, in turn, has favoured urban
sprawl and the expansion of cities into the
desert. Land policies have also encouraged
urban sprawl, for if landownership is
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forbidden to foreigners, it is considered by
the native population as a fundamental
rightto such an extent that Emiratis regard
living in an apartment as an infringement
on their full citizenship (Khalaf, 2006, p.
258). Thus, since the 1970s, the government
has been handing out thousands of plots and
sponsoring the construction of vast numbers
of individual villas for Emiratis (Kakande,
2008), thereby contributing to a growing
pattern of suburban sprawl. Finally, water
scarcity is a pressing concern. The UAE is the
worlds largest per capita consumer of water.
In Abu Dhabi, per capita water consumption
stood at 550 litres per day in 2010 (Stanton,
2010) and it is expected to increase through-
out the decade (Walters et al., 2006).1 Given
the scarcity of fresh water in the region, as
much as 98 per cent of water needs are met
through energy-intensive desalination. Most
of the salt residue is thrown back into the
sea, hence generating even larger concentra-
tions of salt in seawater.
With a population expected to triple over
the next 40 years, Abu Dhabi presents the
picture of a city set on an utterly unsustain-
able course of urban development. This
bleak prospect, however, has given way in
recent years to world-wide praise following
governmental announcements about the
adoption of very ambitious initiatives of
urban sustainability. This new agenda cul-
minated in 2009 with the establishment of a
partnership between Abu Dhabi and the
World Economic Forums Slim Cities
Initiative to develop a global code of best
practice for sustainable urban planning
(Arnold, 2009) and in the nomination of
Abu Dhabi as one of the top 10 sustainable
cities of the future by the Ethisphere
Institute, a US-based think tank.2
Among the various projects currently
underway, the most famous of Abu Dhabis
sustainability schemes is unarguably Masdar
City. Masdar has been heralded by the inter-
national media as the worlds first

sustainable city (Vidal, 2008). The develop-
ment, whose construction commenced in
January 2008, was presented to the public as
a new, entirely master-planned city expected
to host 47 500 inhabitants and 1500 busi-
nesses on 6 square kilometres. The Masdar
project has set many ambitious targets,
which include exclusive reliance on renew-
able energies, a zero-carbon policy and the
recycling of all waste and as much as 80 per
cent of used water (WWF, 2008b). Masdar
City is also supposed to provide a car-free
environment. Transport needs are expected
to be met by an electricity-powered network
of individual vehicles serving the city intra
muros as well as a mass-transit system con-
necting it to the centre of Abu Dhabi.
Designed by Foster and Partners, Masdar
has been presented by the Abu Dhabi
authorities and the World Wildlife Fund
(WWF) as having been conceived according
to the principles advocated by One Planet
Living, a sustainable planning scheme
inspired by the famous BedZed experiment
in South London (WWF, 2008b). Following
the international attention garnered by
BedZed, the environmental consultancy
behind the scheme (Bioregional) and WWF
have joined forces to formulate a replicable
model of urban sustainability known as
One Planet Living. While there is a One
Planet Living community in the making on
every continent, Masdar has been presented
by WWF as the first full embodiment of the
models principles (WWF, 2008b).
Masdar City constitutes an incredibly
ambitious initiative in the field of environ-
mental sustainability, aimed at providing
not only a real-life laboratory of sustainable
urbanisation but also a model for other
cities to follow, as emphasised by its slogan:
One day, all cities will be built like this
(ADFEC, 2010). However, given Abu
Dhabis poor track record in the environ-
mental realm, the question worth asking is:
why this change of heart? In other words,
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PLANNING FOR SUSTAINABILITY 2813
what were the motivations for the adoption
of the deep sustainability (Dinica, 2006)
principles presiding over the formulation of
Masdar? To address this question, I propose
to turn to the political science literature on
issues of regime stability and change in
neo-patrimonial societies.
