Soft power“ and the international image transformation of the rentier state in the 21st century: a case study of the united arab emirates

Master Thesis „Soft Power and the International Image Transformation of the Rentier State in the 21st Century: A Case Study of the United Arab Emirates“ analyzes the long-term and medium-term strategic goals and the soft power generation policies set by the political regime of the UAE, designed to transform the international image of the state. The main issue under consideration is how the UAE actively generate soft power to transform the international image of the state from the "black gold" dealers into the knowledge society leader of the 21st century, while focusing only to the external development policy with no visible changes in the internal politics, in such way creating the new image on the basis of a state which to this day has an autocratic form of government and conservative domestic policies. The purpose of this study is to explain why the UAE seek to transform the international image and become the global leaders of soft power in the 21st century, without making changes to internal policies of the state, based on the theories of the rentier state, state image and soft power. The analysis of theories revealed that the classical rentier state theory supplemented by the features of the late rentier state can explain how the specific structure of the political regime of the GCC states determines the actions of the states foreign policy for preserving the state's international power, stability and internal welfare in the dynamic environment of international relations of the XXI century. But to explain why the political regime is trying to transform its image by generating soft power, adapted rentier state theory needs to be matched with the S. Anholt's theoretical concept of the image of the state. According to the political conception the image of the state is defined as the reputation of the state, which is formed by the development and promotion of actions and products that are valued by the target audience. The relationship between the activities of the rentier state and the content of the reputation of the state are consolidated with the content of the soft power, which in the context of the research is understood as the ability to influence the behavior of others and to convince about the justice of the goals by using the methods of attraction and persuasion. The attractiveness is understood, not as the visual expression, but as the significant content and results of the state's development activities, which contribute to the solutions of global issues and by this help to earn the international recognition. The analysis of the UAE policy strategies shows that ambitious soft power policies are only the driving force to ensure the national interests and international power of the UAE. The state wants to construct a modern narrative of its international role according to which the UAE would present themselves as a global leader of soft power and a role model for others to follow, at the same time ensuring the satisfaction of the state's society, the fascination of the international community, long-term state revenue by external investors and the stable survival of the state and the preservation of its international power after the end of natural resource era. The model being developed so far is rather Utopian, since soft power projects are to a large extent financed by the income gained from the trade in natural resources. Further research should analyze the sustainability of the image of the global soft power leader based on a rentier state structure, trying to find answers how long such a model can last and whether this could be just a short-term solution or the result of a long-term and more meaningful movement of forces