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As Latin America has moved leftward, why have the governments of Brazil, Chile, and Uruguay pursued moderate, gradual change, whereas their counterparts in Venezuela, Bolivia, and Ecuador have proceeded with considerable economic and political radicalism? Comparative analysis and case studies of Brazil and Bolivia indicate that backlash against market reform and the differential strength of party institutions do not satisfactorily explain this striking difference. Instead, natural resource rents and commodity booms and busts play a crucial role. The unearned windfalls produced by bonanzas inspire risk-acceptance among political leaders and common citizens, which can prompt ideological radicalism and political confrontation. This argument, based on a novel, cognitive-psychological microfoundation, contributes to theories of the rentier state and the \"resource curse.\"

This article argues that rentier states stand in contrast to states that have to rely on domestic resource extraction. They display a particular path to state-formation that by and large defies the European path of state-formation: natural resource dependence (mainly oil dependence) has created weak states that are autonomous from societal demands and that do not rely on domestic taxation. State-formation has not been accompanied by political accountability, transparency, or what Charles Tilly has termed the 'civilianisation of government'. In rentier states the expenditure side of public revenues is most clearly linked to a state-building agenda of creating societal peace and political acquiescence. On a theoretical level, this article offers a new reading of state-formation based on the form and the performance of the state. Focusing on a functional understanding of statehood, it thereby highlight where Arab states are strong (security function and in times of oil booms, welfare function) and where they are weak (representation function, and in times of fiscal crisis, welfare function).

Following the guiding thread of recent Ecuadorian economic history, a review of the attempts of several Latin American natural-resource-rich countries to climb the ladder of the international division of labor indicates that the construction of a particular perspective on development with the goal of reducing dependence on international commodity prices is nurtured by dependency theory and by the irruption of environmental thinking in development studies. The Ecuadorian state embarked upon the pursuit of a better position in the world economy mainly during its oil booms (1972–1981 and 2003–2014). Since the twilight of the last century, the state’s embrace of an official environmental discourse and growing social environmental awareness have increasingly held sway in development policy making, but the end of the most recent commodities cycle and the COVID-19 crisis have seen a highly indebted economy in which dependence on exports of natural resources and imports of manufactured products persists as the hallmark of a peripheral state. Siguiendo el hilo conductor de la historia económica reciente de Ecuador, una revisión de los intentos de varios países latinoamericanos ricos en recursos naturales por ascender en la jerarquía de la división internacional del trabajo indica que la construcción de una perspectiva particular del desarrollo con el objetivo de reducir la dependencia de los precios internacionales de los productos básicos se nutre de la teoría de la dependencia y de la irrupción del pensamiento ambiental en los estudios del desarrollo. El estado ecuatoriano se lanzó a la búsqueda de una mejor posición en la economía mundial, principalmente durante sus auges petroleros (1972-1981 y 2003-2014). Desde el ocaso del siglo pasado, la adopción por parte del Estado de un discurso ambiental oficial y la creciente conciencia ambiental social han prevalecido cada vez más en la formulación de políticas de desarrollo, pero el final del ciclo de las materias primas más reciente y la crisis del COVID-19 han llevado a una economía muy endeudada en la que persiste la dependencia de las exportaciones de recursos naturales y la importación de productos manufacturados como sello de un estado periférico.

Do oil busts destabilize petrostates? This article asserts that existing political resource curse theories overpredict the likelihood of instability during oil busts because they overlook petrostates' agency. It argues that, by employing the \"petrostates' toolkit\"-a collection of strategies for mitigating the negative consequences of low oil prices-most oil producers can survive even prolonged oil busts. Through within-case comparisons of thirty petrostates' political stability before and after the 2014 oil price collapse, it finds that most petrostates were more or equally stable during the bust than before it. The article also presents a case study showing how Saudi Arabia used the petrostates' toolkit to remain politically stable after the 2014 collapse. The article concludes that petrostates are not \"over a barrel\" during oil busts.