Imitative Institution-building as a
Legitimation Strategy
When political commentators became doubt-
ful that third wave democracy (Huntington,
1991) would take in the Arab world
(Hudson, 1996; Heydemann, 2002), scholars
of Middle Eastern studies sought to under-
stand the reasons for the failure of the region
to democratise at that time (Schlumberger,
2000). Among the many works on the subject,
Albrecht and Schlumbergers (2004) analysis
of the determinants of stability and change in
neo-patrimonial states is particularly enligh-
tening with regard to the UAE.
The authors postulate that non-democratic
regimes suffer from an inherent lack of legiti-
macy and that their endurance crucially
depends on their ability to devise legitimating
survival strategies. The legitimacy of contem-
porary neo-patrimonial states of the sultanis-
tic type found in the Arab world (Chehabi
and Linz, 1998) is generally thought to be
rooted in the personal authority of the rulers
coupled with rentierismthat is, the alloca-
tive power derived from oil income (Quilliam
and Kamel, 2003; Davidson, 2005, 2009).
Davidson defines this as a monarchical social
contract which
has allowed the UAEs monarchs to trade a
package of economic benefits and legitimacy
resources in exchange for their populations
acquiescence (Davidson, 2009, p. 118).
However, given the finite nature of oil reserves
and the pressures for democratisation exerted
2814 LAURENCE CROT
by a growing population and the interna-
tional community, over time Arab regimes
might be facing decreasing legitimacy. In
order to retain their allocative power in the
post-oil era,3 many Gulf states have thus
actively started to diversify their economies
(Fasano and Iqbal, 2003). Within this con-
text, Albrecht and Schlumberger identify a
set of four core strategies of regime legitima-
tion used by neo-patrimonial states in the
Arab region. They label these strategies as
change for stability: elite change refers to
an attempt to adapt economic and political
elites to a changing environment; imitative
institution-building corresponds to the
establishment of Western-style institutions;
co-optation serves to widen the regimes
power base and weaken potential opposition;
and external influences and constraints are
transformed into economic and political
opportunities (Albrecht and Schlumberger,
2004, pp. 375376).
Whereas all four strategies may be at
work in the UAE, two are directly related to
the adoption of principles of environmental
sustainability: imitative institution-building
and the transformation of external influ-
ences into opportunities. Both phenomena
are in fact closely connected. While the
question of external influences relates to
the pressures exerted by global ideological
paradigms, imitative institution-building
provides a means of responding to these
pressures by adopting the formal institu-
tions they require while keeping intact the
underlying, real power structures. As
Albrecht and Schlumberger observe
There has been a renewed drive towards this
imitative type of institution-building since the
1990s. The specific functions such institutions
take on in authoritarian polities enhance the
persistence of authoritarian regimes. While
informal rules, procedures, and decision-
making structures remain mostly unaltered,
formal institutions have gradually been
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changed to resemble what is expected interna-
tionally from Arab governments with respect
to democracy and market economy (Albrecht
and Schlumberger, 2004, p. 382).
Among the international pressures weighing
on Gulf governments today, the global sus-
tainability paradigm and the fight against
climate change have become near inescap-
able policy concerns. In the UAE, Heard-
Bey notes that the authorities
have always been very sensitive to the views
of the outside world. In order to face off crit-
icism from abroad, the federal governmental
agencies . now seem very keen, indeed, to
satisfy world opinion on a number of issues
(Heard-Bey, 2005, p. 372).
For instance, commenting on the announce-
ment that the International Renewable
Energy Agency (IRENA) would be hosted in
Masdar, the local newspaper The National
wrote that this would contribute to
boosting the country in its aim of being recog-
nised as a progressive state that is tied into the
international community and planning for its
oil future (Stanton, 2009).
Should we infer that Abu Dhabis sustainable
turn is merely an answer to the pressures
exerted by the global sustainability agenda?
Masdars sceptics have used this perspective
to accuse the Abu Dhabi government of
greenwashing (Wigglesworth 2009)that
is, of using Masdar as a facxade for the world
while avoiding clamping down on unsustain-
able domestic lifestyles and public infrastruc-
ture. However, I believe that the desire to
respond to international pressures represents
only one part of the story.
