The Political Lives of Deserts

Abstract

Deserts, like any geographic setting, are not sites where geopolitical dramas simply unfold or “touch down”; rather, they actively constitute geopolitical orders. This article shows how taking deserts rather than states as an entry point can provide a unique lens on geopolitics, state making, and empire. Investigating the political lives of deserts requires asking how they are imagined, narrated, and connected across space and time, and with what effect. To do so, I consider one case of desert-to-desert connection: a long but little-known history of exchange between individuals and institutions in Arizona and the Arabian Peninsula. Taking one example from this history, I show how the “desert” as an environmental imaginary figured in the University of Arizona Environmental Research Laboratory’s joint greenhouse and desalting plant, which was initiated in Abu Dhabi in the late 1960s. Primarily drawing from archival research in the United Arab Emirates (UAE) and Arizona, I also show how this project fit into shifting geopolitical relations in the Arabian Peninsula’s colonial relations, the rise of the UAE as an independent state, and the role of experts working in the service of broader political agendas of the state and the academy, as well as their own self-interest.

沙漠, 同其它地理环境一样, 不是地缘政治剧开始或结束的地方, 而是积极地构成了地缘政治秩序。本文表明, 以沙漠而不是以国家为切入点, 可以为地缘政治、国家成立和帝国的研究提供独特的视角。研究沙漠的政治生命, 需要讨论对沙漠的假想、描述、时空关联及其影响。为此, 文章考虑了一个沙漠和沙漠的关联：一段悠久的但鲜为人知的美国亚利桑那州和阿拉伯半岛之间人员和机构交流的历史。通过这段历史中的一个例子, 文章说明了环境假想中的“沙漠”, 如何在亚利桑那大学环境研究实验室的联合温室和脱盐植物中大放异彩。该植物最先于20世纪60年代晚期, 在阿布扎比开始培育。通过在阿拉伯联合酋长国和亚利桑那州开展的档案研究, 本文还描述了该合作项目如何改变了阿拉伯半岛殖民关系中的地缘政治关系、阿拉伯联合酋长国做为独立国家的崛起、为国家和科研院校的政治议程提供服务的专家的作用、以及专家们的个人考虑。

Los desiertos, como cualquier otro escenario geográfico, no son sitios donde los dramas geopolíticos simplemente se desenvuelvan o “toquen suelo”; más que eso, ellos constituyen activamente órdenes geopolíticos. Este artículo muestra cómo el tomar a los desiertos en vez de los estados como punto de entrada puede proporcionar una lente única sobre geopolítica, construcción de estado e imperio. Investigar las vidas políticas de los desiertos demanda preguntar cómo se los imagina, narra y se los conecta a través del espacio y el tiempo, y con qué efecto. Para hacerlo, tomo en consideración un caso de conexión de desierto-a-desierto: una larga, aunque poco conocida historia de intercambio entre individuos e instituciones en Arizona y la Península Arábiga. Tomando un ejemplo de esa historia, muestro cómo figuró el “desierto” a título de imaginario ambiental en el integrado de invernadero y planta desalinizadora del Laboratorio de Investigación Ambiental de la Universidad de Arizona, que se inició en Abu Dhabi a finales de los años 1960. Apoyándome primariamente en investigación de archivos en los Emiratos Árabes Unidos (EAU) y Arizona, muestro también el modo como este proyecto encaja en las cambiantes relaciones geopolíticas dentro de las relaciones coloniales de la Península Arábiga, el ascenso de los EAU como estado independiente y el rol de los expertos que trabajan al servicio de agendas políticas de mayor alcance del estado y de la academia, lo mismo que en favor de sus propios intereses.

Key Words:

• Arabian Peninsula
• desert
• geopolitics
• historical geography
• political geography

关键词:

• ：阿拉伯半岛
• 沙漠
• 地缘政治
• 历史地理学
• 政治地理学。

Palabras clave::

• desierto
• geografía histórica
• geografía política
• geopolítica
• Península Arábiga

Notes

1 A handful of exceptions are found in comparative studies of deserts, some of which trace direct connections between two places (e.g., Francaviglia 2011; Akhter and Ormerod 2015; Biasillo and da Silva 2019; Isenberg 2019; Isenberg, Morrissey, and Warren 2019; Morrissey and Burtner 2019).

