Qatar’s emir, Sheikh Hamad bin Khalifa Al-Thani, pictured above, announced on Monday that he would step down and pass power to his 33-year-old son, Sheikh Tamim bin Hamad Al-Thani.
On June 24, Qatar’s emir, Sheikh Hamad bin Khalifa Al-Thani, ended weeks of speculation by announcing that he was to step down and pass power to his son, 33-year-old Sheikh Tamim bin Hamad Al-Thani. Although the formal handover marks the endpoint in a carefully planned process, the voluntary change of leadership nevertheless is unprecedented in modern Persian Gulf history. With much of the regional “Arab Spring” unrest rooted in youth-led discontent with aging political leaders, the gas-rich state of Qatar has swum decisively against the tide by accelerating the transition to a new generation. While this confirms the country as the regional maverick, Qatari domestic or international policy will likely not change in any substantive manner.
Sheikh Hamad took power from his father on June 27, 1995, at the relatively youthful age of 44. Along with the foreign minister, Sheikh Hamad bin Jassim Al-Thani (since 2007 also the prime minister), Sheikh Hamad had grown increasingly impatient with his father’s failure to develop Qatar’s energy infrastructure. Once in power, Sheikh Hamad and his eponymous prime/foreign minister became the architects of Qatar’s startling emergence as a regional power with international reach, rooted in the careful exploitation of gas output from the giant North Field that straddles Qatar’s maritime boundary with Iran.
Massive investment and long-term planning resulted in Qatar becoming the world’s largest exporter of liquefied natural gas in 2006 and reaching a production maximum of 77 million tons per year in 2010. Simultaneously, the emir and the prime minister spearheaded a strategy of robust internationalization that positioned Qatar as a diplomatic mediator in regional conflict zones and attracted top-end educational institutions and sporting events to the emirate. Their strategy paid dividends with the creation of Education City, featuring six leading U.S. universities, in the 2000s and the successful bid to host the 2022 FIFA soccer world cup.
Qatari leaders also threw their support behind the uprisings in Libya and Syria and developed close ties with the Muslim Brotherhood in Egypt, to the concern of neighboring states such as Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates. Together with Al Jazeera, which was the emir’s brainchild while he was still heir apparent in 1994, these initiatives put Qatar well and truly on the map as an innovative and energetic new actor in international affairs. Further, the Qatar Investment Authority, chaired by the prime minister, embarked upon an aggressive global expansion predicated largely on prestige acquisitions of iconic brands and landmark buildings.
In his speech to the nation on June 25, the outgoing emir explained that “I had not desired power for the sake of power nor endeavored to rule for personal motives.” His decision to hand power to Sheikh Tamim — his fourth son (and the second with his favored wife, Sheikha Mozah) — was widely anticipated, as Tamim had gradually assumed responsibility for managing Qatari domestic affairs — in much the same way that Sheikh Hamad accumulated de facto power in the early-1990s before his own accession to the leadership. As such, little change is expected in the general direction of Qatari policymaking, as Sheikh Tamim has been the architect and chair of Qatar’s long-term National Vision 2030 development plan and the head of the Qatar 2022 Supreme Committee in charge of preparing Qatar for the soccer World Cup. Moreover, he and Sheikha Mozah set up Supreme Councils in education, health and other sectors that likely will continue to ensure an influential role for the former first lady.
Where change is likely is in the style rather than the substance of decision-making. With the vastly influential prime/foreign minister expected to step down (to be replaced likely by Sheikh Abdullah bin Nasser Al-Thani and Khaled al-Attiyah, respectively), there will inevitably be a void left by Hamad bin Jassim’s intensely personal style of networking and leadership. Hamad bin Jassim’s reputation as a “non-stop mediator” will also not easily be replicated by the new team lacking his extensive range of contacts and experience. Yet Sheikh Tamim had been becoming increasingly active in Qatari regional and foreign policy in recent months, including mediating between Hamas and the King of Jordan in 2012, coordinating with Saudi Arabia on means to support the Syrian opposition, and meeting with Secretary of State John Kerry only last weekend. Moreover, if al-Attiyah steps up from minister of state for foreign affairs to foreign minister, he will impart a degree of continuity to the transition.
Yet challenges do face the new leadership in Doha. Chief among these will be managing the strained relationships with neighboring Gulf states irked by Qatar’s maverick stance toward the Arab Spring. In Syria, too, Qatari policy arguably overreached itself, and Sheikh Tamim may need to recalibrate policy to better align Doha’s capabilities and intent. Analysts will also watch for any shift in Qatar’s policy toward the Muslim Brotherhood as this has left Qatar increasingly isolated within the six-member Gulf Cooperation Council and at odds with international partners.
More broadly, two further points of interest emerge. Qatar now is in the unusual position of having two living former leaders. Former Emir Sheikh Khalifa bin Hamad Al-Thani assumed the honorific title of “Father Emir” when he returned to Qatar in 2004 after a period in exile; will a much younger Sheikh Hamad settle into a similarly backseat role? And what, if any, spillover effect might Qatar’s unprecedented transition have on other regional rulers? 2013 already has seen the pope and the queen of the Netherlands voluntarily hand over power, but the Qatari case brings the “year of abdications” uncomfortably close to home for many other aging leaders.
Kristian Coates Ulrichsen is the Baker Institute fellow for Kuwait. His research examines the changing position of Persian Gulf states in the global order, as well as the emergence of longer-term, nonmilitary challenges to regional security. Previously, he worked as senior Gulf analyst at the Gulf Center for Strategic Studies and as co-director of the Kuwait Programme on Development, Governance and Globalisation in the Gulf States at the London School of Economics.