As already mentioned, Albrecht and
Schlumberger argue that complying with
external standards and constraints becomes
more acceptable to authoritarian regimes

when these constraints may be turned into
opportunities. In other words, the outside
worlds opinion tends to matter more to
autocratic governments when it aligns with
the prerogatives of their internal agenda.
This appears to be the case in Abu Dhabi.
Faced with a fast-growing population and a
host of environmental challenges, the rulers
are well aware of the need to establish a
more viable development path for the
Emirate. A further incentive may also stem
from the fact that the UAE ranks among the
countries that are highly vulnerable to the
effects of climate change such as rising sea
levels and increased water demand and scar-
city (Janardhan, 2007). In this context, the
availability of practices and technologies
which have proved successful elsewhere con-
stitutes an attractive solution, thereby offer-
ing a convenient way of combining the
search for external legitimation with that for
environmental sustainability. Masdars adhe-
sion to One Planet Living is a case in point.
One Planet Living and its BedZed prototype
have received such praise and publicity that
they have acquired celebrity status through-
out the world (Lovell, 2008). Adhering to
this model has thus allowed the Abu Dhabi
government to send a strong signal to the
international community by stating its com-
mitment to sustainability objectives. If we
follow Bulkeley in seeing the adoption of
best practices as a means of reward and rec-
ognition (Bulkeley, 2006, p. 1037), Masdar
can then be interpreted as a political ration-
ality (p. 1029) through which Abu Dhabis
dedication to urban sustainability is per-
formed and enacted.
Furthermore, among the sectors identi-
fied and prioritised for economic diversifi-
cation by Mubadala, the state company
behind the development of Masdar, expan-
sion into green and renewable energies has
been singled out as one of the most pro-
mising. According to an official spokesman,
this ensues from the fact that
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PLANNING FOR SUSTAINABILITY 2815
Abu Dhabi knows the energy business rather
well [and] enjoys competitive advantages
allowing it to successfully establish these new
industries (Ameinfo, 31 January 2007).
Masdar, with its focus on high-tech, low-
carbon solutions, fits well with this new eco-
nomic strategy, as well as with the dominant
global approach to urban sustainability
which concentrates on zero-carbon develop-
ments as key solutions to global warming.
This approach emphasises techno-economic
solutions over social and institutional ones,
thereby making zero-carbon best practice
schemes more easily transferable from one
local context to another (Lovell, 2008; Rydin,
2010). In Abu Dhabi, this focus on techno-
economic issues provides a convenient
framework as it allows the authorities to sub-
scribe to the global sustainability agenda
while setting aside the institutional and
social dimensions of sustainability which
may constitute a more sensitive aspect of the
pursuit of sustainable development in the
UAE. Now, if the adoption of sustainable
planning in Abu Dhabi corresponds to a
political strategy designed to boost external
legitimacy (through imitative institution-
building) and internal legitimacy (through
economic diversification), one may wonder
about the consequences this may have for
the implementation of Masdar and its ability
to reach stated objectives. In the next section,
I try to examine Masdars performance to
date.
Masdar in Practice
Masdars development is led and overseen
by the Masdar Initiative, the first major ini-
tiative launched by Abu Dhabis Future
Energy Company (ADFEC), a state-owned
corporation created by Sheikh Mohammed
bin Zayed Al Nahyan in 2006. Upon signing
an initial agreement with the Abu Dhabi
2816 LAURENCE CROT
government in 2008, WWF released an
announcement stating that
Masdar plans to exceed the requirements
of the 10 sustainability principles of the One
Planet Living programme, a global initiative
launched by WWF and environmental con-
sultancy BioRegional. It is expected this will
make it a global benchmark for sustainable
urban development (WWF, 2008b).
