Legitimacy and Coercion in Rentier States

Many MENA states are viewed as illegitimate, yet the coercive apparatuses of such states remain strong, because rentier economies create state systems which are detached from their constituencies. For some MENA states, most capital is generated by external rent such as oil export revenue or foreign military financing, which yields excessively low, sometimes nonexistent tax rates.

Such low tax rates provide incentives for foreign nationals to settle in some MENA states, fueling cosmopolitan societies fractured by nationalistic divides. For example, expatriots outnumber UAE nationals by a factor of 9 to 1, which fuels a disunified populous. Such diverse constituencies are common in a number of major cities across MENA--Doha, Abu Dhabi, Dubai, Cairo, and others. Yet, though the governments of rentier states may be seen as illegitimate, they retain coercive abilities which make them difficult to depose. 

In her article, "The Robustness of Authoritarianism in the Middle East: Exceptionalism in Comparative Perspective," Eva Bellin outlines four distinct properties of the "coercive apparatus" which allows a disconnected government to retain power in the rentier state system:

• Fiscal health

• Successful maintenance of international support networks

• Level of institutionalization (patrimonial logic with cronyism, or meritocratic and operating with a 'higher purpose')

• The degree to which it faces a high level of popular mobilization

Though fiscal health has been waning as a result of decreased oil prices, many MENA states remain entrenched in patrimonial logic and connected to international support networks from which they derive power and legitimacy, especially allies like China, Russia, and sometimes the United States. Therefore, some efforts toward popular mobilization have been squelched, as was the case in Bahrain and, to some extent, Syria.