United Arab Emirates

The United Arab Emirates is a federation of seven emirates where Abu Dhabi and Dubai exercise power disproportionate to the constitutional design. Abu Dhabi holds roughly 90% of the UAE's oil reserves and controls the federal budget, while Dubai has diversified into tourism, logistics, real estate, and financial services — creating a dual-metabolism economy where one emirate runs on hydrocarbons and another on services. The UAE's governance structure gives the ruler of Abu Dhabi the presidency and the ruler of Dubai the prime ministry as permanent conventions, concentrating federal authority in two families. The country has positioned itself as a global hub for talent and capital flight, attracting Russian oligarchs, Indian entrepreneurs, and British expatriates through zero income tax, golden visa programmes, and strategic neutrality. The biological parallel is a colonial organism where two dominant polyps (Abu Dhabi and Dubai) direct resource allocation for the colony, while the five smaller emirates function as dependent structures receiving transfers.