In spite of these auspicious beginnings, the
relationship between the Masdar Initiative
and One Planet Living has proved more
complex than expected. According to a
BioRegional officer, in June 2009 Masdars
leaders had still not signed the One Planet
Living action plan
They [Masdar representatives] have not
agreed to commit to the rules required by
One Planet Living, although they are using
the One Planet Living brand name . but
they dont want to be constrained by another
scheme or organisation (personal interview,
21 May 2009).
A key difficulty rests on the fact that One
Planet Living schemes do not focus exclu-
sively on environmental issues but also
address the social dimension of urban sus-
tainability. The discourse surrounding
BedZed has been criticised by some authors
for its emphasis on the technological,
energy and economic performance of the
scheme over its social, behavioural and
administrative innovations (Lovell, 2008).
However, in practice, BedZed was explicitly
designed with a comprehensive approach to
sustainability. This also applies to One
Planet Living. For each new One Planet
Living community, a tailor-made action
plan addresses a series of sustainability
challenges. As regards the 10 One Planet
Living principles for Masdar, only five con-
cern the low-carbon, techno-economic
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dimensions of sustainable urban develop-
ment. The other five requirements relate to:
the supply of sustainable food; the protec-
tion of habitats and wildlife; the preserva-
tion of local values and heritage; issues of
social equity and fair working conditions;
and the provision of events and facilities to
promote health and happiness for all demo-
graphic groups (WWF, 2008b). Some of
these principlessocial equity or the provi-
sion of infrastructure for all population
groups for examplecall for the establish-
ment of planning practices that are far
removed from the developmental patterns
which have been the hallmark of Abu
Dhabis urbanisation over the past 40 years.
Principle number 9 has been of particular
concern. It calls for
fair wages and working conditions for all work-
ers (including construction) as defined by
international labour standards (WWF, 2008b).
The UAEs poor track record concerning the
treatment of low-skilled migrant workers is
an iniquitous feature of the Emirates rapid
urbanisation and has regularly been
denounced by external observers and human
rights organisations. Whereas most of the
blame has been targeted at Dubais labour
camps and slave-like construction compa-
nies (Davis, 2007), construction workers face
similarly appalling working and living condi-
tions in Abu Dhabi (Walters et al., 2006).
This is a sensitive issue as the UAE authori-
ties have often turned a blind eye to the
sometimes illegalemployment practices of
construction companies.
In February 2010, while I was conducting
research in Abu Dhabi, WWF had just car-
ried out a review of Masdar and reaffirmed
its collaboration with the project. In the
Masdar Initiatives brochure entitled Why
is Masdar City sustainable? (ADFEC, 2010),
one could indeed read that Masdar was
committed to One Planet Livings

framework. However, the framework pub-
lished in the brochure differed from WWFs
initial version. Any reference to labour
issues had been removed. Instead, the
revised principle number 9 now vaguely
stated that Masdar must
ensure that the communitys impact on other
communities is positive: Masdar City is com-
mitted to helping the broader Abu Dhabi
community, the UAE, the region and the
world (ADFEC, 2010).
The problematic issue of labour standards
had been avoided to accommodate local
agendas and practices.
From a wider theoretical perspective, this
is a situation where an imported scheme has
been renegotiated to suit local institutional
arrangements and resistances to change.
These findings support the recent literature
on the mobility of best practice policies
(McCann, 2011; Peck and Theodore, 2010),
which calls for a close examination of the
ways in which mobile policy models are
renegotiated by the agents involved in their
transfer. Indeed, when imported models
touch ground in host environments, they
are rarely copycat versions of the original
model but hybrid schemes altered by the
mutations undergone along the wayas
appears to have happened in the transfer of
One Planet Living to Abu Dhabi. More gen-
erally, this issue raises the question of the
replicability of models of urban sustainabil-
ity beyond local, national and regional bor-
ders. Indeed, the definition and contents of
the essentially contested concept of sus-
tainability, even when considered from a
purely environmental perspective, remain
slippery and shape-shifting in nature
(Davison, 2008, p. 191; see also Connelly,
2007; Newman, 2007). In other words, the
discursive and policy interpretation of sus-
tainability in any particular local context is
not a given, but the result of political
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PLANNING FOR SUSTAINABILITY 2817
struggles about the direction of social and
economic development (Jacobs, 1999).
