New Books Network Christian Henderson, "Monarchies of Extraction: The Gulf States in the Global Food System" (Cambridge UP, 2026)
Apr 12, 2026
Christian Henderson, a Leiden lecturer and author of Monarchies of Extraction, maps how Gulf states became 'inverted farms' dependent on massive food imports. He traces agrarian change, foreign-led technocratic farming, state agribusiness accumulation, transnational supply chains, land investments in Africa, and how food shapes politics, identity, and crisis responses in the region.
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Gulf States As Inverted Farms
- Gulf states function as 'inverted farms' that import vast amounts of agricultural commodities rather than producing them domestically.
- Henderson notes the Arab region imports ~$100 billion in food annually, with the Gulf (≈11% population) accounting for about half, revealing dependency on external land and resources.
Food Reveals Gulf Integration In Global Capitalism
- Treating the Gulf as capitalist actors shows they are core to global value flows, not marginal rentier exceptions.
- Henderson argues food imports and unequal value distribution reveal the Gulf's core-periphery extraction of environmental and social costs.
Water Pumps Replaced Indigenous Irrigation Knowledge
- Postwar interventions and imported technology replaced local irrigation knowledge with pumps that enabled rapid groundwater depletion.
- Henderson recounts how foreign agencies promoted mechanized equipment, which drained Arabia's aquifers and ended traditional water management.