This article aims to analyze the implications of the Arab uprisings on the Rentier State Theory (RST). Initial conceptualization of rentier state was based on the impact of externally generated oil revenues on the economic development as well as the nature of the state and state-society relations. Especially since 2000s the literature has been largely dominated by the study of relationship between rentier states and democratization. Based on the observations of the earlier literature, most of the studies argued that there was a strong correlation between rentierism and lack of democracy. There were also few studies that challenged this argument. The Arab uprisings should lead to the revisiting of the arguments of the RST. In only two of the rentier states, namely Bahrain and Libya, has there been a widespread uprising. Both ended through outside intervention, one in support of the regime, the other against it. In other rentier states, limited protests did not lead to uprisings. Therefore, the question is twofold: First, what do the full-scale uprisings in two rentier states tell us? Second, what does it tell us that with the exception of these two states, all other rentier states have been able to maintain stability? Bu makale Arap ayaklanmalarının Rantiye Devlet Kuramı (RDK) açısından sonuçlarını analiz etmektedir. RDK öncelikle petrol gelirlerinin petrol üreten ükelerin ekonomileri, devlet yapıları ve devlet-toplum ilişkileri üzerinde yaptığı etkileri incelemiştir. Ancak özellikle 2000Tİ yıllarda araştırmalar büyük ölçüde rantiye devlet-emokrasi ilişkisi üzerine yoğunlaşmış ve literatürün önemli bir kısmında rantiye devletlerin demokratikleşemeyeceği iddiası öne sürülmüştür. Az sayıda bazı çalışma ise bu iddiaya karşı çıkmıştır. Arap ayaklanmaları RDK’nin iddaialarını tekrar gözden geçirmeyi zorunlu kılmıştır. Rantiye devletlerin sadece ikisinde, Bahreyn ve Libya’da, geniş anlamda ayaklanmalar gerçekleşmiştir. Bu iki ayaklanma da dış müdahale ile sonuçlanmıştır. Bahreyn’de dış müdahale ayaklanmayı bastırmaya yönelikken, Libya’da ayaklanmayı desteklemek üzere dış müdahale gerçekleşmiştir. Diğer rantiye devletlerde ise sadece çok sınırlı protestolar lmuştur. O halde bu durum iki soruyu gündeme getirmektedir: Öncelikle, iki rantiye devletteki ayaklanmalar bize neyi söylemektedir? Öte yandan, bu iki istisna dışında, rantiye devletlerde istikrarın korunması nasıl açıklanabilir?

In oil-rich Gulf monarchies, fiscal constraints and demographic growth are leading to the exclusion of young citizens from the established social contract as government jobs—the dominant channel of patronage in the region—are becoming unavailable to them. We show that such outsider citizens constitute a new, politically consequential social class that is exposed to a much less attractive private labour market where they compete with low-cost migrant workers. The dualization of labour markets for citizens provides a new lens for understanding regional political unrest since the late 2000s and new group interests emerging around labour and migration policy, in which labour organizations representing outsiders have started to display solidarity with migrant workers. The new insider–outsider cleavages require a revision of rentier state theory’s claims about (the absence of) class formation and the role of inequality in rentier politics. They help us expand and refine Eurocentric theories of labour market dualism.

The article examines Qatar’s foreign policy during the reign of Emir Hamad bin Khalifa Al Thani (1995–2013), focusing on the foundations and instruments of its ambitious, hyperactive, and transformative approach. It highlights how this small rentier state developed and adapted its foreign policy strategy over time. Article frames the hyperactive foreign policy of a small state as a temporal phenomenon, pointing out to the unintended consequences of a hyperactive foreign policy leading eventually to its recalibration.

Do oil busts destabilize petrostates? This article asserts that existing political resource curse theories overpredict the likelihood of instability during oil busts because they overlook petrostates’ agency. It argues that, by employing the “petrostates’ toolkit”—a collection of strategies for mitigating the negative consequences of low oil prices—most oil producers can survive even prolonged oil busts. Through within-case comparisons of thirty petrostates’ political stability before and after the 2014 oil price collapse, it finds that most petrostates were more or equally stable during the bust than before it. The article also presents a case study showing how Saudi Arabia used the petrostates’ toolkit to remain politically stable after the 2014 collapse. The article concludes that petrostates are not “over a barrel” during oil busts.

This study investigates potential differences in attitudes towards corporate social responsibility (CSR) between Saudis and Muslims from other predominately Islamic countries. We propose that Saudi Arabia's unique rentier-state welfare and higher education systems account for these distinctions. In evaluating our propositions, we replicate Brammer et al. (J Bus Eth 71(3):229-243, 2007) survey on attitudes towards CSR using a sample of Saudi undergraduate and graduate business students and compare the results against data from subjects in other majority Muslim countries. In addition, this work examines possible differences within the Saudi sample with respect to sex and academic level. Our results indicate that our Saudi subjects maintain higher expectations for corporations' social responsibility within their supply chain than the Brammer et al.'s sample. In contrast, Muslims in the Brammer et al.'s sample hold higher expectations for corporations in supporting societal development and poverty alleviation in comparison to the Saudi sample. We also find within the Saudi sample that females and subjects at higher academic levels are more inclined to hold corporations responsible for social issues related to CSR than males and subjects in lower academic levels. We examine these findings, explore their implications, and propose areas for future research.

Oman is considering adopting the latest e-governance technology, including Blockchain-based. While much research was conducted into the benefits and risks of Blockchain-based in information systems and finance fields, fewer researchers investigated the opportunities and risks associated with adopting Blockchain-based frameworks for governance and public administration, especially in highly bureaucratic, centralized rentier states, such as Oman. As the first phase of an exploratory sequential mixed-methods study, our purpose was to identify key governance problems in contemporary Oman and analyze each problem against evidence drawn from the relevant parts of the Blockchain-based and e-governance literature to evaluate the potential utility, risks and limitations associated with adopting block-chained e-governance solutions in the Sultanate. Our initial results indicate that there are advantages for states, such as Oman, from being an early mover into block-chained e-governance systems, including greater cost efficiency, drastically improved accuracy and reliability of information systems, transparency and accountability of public services, and an upgrade in the overall level of legitimacy and public trust in the institutions of governance. However, more research into the risks related to reconciling block-chained systems with the dynamics of labor, tax reforms and centralized authority in a rentier social contract is required.