Therefore, if the definition of sustainability
embodied in an imported model of urban
sustainability does not match that of the
recipients, the replicated scheme is likely
to drift away from the original.
This risk does not only concern the social
dimensions of Masdars sustainability. So
far, the project has also failed to keep pace
with its initial environmental objectives. To
begin with, the citys construction has fallen
behind schedule. According to most observ-
ers, the initial 2016 deadline for completion
of the first phase of construction has been
delayed by at least four years. In early 2010,
the only building that was close to com-
pletion was the Masdar Institute of Tech-
nology, a research university borne out of a
partnership between the Abu Dhabi govern-
ment and the Massachusetts Institute of
Technology (see Figure 1).
In the wake of the global economic crisis,
the projects leaders have sought to reduce
costs by reworking important aspects of the
master plan. In February 2010, a major
review of the entire project was thus con-
ducted at the request of state authorities.
According to Waleed al Muhairi, Mubadalas
chief operating officer
Real estate has been slow. It is not unreason-
able to expect a review is going on. In fact,
dont you think thats prudent? Thats what
anybody would do. And so, obviously, we
are undergoing that right now and we are
supportive of that review process and will
make whatever changes we need to in order
to ensure both the economic viability and in
order to meet our mandate (Fitch, 2010).
The sustainability division at the Masdar
Initiative was worried about the implica-
tions of the review for the attainment of
Masdars objectives. Their concerns turned
out to be well-founded as one of them
2818 LAURENCE CROT
Figure 1. The Masdar Institute of Technology. Photograph: Kate Geddie.
informed me a few weeks later that the
division had been shut down and that most
of its collaborators had been dismissed.
Since the initial master plan, the project
has been altered in several ways. First, in an
attempt to diffuse financial risks, the Masdar
Initiative has decided to outsource construc-
tion to third-party commercial developers.
Although the Masdar Initiative remains the
chief developer, it is now doubtful that it
will be able to retain the necessary oversight
throughout the construction process to
ensure compliance with sustainability prin-
ciples. Secondly, energy and technology
choices have been re-evaluated. Computer
tests have shown that the construction of
large solar panels would be less effective than
anticipated due to local dust storms, with
solar power output reduced by at least
40 per cent. A further disappointment is
the abandonment of on-site energy genera-
tion, which had been expected to represent
Masdars only source of power. The city
will now have to purchase energy from
off-site locations. The initial master plan was
also counting on the desalination of
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groundwater with solar energy, a key issue
given the scarcity of fresh water in the UAE.
So far, however, Masdars water comes from
an energy-intensive desalination plant in
Abu Dhabi which is powered by gas (Vidal,
2010). Furthermore, the futuristic auto-
mated electric podcars known as personal
rapid transit (PRT), the flagship feature of
Masdars car-free strategy, have been dis-
carded as they are now considered unable to
meet the citys transport needs. Of further
concern is the realisation that the planned
systems of mass transita light rail network
and a metrodevised to connect Masdar
City to the capital have been delayed.
Thirdly, while the Masdar Initiative had
initially counted on state subsidies to offset
the higher costs of using renewable ener-
gies, by early 2010 no subsidy plan had
been approved. In the words of a Masdar
Initiative officer
With the economic crisis, the Abu Dhabi gov-
ernment is no longer throwing money at the
Masdar Initiative. Now the project is expected
to stand on its feet and to be commercially

viable. This generates a conflict between the
sustainability team and the commercial team
(personal interview, 08 February 2010).
