Why decriminalising alcohol and ending unmarried couples ban makes economic sense for the UAE

The headlines may have been about morality, but the reason the United Arab Emirates has decriminalised alcohol and scrapped a ban on unmarried couples living together might be more to do with economics.

At the weekend, the oil-rich Arab nation announced a major overhaul of its Islamic personal laws relating to the protection of women, cohabitation, alcohol, suicide, divorce and wills.

While authorities in the UAE had long turned a blind eye to the behaviour of many expats – who account for almost 90 per cent of the population – the reforms signal a commitment by the country to market itself as a beacon of moderate Islam in the Middle East as it seeks out foreign investment in the wake of the coronavirus pandemic.  

Christopher Davidson, gulf affairs expert at Durham University, says there was “strong economic reasoning” behind the reforms, to lure tourists and foreign investment back as the country faces a mass exodus of foreign labour.

“The UAE needs tourism to bounce back and this is a final reminder to dispel any concerns that this is a friendly business and tourist destination,” Davidson says.

Oxford Economics, a UK forecaster, estimates 900,000 jobs are under threat in a population of under 10 million. A lack of tourism, falling oil prices and the postponement to 2021 of Dubai’s World Expo had further contributed to the economic downturn. 

The UAE has also recently introduced retirement visas for the first time as it seeks to woo long-term expats rather than a younger, more transient population. Dubai in particular has been aggressively marketing itself with a global campaign declaring itself “open”, and brought in remote working visas last month to bolster its population. Its recent US-brokered deal to normalise ties with Israel was also intended to bring in a flood of investment and tourism.  

But foreigners were often wary of the country due to “occasional random stories” of those who fell foul of the law, Davidson says.

“These [laws] are no longer a grey area that they once were. For people within the country it’s life as usual, these things were tolerated and openly so for many years. But it’s less about the UAE and more about the UAE on the world stage and its economic aspirations.”

While the surprise announcement caught many off guard, Davidson believes the reforms were announced on Saturday as a knee-jerk reaction to “concerns” over president-elect Joe Biden’s incoming administration. The current president, Donald Trump, had supported the three-year-long UAE and Saudi-led blockade on Qatar, and the UAE had supported Trump’s decision to leave the Iran nuclear deal in 2018.

“This is the first of many measures and announcements to prove and remind America that the UAE is a moderate Muslim force and a natural partner in the region,” he says.

It is unclear at the moment when they come into force.

One of the most seismic shifts is allowances for unmarried couples to live together for the first time. Previously, it was common for couples wanting to cohabitate to pretend to be married, or to get married, to share a home. The ban had also extended to mixed gender flatmates.

While the move does not explicitly permit sex outside of marriage, consensual sex will no longer be punished by law. This would likely go some way to repealing the country’s archaic rape laws too, where women are prohibited from reporting rape as it is considered pre-marital sex.  

The cohabitation reforms do not, however, mention abortion, pregnancy while unmarried or homosexuality – all of which are illegal in the UAE.

Byron James, a partner with Expatriate Law in Dubai, says it’s unclear whether the UAE will “create a formal status of cohabitants”, allowing de facto relationships to assume legal status and rights, or if authorities will simply no longer prosecute couples for living together. This would also raise important questions about having a child out of wedlock.

Currently, you can’t be admitted to a labour ward in the UAE or register a birth without a marriage certificate.

The decriminalisation of alcohol and co-habitation would also impact family law, James says. Alcohol is widely available in the UAE but government-issued licences, though rarely asked for, were required to buy it.

While drinking alcohol or living together while unmarried was unlikely to get a person penalised as an isolated offence, it was often used as ammunition in divorce cases.  

“People didn’t want to go to court for issues to do with their children, as they drink or live with someone not married and no one wants to risk that criminality. It was an impediment for people to access the justice system, becoming the bigger issue than what they needed help with.”

Divorces would also be set to change with the reforms. Previously, assets would be divided according to strict Islamic Sharia law. Now, the laws from wherever the marriage took place will apply. This means couples opting for a destination wedding will now have to do their research on their chosen country’s divorce laws.

Other amendments to the laws are the decriminalisation of attempted suicide and sweeping changes to women’s rights. This has involved the scrapping of so-called “honour crimes”, a widely criticised custom where male relatives could escape conviction for assaulting a woman, if it was seen as dishonouring her family. There will now be harsher punishments for men who harass women, no matter how mild or severe.  

Emirati political scientist Abdulkhateq Abdulla says the reforms had been in the making “for some time”, with committees meeting frequently to amend laws that often have not been updated since the 1970s, some even earlier.

“The UAE wants to be measured as the most modern, transformative, cosmopolitan, society in the world. This brings the country up to international standards,” he says.

While the reforms have been announced, they have not yet been written into law. Abdulla believes this will happen in the coming days, with the full support of the 1 million strong Emirati population.

“The local population has been ready for these changes since day one. They have been consulted, and they have been raised and taught to have full trust in the government.”

But when asked about the recognisation of pregnancy out of wedlock, abortion or gay rights in the near future, Abdulla reserved judgement.  

“This country has been good at gradually improving itself. They don’t like sudden moves, they ensure the citizens are comfortable and when they see that nationwide, people are ready for it, that’s when the decisions are made.

“This is just one step among many that the country will be announcing in the coming years.”