The overlap of new religious and new economic paradigms in the

late twentieth century is nowhere as obvious as in Kuwait. Cyberpunk , postmodern as it is , stands for the exhaustion of the industrial economy , the exhaustion of the avant-garde, and the exhaustion of modern cultural values. Compared with postmodern Kuwait* , Dubai is highly modern. In the 1970s and 80s , Kuwait and Saudi Arabia imported Western modern architecture en masse. A wave of Islamization caught the Middle East at the same time. In other words , modernization was organized in the Gulf precisely at the moment when the Arab world began aborting modernity. Interestingly , this was also the time when the Western world was switching from Futurism to the cyberpunk-postmodern.

In reality , Gulf regimes were always afraid of being modern

because modernity brings democratic ideals and practices. They even the bring de r atic ideals and pctice                In Kuwait , the present cyberpunk situation is the result of these constellations.

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*Let's not forget that postmodernism was officially born in nearby Iran in 1979 when modern ideals were, for the first time, very consistently questioned. 

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"Gᑌᒪᖴ ᖴᑌTᑌᖇIᔕᗰ"

Fatima Al-Qadiri and Sophia Al-Maria find the taste of an

avant-garde culture in the Middle East that they name “Gulf Futurism.” In an article praised by Bruce Sterling , the artists describe the Gulf as

"a region that has been hyper-driven into a present made up of interior wastelands, municipal master plans and environmental collapse, thus making it a projection of our global future. (…) Over the last fifty years , the Arabian Gulf has given birth to a very particular brand of futurism. It is a phenomena marked by a deranged optimism about the sustainability of both oil reserves and late capitalism. Similar to early 20th century Euro-Futurism and mid-century American kitsch and retro futurism, Gulf Futurism is evident in a dominant class concerned with master-planning and world-building, while the youth culture preoccupied with fast cars, fast tech and viddying a bit of ultra-violence." [8]

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The picture is correct and applies to the whole Gulf. Still

one would do better disentangling the futurist elements from the cyberpunk ones. Master-planning (which was frantically practiced in Kuwait in the 1960s and 70s though never really implemented) is a futurist activity. But the youth culture appears to be more cyberpunk, which becomes graphically clear in the following description. The Gulf is marked by

"the isolation of individuals via technology, wealth and reactionary Islam, the corrosive elements of consumerism on the soul and industry on the earth, the erasure of history from our memories and our surroundings and finally, our dizzying collective arrival in a future no one was ready for."

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So much for Gulf Futurism. Let's come back to Dubai. Is Dubai ,

which still radiates much 20th century positive Futurist energy , already heading towards the cyberpunk culture of Kuwait? Dubai is built on a fragile ground and any sort of invasion similar to what happened in Kuwait in 1990 would probably plunge Dubai into the most authentic cyberpunk syndrome the world has ever seen.

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Most people would today say that Dubai is ahead of Kuwait

because it is better organized , cleaner , etc. Kuwait is even eagerly emulating the Dubai model building its own Jumeira resort on its Failaka Island. However , in reality Dubai is not ahead , but Cyberpunk Kuwait is much ahead of Futurist Dubai. Kuwait is Dubai’s Future.

Kuwait Times Oct 11, 1971