As a result of these revisions, Masdar appears
to be drifting away from its grandiose aspira-
tion of becoming the worlds first truly sus-
tainable city. Echoing the downgrading of
Masdars goals, the future city is now
branded as carbon-neutral rather than
zero-carbon (Bsat, 2010). When asked
about the reasons for these diminished
expectations, most of my respondents
invoked the greater prudence engendered by
the global economic crisis. However, whereas
Abu Dhabi undoubtedly suffered important
financial losses as a result of the crisis, the
damage has been nowhere near that incurred
by Dubai, and its economic power remains
colossal. One only has to consider the
impressive projects steered by the Abu Dhabi
Urban Planning Council (UPC) over the
same period. The UPC was founded in 2007
to act as Abu Dhabis official planning
authority. Its creation represents a revolution
in Abu Dhabis urban history. Prior to its
existence, there was no development review
process as such. Planning approval was
granted directly by the Sheikh on the basis of
drawings and aerial pictures on which he
personally made handwritten amendments
(personal interview with a UPC planner, 09
February 2010). The UPC, with its formal
rules and procedures, thus represents a cor-
nerstone in creating a culture of planning in
a city previously devoid of such institutional
arrangements. Although it has received less
international attention than Masdar, the
UPCs flagship project, a medium-term
planning framework for Abu Dhabis devel-
opment entitled Plan Abu Dhabi 2030, con-
stitutes an attempt to achieve managed
urban growth in the Emirate. Interestingly,
whereas in early 2010 Masdars objectives
and procedures were being questioned
and re-evaluated, UPC planners seemed
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PLANNING FOR SUSTAINABILITY 2819
confident that Plan Abu Dhabi 2030 would
not be affected by the crisis in any significant
way. According to a UPC senior planner:
The crisis is interesting if you look at it from
the perspective of planning. . private devel-
opment proposals may be affected by cash
flow and financing concerns and hence be
slowed. But when it comes to public plan-
ning projects, its steady as you go. Proof of
that is the Capital City District. In 2009 we
completed the master plan for Capital City,
and now weve hired a project management
company to begin execution (Koolhaas and
Reisz, 2010, p. 216).
When asked about the differences between
planning work in authoritarian and plura-
listic contexts, a Canadian planner at UPC
explained that a fundamental advantage in
Abu Dhabi was that
The Crown Prince makes it much easier to
make swift decisions [and that] here you rea-
lise there is actually a chance of seeing what
you have planned getting implemented, a
rare thing for planners (personal interview,
10 February 2010).
In the same vein, Vancouvers former plan-
ning director, Larry Beasley, who acts as a
special advisor to the UPC, stated that
In this culture, when the leadership endorses
something, then magical things happen .
unlike my culture. Its not that way in my cul-
ture (Koolhaas, 2010, p. 212).
It appears, thus, that the global economic
downturn can only provide a partial explana-
tion for Masdars reduced ambitions. In the
next section, I attempt to offer another expla-
nation by arguing that imitative institution-
building, as a legitimation strategy, is flawed
when the imported institution is too distant
from local values and policy practices,
2820 LAURENCE CROT
especially if the imported model directly
challenges other sources of legitimacy.
Subsidising Unsustainability
I have argued that the practice of imitative
institution-building reflects a quest for
external legitimacy (i.e. legitimacy in the
eyes of the international community) that is
characteristic of neo-patrimonial autocra-
cies. Yet what happens when the imported
institution challenges some of the very fea-
tures from which the political regime is
deriving its internal legitimacy (i.e. legiti-
macy in the eyes of the local population) in
the first place? Since the discovery of Abu
Dhabis vast oil reserves, the state has been
providing for the local population in almost
every possible wayfrom lavish infrastruc-
ture and services to mass employment in
the public sector.4 The redistribution of oil
income has been channelled into unbridled
consumerism and profligate lifestyles which
have become the hallmark of decent
Emirati life. In the environmental realm,
while many Western governments are using
financial and tax incentives to bolster envi-
ronmental awareness and behavioural
change among their population (Rydin,
2010; Reiche, 2010), Abu Dhabis govern-
ment has been heavily subsidising water,
electricity and land consumption for
national citizens. As noted by Reiche
very cheap and subsidised energy is an inte-
gral part of the wealth transfer to the domestic
population from oil and natural gas generated
revenues (Reiche, 2010, p. 2397).