2 Decades before the primacy of hydrocarbons in writing about resources in the Arabian Peninsula, however, agriculture was an important topic in social science research on the region (e.g., Twitchell 1944, 1958; Crary 1951; Sanger 1954; Cressey 1957; Melamid 1957; van der Meulen 1957; El Mallakh 1970, 1981; Bowen-Jones and Dutton 1983).

3 UA Special Collections, UA Bio, Hodges, Carl N. 1937–, Printed Materials. Hodges’ CV updates filed with the university are inconsistent regarding his field of graduate study, which is sometimes named as meteorology, atmospheric physics, or water resources administration.

4 Elsewhere, the connection with Sheikh Zayed is described not as resulting from the magazine article but as the result of a meeting with one of Zayed’s advisors that Hodges had in Kuwait, while on a seventeen-country tour to further broadcast the greenhouse and desalting plant in Mexico (e.g., “Tiling the Desert” 1970).

5 See, by contrast, recent reports critiquing U.S. universities for accepting funding from sources in the Arabian Peninsula (e.g., Sokolove 2019).

6 UAE NARA 2631, Department of State Memorandum of Conversation: Power/Water/Food Project in Abu Dhabi, 19 August 1970.

7 Ibid.

8 UAE NARA 2631, Letter from Carl Hodges to Senator Paul J. Fannin, 28 September 1970.

9 UAE NARA 2937, Department of State Telegram: Abu Dhabi Arid Lands Research Center, University of Arizona Project, 3 December 1970, p. 1.

10 Ibid., p. 2.

11 Ibid., p. 3.

12 UAE NARA 2937, Department of State Telegram: Abu Dhabi Arid Lands Research Center, 10 December 1970.

13 Despite repeated efforts over the course of months, I have not been able to reach Hodges or any other individuals involved in the ERL before it was closed in 2015. Although it was not the focus of my research, I learned that the level of institutional malfeasance was so great and personal conflicts so severe that getting these interviews would be impossible.

14 UAE NARA 2937, Department of State Telegram: Abu Dhabi Arid Lands Research Center, University of Arizona Project, 3 December 1970, p. 4.

15 For the loan documents and extensive correspondence on this, see UA Special Collections, Harvill Presidential Correspondence Files, 1970–1971, Environmental Research Center.

16 Letter from President John P. Schaefer to Khalifa Al-Yusef, Chairman, Arid Lands Research Center Committee, Abu Dhabi, 14 July 1971. UA Special Collections, Schaefer Presidential Correspondence Files, 1971–1972, Environmental Research Center.

17 For more about the dismantling of the UA project, see Koch (2019).

18 Letter from Sayed M. H. Juma (D.G. Planning & Coordination for the State of Abu Dhabi) to UA President Richard A. Harvill, 28 December 1968, Letter No. 348/68, UA Special Collections, Harvill Presidential Correspondence Files, 1970–1971, Environmental Research Center.

Additional information

Funding

Research for this project was supported by a Fulbright Core Scholars Grant, Middle East and North Africa Regional Research Program, an Alexander von Humboldt Foundation Fellowship for Experienced Researchers, and a CUSE Grant from the Syracuse University Office of Sponsored Programs.

Notes on contributors

Natalie Koch

NATALIE KOCH is Associate Professor of Geography at Syracuse University’s Maxwell School of Citizenship and Public Affairs, Syracuse, NY 13244. E-mail: [email protected]. She is a political geographer working on state theory, geopolitics, nationalism and identity politics, and resource governance. With a regional focus on the Arabian Peninsula, she examines alternative sites of geopolitics such as spectacle, sport, science and higher education, environmental policy, and “post-oil” development schemes in resource-rich states.