The Gulf’s first Western-style Monday-Friday workweek for public employees, rumored for years, is about to become a reality in the United Arab Emirates (UAE), the Arabian Peninsula’s business hub where foreign residents outnumber locals nearly nine to one. Private companies are left with the flexibility to choose what “serves their business best.”

The federation of seven emirates, particularly Dubai, seeks to position itself as a global financial and logistics hub on par with international cities like Singapore and Hong Kong. Not everyone agrees, though. Reforms labeled “Western” irritate the more conservative elements of Gulf societies. Some say the Arab region should stick firmly to its Islamic identity. “Globalization, besides dissolving the identities of peoples, is a fiery furnace that devours the wealth of nations,” Oman’s Grand Mufti, Ahmed Bin Hamad Al-Khalili, said in a tweet.

The UAE Minister of Human Resources and Emiratization, Abdulrahman Al Awar said the change “does not come in isolation,” rather in the context of “multiple reforms.” Since 2020, the UAE decriminalized cohabitation for unmarried couples and premarital sex, allowed civil marriage, and said it would set up a new court for non-Muslim family members.

Source Credit: Al-Monitor