Although water is a scarce resource in Abu
Dhabi, Emiratisconsidered by the Abu
Dhabi Electricity and Water Authority
(ADWEA) as subsidy customerscon-
sume it for free,5 whereas foreign residents
buy it for a small fee. Electricity is priced
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for all, but at a heavily discounted rate to
Emiratis. As regards land consumption, I
have already highlighted that land use prac-
tices encourage urban sprawl and the use of
private cars. Let us consider a concrete
example. In August 2009, a new body cre-
ated by the Urban Planning Council, called
the Abu Dhabi Centre for Housing and
Service Facilities Development, announced
that 17 000 new houses would be built in
the Emirate over the next five years. The
Centres General Director, Mr Al Suwaidi,
explained that most houses and plots
would be awarded to Emirati citizens free
of charge. To justify the size and public
cost of the programme, Mr Al Suwaidi
stated that
The Government wants locals to have a high
standard of living .. We are not compro-
mising on quality for the locals. . What the
Government is having in mind for Emirati
housing is huge (quoted in Gillet, 2009).
Another illustration of the governments
tendency to use land property as a social
subsidy can be found on a YouTube video
featuring Abu Dhabis late ruler Sheikh
Zayed addressing the speaker of the UAEs
Federal Council
I swear by God Almighty that I dont under-
stand how there are [UAE citizens] in apart-
ment buildings who are still renting. . How
is it possible that they are living in rented
apartments? How does a ruler have the right
to let a citizen live in rent? . How many
times have I asked you to write down who
doesnt have anything . who doesnt have
any farmland, or real-estate or any other
income . to write their names down and give
them to me (quoted in Sultan Al Qassemi,
2010, p. 195).
The subsidisation of consumption of envi-
ronmental resources is a practice which has

become deeply entrenched in the relation-
ship between Abu Dhabis rulers and the
local population. In other words, the gov-
ernment is openly subsidising environmen-
tally unsustainable behaviour. As a close
adviser to the Sheikh told me
Emiratis are very grateful to the Sheikhs for
sharing oil revenues and wealth with the
population, and ensuring good standards of
living. Calling Emiratis lifestyles and beha-
viours into question is not an option for the
Sheikhs (personal interview, 14 February
2010).
By avoiding the fundamental questions of
environmental awareness and behavioural
change among the population, the rulers
thus find themselves in a situation where
environmental sustainability can be pur-
sued only through technological solutions,
the exploitation of renewable energies and
smart spatial planning and physical design.
While these are commendable objectives, as
of today they can not suffice to meet
Masdars ambition to become the worlds
first sustainable city. As a sustainability
manager at the Masdar Initiative warned
If the principles that have driven Masdar City
have to be embraced, the UAE residents first
have to comprehend, and then be willing to
pursue, the concept of sustainability (Abbas,
2010, p. 244).
Raising the local populations awareness,
however, requires a radical departure from
the current structure and contents of state
incentives and communication. Without
increased popular awareness and behavioural
change, even if Masdar ultimately succeeds
in delivering the innovative green design and
technologies it promised, it is probable that
its impact on the wider urban areathat is,
beyond Masdars boundarieswill remain
limited. According to a BioRegional officer,
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PLANNING FOR SUSTAINABILITY 2821
reports on BedZed have shown that even the
most inventive green technologies require
users to be at least minimally environmen-
tally aware and willing to adapt their beha-
viour to new lifestyles (personal interview,
21 May 2009). Under current conditions, if
living and working in Masdar requires some
level of individual awareness and commit-
ment, the project is likely to end up as an
isolated community of like-minded
inhabitantsmost probably foreign, highly
skilled professionals working for green-tech
firms located in Masdarrather than to
become a model susceptible of spreading to
neighbouring Abu Dhabi and the wider
region. The fact that it has been designed as
a walled city constitutes a telling metaphor.
As a UPC planner observed
In addition to being physically isolated from
the rest of the city, Masdar will be a walled
neighbourhood . thats very odd . how
can you draw boundaries around sustainabil-
ity? (personal interview, 09 February 2010).
