Death will unlikely feature among the expectations people harbor as they head to shopping malls. But death is never incapable of surprise, and the tragic loss this week of nineteen lives, most of whom toddlers, in a fire at one of Qatar’s largest shopping malls is a brutal reminder of that fact.
An investigation was promptly ordered into the causes of the fire. And arrest warrants were issued against, among others, the owner of the mall and the owner of the nursery that saw thirteen of its toddler customers and four of its teachers perish in the fire.
While commendable, those measures are far from adequate if the goal is to prevent such tragedies happening again.
Reportedly, the immediate cause of the fire is human error (a fire at a shop below the nursery) and technical failure (alarms not sounding off in a timely manner). To blame the tragedy on human error and technical failure, however, would be disrespectful of the dead and their families.
The underlying cause appears to be the version of “state capitalism” widely practiced in Qatar and the other fossil-fuel-rich countries of the Arabian Peninsula, whereby vast swaths of the private sector are owned by members of the sprawling royal families, their allies, or their associates. The result is an environment where corners are occasionally cut on various regulations, including on safety, to avoid offending the well-connected business owner, let alone those with the same family name as the country’s ruler.
The Villaggio fire seems to be a case in point. While the results of the investigation are yet to be announced, the facts so far known are telling. The nursery that bore the brunt of the tragedy was owned by the daughter of Qatar’s cabinet minister of culture, Sky News reported. Also, local newspapers revealed, the nursery, which had operated for years, was not licensed. The owner of the nursery is one of those targeted by the attorney general’s arrest warrants for “interrogation.” It is not clear if charges will be filed against her.
To be clear, the engagement of the Gulf countries’ ruling elites or their families into the private sector does not necessarily resemble what one can see in other developing countries where a predatory bureaucracy or a corrupt elite syphon off the fruits of market policies. Perhaps with the partial exception of Saudi Arabia, the largest of the six members constituting the Gulf Cooperation Council, the Gulf states are small emirates where the image of the state is overlaid on societies that are largely tribal in structure and relationships.
Granted, at times tribal allegiance is just bought off through grants of certain sectors in the economy (such as retail). However, absent a developed entrepreneurial class, the state sometimes has no choice but to lead the charge itself in owning and operating private enterprises in the sectors the nascent business community shows no appetite for.
This kind of “state capitalism” is nothing novel; Japan, South Korea, and Taiwan, to mention just a few examples, have all adopted some form of it in the late nineteenth-century and mid-twentieth-century, respectively, as they sought to modernize their economies.
The difference between such precedents, however, and what one witnesses in the Arabian Gulf is the extent to which projects favored or partially owned by the state are exempt, fully or partially, from regulations.
This is particularly worrying in Qatar, which as anyone living here would say has witnessed a dramatic construction boom over the past six years, with tens of skyscrapers darting out of the landscape -- in Downtown Doha, towering over the Corniche, and elsewhere. And more construction fever is anticipated as Qatar prepares in earnest for hosting the World Cup 2022 games.
On the other hand, the malls in the Gulf countries are much more than shopping venues. Paco Underhil, the author of Call of the Mall, would probably say that malls have indeed transcended their shopping function everywhere. But two features specific to the Arab Gulf make the mall a particularly important component in the labor and social equation in those countries.
First, thanks to a combination of inclement weather most of the year and a conservative society that is at best uneasy about public places of social mingling, the shopping mall is the only truly public space where both nationals and expatriates can spend their leisure time.
Second, with hardly any cultural events and a paucity of entertainment options, the Gulf countries offer the mall as the answer to the routine question on the minds of expats, especially with families: where should I go on weekend? And we should remember that these countries rely heavily in their workforce on expats -- over 80 per cent in places like Dubai and Doha.
So instead of getting contented with an investigation and a few arrests, the Qatari leadership should re-envision its bureaucracy so as to ensure the latter’s autonomy and effectiveness in enforcing regulations. This would be the best way to honor those whose lives death claimed, unlikely, at the mall.
