Gulf Futurism and Environmental Authoritarianism in the Middle East

With analyses of new environmentalist and futuristic megaprojects in Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates, this research project hypothesizes that green transition in the Middle East is not just a matter of technical mitigation and adaptation but just as much a product of political ideas that have consequences for national systems of control and coercion, in that many of the technologies introduced through green tech can be used for surveillance, disinformation, censorship and biometric population control. Where do futurist ideas come from, and what kind of work do they do in society?