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How to Build a Sandcastle: An Analysis of the Genesis and Development of

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DOI: 10.1080/10630732.2012.735105
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How to Build a Sandcastle: An Analysis

of the Genesis and Development of
Masdar City
Federico Cugurullo
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Journal of Urban Technology, 2013
Vol. 20, No. 1, 23–37, http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/10630732.2012.735105
How to Build a Sandcastle: An Analysis of the Genesis

and Development of Masdar City
Federico Cugurullo
ABSTRACT Fuelled by an increasing diffusion of “green-consciousness” in urban politics,

the eco-city has recently gained momentum. In the last decade, several governments from
different areas of the world have approved plans for the construction of new master-
planned urban developments aiming to find a balance with nature. The eco-city phenom-
Downloaded by [King's College London] at 06:08 07 February 2013
enon is inscribed in a critical spatio-temporal context and its effects will arguably have a
strong influence on our near future. Today, cities drain most of the global resources, have a
major impact on the environment, and attract an increasing percentage of the world’s
population. Should the mainstream projections on 2050 prove to be correct, what we
build now is and will be of primary importance. Hence, it is time to bring our current para-
digms into question. This paper acknowledges the popularity that the eco-city has achieved
in planning and mainstream discourses on sustainable development and aims to develop
an understanding of the phenomenon on the basis of empirical analysis. More specifically,
the paper focuses on the nexus between eco-cities and sustainability ideology to show how
the latter is understood and applied in the development of new settlements. Using Masdar
City as a case study, the three canonic dimensions of sustainability: the economic, the
social, and the environmental, are here explored, and their respective weight evaluated.
Ultimately, it will be shown how the foundations of the eco-city are strongly grounded
in economic concerns and how the social and environmental aspects form only a layer
aiming to hide the real nature of the phenomenon.
KEYWORDS Eco-City; Sustainable City; Triple Bottom Line; Masdar City; Sustainability
Ideology; Green Technology
Introduction
The popularization of sustainability ideology along with the increasing awareness
of cities’ impact on the environment has had a significant imprint on urban plan-
ning. In the space of 40 years, the world has seen a diffusion of green conscious-
ness in urban politics fueled, in part, by the idea that the so-called eco-city is one
of the keys to solving environmental problems and a means of making the world
sustainable (Girardet, 2003; UN-Habitat, 2009). Spreading from the West, sustain-
ability-related ideas have now become part of a considerable number of urban
projects on all the continents (Satterthwaite, 1997; Brand and Thomas, 2005).
Correspondence Address: Federico Cugurullo, Department of Geography, King’s

College London, Strand, London, WC2R 2LS, United Kingdom. Email: federico.
cugurullo@kcl.ac.uk
Copyright # 2013 by The Society of Urban Technology