Conclusion
Eco-developments and other attempts at
creating sustainable communities can not be
studied in abstraction from their local and
national political contexts. In order to
account for the successes and failures of
urban sustainability schemes, their broader
political narrative has to be told. In this arti-
cle, I have attempted to interpret Masdar
Citys early developments by examining
some fundamental aspects of its political
narrative. The findings do not concur with
the assumption that autocratic regimes lack
incentives to pursue sustainable develop-
ment. On the contrary, in the case of neo-
patrimonial regimes in the Arab Gulf, their
dynastic approach encourages them to adopt
long-term views that are well-suited to the
2822 LAURENCE CROT
philosophy embodied in the sustainable
development paradigm. In particular, the
sheikhs need to legitimise their on-going
political dominationboth internally and
on the international stageresonates well
with the focus of sustainable development
on meeting the needs of the present without
compromising the ability of future genera-
tions to meet their own needs (WCED,
1987, p. 43).
This is, however, only part of the story.
Indeed, after an initial period of strong polit-
ical and financial backing, some of Masdars
most ambitious sustainability goals have
faced declining state support. One consistent
explanation for this waning political will
appears to be the clash between the values
embedded in Masdars imported model of
sustainability, and the absence of corre-
sponding standards among local society.
This does not suggest that there is no genu-
ine commitment to environmental sustain-
ability on the part of the rulers; but, given
that the regime derives much legitimacy
from the attainment of unrestrained life-
styles for the local population, the rulers are
prepared to pursue urban sustainability
insofar as it does not threaten the social con-
tract. A conclusion to be drawn is that, in the
pursuit of sustainable urban development,
the (un)suitability of any particular political
system cannot be decided a priori but needs
to be examined in light of the core values on
which the system hinges and the nature of
statesociety relations. A promising research
avenue for scholars interested in the global
circulation of sustainable planning policies
therefore calls for a deeper engagement with
the political motivations presiding over the
adoption of imported policy knowledge.
The observations made in this paper also
have implications for the debate on the con-
cept of sustainable development and its con-
tested meanings. Even if we set aside the
social and economic dimensions of the con-
cept to focus on environmental sustainability,
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the fact that its definition and contents vary
from place to place has become an obvious
observation. A more interesting issue raised
by the case of Masdar, however, is that the
interpretation of sustainability in a particular
location can shift relatively rapidly as a result
of political struggles and societal resistances.
In 2010, a sustainable development expert
was marvelling at Abu Dhabis ability to con-
ceptualise a solution and have it adopted as
policy the next day and considered that this
provides the single most important opportu-
nity for advancing sustainability in an urban
context (Heid, 2010, p. 119). However, the
evidence discussed in this article suggests that,
even when a political administration has the
ability to devise and adopt new policies over-
night, it remains reticent to face the political
costs raised by unpopular policy reforms.
Given the rulers awareness of the need to
ensure a sustainable future for the Emirate
and the region, the search for viable and effi-
cient environmental solutions will undoubt-
edly continue in Abu Dhabi. The extent and
depth of the reforms adopted, as well as the
political costs that the regime will be willing
to incur, remain to be seen.
Acknowledgements
The author is grateful to the anonymous referees
for their helpful comments and suggestions.
Funding
The research presented in this article has been
funded under the project title C-30 MOVE by
the Swiss University Conference and the
Universities of Berne, Lausanne, Neuchatel,
Zurich and EPFL.
Notes
1. In the UK, for instance, average per capita
consumption is 150 litres per day.
2. For details about nominated cities, see:
http://ethisphere.com/2020-global-sustainability-
centres/.

3. At current extraction rates, Abu Dhabis oil
reserves should last for another 90 years
(Reiche, 2010).
4. The UAE is believed to suffer from high
unaccounted-for levels of unemployment
masked by public service employment.
5. For greater detail regarding ADWEAs tariffs,
please visit: www.rsb.gov.ae/En/PrimaryMenu/
index.aspx?PriMenu_ID=177andCatMenu_ID=
67andSubCatMenu_ID=152.
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