Since 2010 there has been a surprising increase in mobilization efforts by many different groups in Kuwait. These groups have united many different tribes, urban-rural groups, and ideological factions under a banner calling for political reform. In this unprecedented environment, activists organized the country’s largest protests ever. These events are puzzling if rentier theory, the foremost explanation for durable authoritarianism in the Gulf, is applied to the situation. Generally speaking, rentierism argues that rents foster socio-political stagnation that alters state-society relations (Luciani 1994, Beblawi 1998). Yet, within this literature there are intrinsic differences between three approaches that result in divergent explanations for the protest events. This leads to the question: how and to what degree did the issue of rent distribution influence or contribute to mobilization efforts by groups? The classic approach to rentierism states that civil society groups are primarily rent-seeking units concerned with stable access to rents (Brynen 1992, Herb 1999, Ross 2001). From this view, opposition groups mobilized because rents were not being distributed effectively, generating a crisis in their relationship with the state. Another approach argues that the distribution of rents causes’ conflict instead of stifling it, because the way revenues are deployed fosters civil society opposition (Okruhlik 2009, Sandbakken 2006). From this perspective, current protests by groups can be explained as being the failure of long-term distribution strategies. The last approach theorizes that rents only work to weaken civil society by working in concert with the traditional legitimacy and historical institutions of the regime (Moore and Peters 2009, Gause and Yom 2012, Crystal 1989). If this view is correct, than the protests are the result of degradation in the traditional legitimacy and institutional coherence of the Kuwaiti state, which means that unaided, rents cannot assert state authority. This papers’ objective is to test these different theoretical outcomes. Kuwait is an excellent case study due to its characteristics as a classic rentier state and the intensity of recent mobilization efforts. The study proceeds in two steps. First, by qualitative interviews conducted with activists, tribal leaders, and others who were involved in the protests in February to June 2012 and March to August 2013. Second, by carrying out an analysis of economic and socio-historical data to understand the context of the situation. This research contributes to the literature by unpacking the black box of rentier theory to understand its mechanisms and explanations more accurately.

“Your Portfolio, Your Values”: Bringing Shar’ia Compliant Financial Products in the United States In the past decade, the market share of Sharia-compliant assets has grown dramatically, with a current global value of over a trillion dollars and a potential market of three to four trillion dollars. Islamic securities have even attracted the interest of Western financial institutions, and European countries are in the process of reforming tax, legal, and regulatory frameworks to accommodate Shar’ia-compliant investments. Shar’ia compliant financial products in the United States, however, remain under-available, under-developed, and under-studied due to substantial political, legal, and regulatory challenges. For example, there is no formalized system of accreditation for Muslim scholars, leading to a plurality of opinions on the ethical soundness of a given product. Given such an uncertain landscape, American regulators and institutions must simply trust that Muslim scholars are competent enough to asses the compliance of complicated financial products with Islamic law. Additional problems arise because financial institutions advertising Shar’ia-based retail products risk considerable backlash due to a growing suspicion of Shar’ia law; potential customers, meanwhile, are disincentivized by taxation schemes structured around interest—a feature that Islamic products inherently lack due to Qur’anic prohibitions on usury. Products or transactions may also end up being doubly taxed, or exempt from tax deduction and redundancies in regulation complicate the securitization of Islamic mortgages. This paper grounds its analysis in a combination of Islamic jurisprudence, federal securities law, and relevant statutory and common law to examine the harmonization of Islamic financial products with existing legal and regulatory frameworks. It includes a discussion about the benefits and drawbacks of a financially plural system that makes room for Islamic products alongside conventional securities. Attention is also paid to the various political challenges that have thwarted the growth of Shar’ia-compliant products in the United States, including standard practices in the American financial marketplace and widespread ignorance surrounding Islam.

This paper analyzes the institutional failure of Turkish Tobacco Bank project existed between 1938 and 1961. Tobacco, the most important export crop of Turkey, was taken under state monopoly by special legislations in the 1930s. Contrary to the promises of the legislations for a heavily regulated and smoothly functioning market orchestrated by the Monopoly (TEKEL), Turkish tobacco market was an arena of “eternal anarchy and chaos,” as described by many primary historical sources. The “chaotic” atmosphere was fed by struggling social, political and economical policies of market actors – tobacco producers, merchants, experts and the Monopoly - around several conflicts such as prices, grading, warehousing conditions and credit system. As a radical and absolute solution to the unending problems of tobacco market, an institutional reform package was proposed by tobacco experts in the war years. According to the original package, producers would have been organized under cooperatives, sales executed in exchange markets, and both the cooperatives and exchange markets established by the main regulatory institution, Turkish Tobacco Bank. Despite major revisions in the reform package during the post-war years, the idea to establish a “regulatory institution” – apart from the Monopoly - gained support among Turkish governing elites. Between 1946 and 1957, a compulsory withholding was cut directly from tobacco producers to raise the necessary startup capital for the projected institution. The foundational law of the institution was enacted in 1950, and the targeted capital was raised by 1957, however the tobacco bank could never be established. In this paper, I examine this interesting, informative and challenging history of the institutional failure of Turkish Tobacco Bank depending on the primary historical sources such as State Archives, tobacco journals, local newspapers and personal archives of the Monopoly experts. Revealing a direct and hidden taxation practice in tobacco market, the examination also provokes to question the prevailing arguments of modern Turkish historiography about the lack of taxation in the agricultural sector during the Republican era. I discuss the challenging historiographic insights hinted by the not-well known story of Turkish Tobacco Bank, and show that the direct and hidden taxation practice had a decisive impact on the discourses, demands and policies of different market actors.

Assyrians and Syriacs in Sweden. Could Soccer Solve the Quest for Belonging? Since 1967 Assyrians and Syriacs has immigrated to Sweden from countries in the Middle East. The integration of them into the Swedish society has often been presented as a success story (Pripp, 1994). The most obvious example is probably the outstanding performance by the two soccer teams Assyriska FF and Syrianska FC. Both teams have been able to make it all the way to the highest national division, Allsvenskan (Ackfeldt & Andersson, 2012). In this paper I am elaborating on the significance of soccer for belonging in both the “old” society and in the Swedish society. Now, this paper is written in the shadow of the present terrible situation in Syria. There are new immigration flows from the Middle East to Europe, not least to Sweden. During 2007 the city of Södertälje, south of Stockholm, received more Iraqi refugees then the whole of North America! Every month at the moment 1500 individuals from Syria is applying for asylum in Sweden and for obvious reasons almost 100% of them is guaranteed a permit to stay. Sweden is the country in Europe that receives most asylum seekers, which is quite understandable. There is and have been strong relations between relatives living in Sweden (Södertälje) and in the Middle East. A uniting force between those who decided to leave and those who decided to stay has been Assyriska FF and Syrianska FC. Their games have been broadcasted by satellite TV and followed by Assyrians and Syriacs all over the world. My intention in this paper is to show the role soccer has had and have for immigrants in Sweden, being trapped between on the one hand the demands from the “old” belonging and the demands from the “new” belonging. Ethnic soccer teams have played a significant role for facilitating this duality of demands (Deniz & Perdikaris, 2000). But it is also an aim of this paper to focus on the role soccer has played for transnational networks, bringing together individuals, families and groups in diaspora situations in Sweden with relatives in the Middle East end elsewhere. By following conversations on the internet and by carrying out interviews with immigrants in Sweden, both “old” ones and “new” ones, I have managed to get a better understanding of the role of soccer for solving the quest for belonging.