24 Journal of Urban Technology
Although characterized by peculiar contextual variations, all these projects seem

to follow two main patterns. We find plans for retrofitting existing cities with
green technology, as well as seeing more ambitious plans for new master-
planned cities designed to have low environmental impact and engineered to
be supplied with renewable energy. While changing the existing built environ-
ment remains the most frequent strategy adopted, the second pattern, building
new sustainable cities, has recently become more and more popular. In the last
decade, several governments, from a wide range of geographical locations, have
approved the construction of new urban developments intended to be sustainable,
carbon neutral settlements. As of this writing, over 20 projects for new eco-cities
have been launched. Masdar City, a Middle-Eastern development alleged to be
the epitome of its kind, is one of them.1
If urban environmentalism keeps growing in popularity at this speed, what
some scholars (Ahern, 1995; Beatley and Manning, 1997; Finco and Nijkamp,
2001; Whitehead, 2003) have already portrayed as a development paradigm
may become the dominant way of thinking in planning, thereby dictating the
future of cities and of the planet itself. Many reports show increasing links and
concatenations between the urban and the natural environment, and predicting
the results of this equation is not a difficult task. By 2050, the world’s population
is expected to grow to nine billion people, 70 percent of whom will be accommo-
dated in urban areas (United Nations, 2004, 2011; US Census Bureau, 2011; World
Bank, 2010). According to the World Bank (2010), cities drain 70 percent of the
global energy resources, emitting 80 percent of the greenhouse gases. But it is
not only the amount of the impact that should be taken into consideration: it is
the time frame of this impact that must be of primary concern. We build urban
developments that are likely to stand for at least half a century, and the present
economic situation does not allow us any tabula rasa (World Bank, 2010). What
we build now will be what we will see in 2050.
Today, there are more apocalyptic theories related to the year 2050 than those
connected to 2012 eschatological beliefs. Over population, resource scarcity, and
climate change are just a few of the many nightmares casting a shadow on our
future (Gray, 2007; Smith, 2010). Whether or not what we are experiencing is a
slow apocalypse, we should not underestimate the impact of cities. Therefore, if
the eco-city is or is about to become the leading model in urban planning, it is
time to bring this model into question. On the basis of empirical research, the
objective of this paper is to develop a critical understanding of the eco-city, focus-
ing on its bonds with the broader sustainable development ideology.
As Whitehead (2007) highlights, understanding cities does not simply mean
understanding physical constructs. It is a way to catch the essence of the dominant
patterns and values of our society. Harvey’s (1985, 1989) studies on cities empha-
size the connections between processes of urbanization and underlying ideol-
ogies, picturing cities as spatial recipients of leading economic and political
doctrines. But what is the nexus between the eco-city and sustainable develop-
ment? And how is this nexus influencing the development and implementation
of new settlements? Hitherto, sustainability studies have focused on the tripartite
relation between the economic, the social, and the environmental aspects of devel-
opment policies: the so called triple bottom line (Krueger and Savage, 2007).
However, there is still limited knowledge of the degree of balance between
these three dimensions, especially with regard to urban planning. As a direct
output of sustainability ideology, eco-planning has apparently integrated the
How to Build a Sandcastle 25
triple-bottom line approach, but a number of studies (see for instance Gunder,
2006, and Dyllick and Hockerts, 2002) suggest a disproportional concern for
only one side of development: the economic. Using an alleged eco-city, Masdar
City, as a single case study, this paper aims to examine the project focusing specifi-
cally on the economic, the social, and the environmental dimensions underpin-
ning it. By means of this triple approach, it will be shown how asymmetrical
the implementation of the three dimensions of sustainability is, and how the
core of the eco-city is strongly dominated by economic concerns with social and
environmental aspects merely implemented on a superficial level without really
being part of the development. By analyzing its core, what orbits around it, and
what lies on the surface, the different layers forming an eco-city will be revealed
and its adoption as a planning model criticized.
Unveiling the Masdar City Project

The eco-city phenomenon includes a vast number of cases from a plethora of geo-
graphical locations and engaging it on a comprehensive scale is out of the range of
this paper. Embracing the Platonic idea (recently popularized in social sciences)
that from a single principle it is possible to catch the essence of broader phenom-
ena, this work adopts a single case study approach and puts Masdar City at the
center of the inquiry (Plato, 1997; Yin, 2003). There are a number of reasons that
justify this choice. First, the Masdar City project has been one of the first aiming
toward a master-planned, zero-carbon, sustainable settlement, and, in a sense, it
opened the way for a series of new eco-city projects heading in similar, if not the
same direction. Consequently, understanding Masdar City means, in some
respects, understanding its epigones, thereby achieving a deep insight into the
eco-city phenomenon. Second, since the project was launched in 2006, Masdar
City has obtained great popularity, arguably getting close to its aim of being not
just a model of sustainability but of urban planning itself. Should Masdar City
accomplish this objective, the present work may contribute to an understanding
of the city of the future and, hopefully, provide material for architects, planners,
and policy-makers to critically evaluate this model before following it. In addition,
Masdar City is the only new, so called eco-city that, up to this point, has been suffi-
ciently developed to permit empirical examination. Although the city is still under
construction, its core has been completed and the first citizens have already moved
in. Therefore, in Abu Dhabi we do not have just ideas, but their reification into the
built environment, and a site offering concrete material for research.
The structure of the paper is based on three empirical sections, preceded by a
geographical and an historical introduction both aiming to frame the spatio-tem-
poral context of Masdar City. After illustrating the geography and the history of
the case study, the remaining sections discuss the entire body of the Masdarian
development, starting from its core, continuing through what revolves around
it, and eventually concluding with the elements lying on the surface. Mirroring
Masdar City’s triple bottom line approach toward sustainable development, this
work follows a triple bottom line approach to analysis, thereby considering the
economic, the social, and the environmental dimensions of the city. First to be
explored are the characteristics of the business strategies adopted and their influ-
ence on the urban fabric. An examination of how the social aspects of sustainabil-
ity are interpreted and put into practice will follow. Finally, the layer of discourses
constructing the environmental performance of the new settlement will be

