dubai

So when Dubai does it it's tourism, but when Chinese do it it's a bullying tactic?

It's not impossible (the artificial ski slope in Dubai maintains a similar gradient) but it takes a tremendous amount of energy.

And I trust that over time Dubai will solve some of the problems which annoyed this author.

I don't remember Dubai building military installations, only selling mansions to those who can afford it.

Did Dubai do it in waters that are claimed by other countries?

Took a surf trip to Sri Lanka year before last, when I had to be in Dubai for a project.

I have no doubt that Dubai will still exist as a city in the future.

I think the most likely outcome is that Dubai will become a satellite city of Abu Dhabi, and the economic (and possibly political) activity of Dubai will increasingly become dependent upon that city.

Specific players, like Dubai World, may perish or be mauled.

My hunch is that Dubai is a durable institution.

Does Dubai do it in contested international waters?

But Dubai and Singapore are real places not under threat by pirates, while I can't think of a libertarian society that actually exists anywhere.

Construction workers in Dubai is a great analogy to "voluntary" sex work.

This sort of "investment" is not very different from the sort of tribalistic "make it rain" spectacle you saw blowhard masters of local fiefdoms in Dubai pull, or continue to see in other Gulf Arab states, just to point to one widely-recognised example.

"The US rating agency Moody's has warned that Dubai faces a "systemic increase in debt" after borrowing abroad on a huge scale to fund its construction boom, raising the risk of a financing crunch unless richer neighbours in the United Arab Emirates offer support." - Oct 13, 2008.

Dubai is an amazing and special place, not to be dismissed lightly and put into some prefab category.

It's harder to really understand the economic and strategic drivers behind Dubai.

The title makes as much sense as 'Going undercover as a construction worker' and then writing about a construction worker kept as a slave in Dubai.