unpacked. The paper concludes with the evaluation of the foundations of
Masdar City, with particular attention to the balance between the economic and
the social dimensions in eco-planning.
The empirical sections of the paper are built on data collected through nine
months’ field work in the United Arab Emirates (UAE) between 2010 and 2011.
During this time, 18 in-depth, semi-structured interviews and 10 unstructured
interviews were conducted with representatives from the leading company devel-
oping Masdar City, the Masdar Initiative, its main partners (such as General Elec-
tric, Schneider Electric, and Siemens), the government bodies politically involved
(Abu Dhabi Municipality, Abu Dhabi Urban Planning Council), the main environ-
mental organizations giving scientific support to the project (WWF and IRENA),
and the architectural firm behind the master plan (Foster and Partners). Different
interview schedules were prepared for different actors, each interview seeking to
investigate specific aspects of the Masdarian narrative. Few interviews covered
the same topic; the only exception represented by sessions focused on confirming
previously formulated theories and/or verifying if the same situation was hap-
pening in different contexts. The interviewees were selected according to their
position and role within their respective organization and in relation to the speci-
ficity of the research. For instance, unpacking the business strategies behind the
development of Masdar City led to key business development managers and ana-
lysts from the Masdar Initiative and its partners. Given the political context where
the research was conducted, anonymity was guaranteed to all the actors inter-
viewed. According to Freedom House (2011), the UAE’s spectrum of civil rights
(including freedom of speech and personal autonomy) is still very poor, and the
anonymity of the interviewees was, therefore, an essential condition from the
beginning of the research. This paper maintains that condition in order to
protect the numerous people who shared the data on which the following empiri-
cal sections are based. In addition, the paper draws on data produced by means of
a critical discourse analysis of audio, visual, and written material collected at the
2010 European Future Energy Forum in London and the 2011 World Future
Energy Summit in Abu Dhabi. Data were analyzed through a three-dimensional
framework, paying close attention to the content, the form, and the context of
the discourses inquired (Van Dijk, 1997; Phillips and Hardy, 2002). Context
matters was the underlying idea underpinning the whole field work. The area
where the construction of Masdar City has taken place is part of a geographical
context that over the years has produced a series of particularities difficult to
find in other parts of the globe. This paper acknowledges the uniqueness of
places such as Abu Dhabi and Dubai and their influence on Masdar City. Over
100 informal interviews were conducted with a variety of actors from the UAE,
both locals and expatriates, coming from heterogeneous backgrounds and social
classes. This, along with an overt participant observation constituted the bulk of
the understanding of the social and geographical dynamics of the region and
the premise for the present work.
Through Geography
Abu Dhabi is part of the UAE, a federation of seven semi-autonomous
emirates located in the southeast of the Arabian Peninsula. In 1971, after almost
two centuries of English control, the then ruler of Abu Dhabi, Sheik Zayed bin
Sultan Al Nahyan, thanks to his charisma and finances, managed to negotiate
the terms of union with the leaders of the other emirates, thereby bringing the
country to a prominent position within the newborn federation. Under Zayed’s
control, the unification of the region was relatively fast, supported by the recent
oil discoveries and the wealth they were yielding. The oil industry had started
in the 1960s, evolving and increasing the production a decade later with the cre-
ation of the Abu Dhabi National Oil Company (Morton, 2011). Since then, Abu
Dhabi has seen its wealth increase, reaching one of the highest GDPs per capita
in the world. However, until Zayed’s death in 2004, wealth and development
had been subjected to different speeds. As Tatchell (2010) points out, the old
ruler had cautiously limited any change, slowing down construction in an
attempt to preserve a traditional lifestyle. Zayed’s approach is summarized by
Ali (2010: 54), who notes that, when the economy boomed, Abu Dhabi had “a
more conservative and low-key approach to its development, in contrast with
Dubai’s flashy approach,” with the result that “while Dubai became famous,
Abu Dhabi became [. . .] simply richer.”
The present Abu Dhabi is very different. For some, it is almost unrecognizable
(Tatchell, 2010). The new generation of rulers has been more audacious and ambi-
tious than the former, launching the country into a fast run made of iconic archi-
tecture, urban regeneration, new cities, foreign investments, and economic
diversification. The aim is to transform Abu Dhabi into a modern state with a glob-
ally competitive economy, coming out from the vernacular isolation and entering
the mainstream. Looking at the financial assets of the country, it is hard to be skep-
tical. Abu Dhabi has the world’s sixth largest proven oil reserves, and with 2.5m
barrels per day, it is the tenth largest producer of the global oil industry (Abu
Dhabi Government, 2008). This, along with an impressive array of overseas invest-
ments, makes Abu Dhabi’s position particularly promising. According to the
latest governmental releases, economic growth is soaring, GDPs per capita has
increased by 20 percent, and the autochthonous population has never been so
wealthy (Abu Dhabi Government, 2008).
However, this idyllic situation may change soon. Today Abu Dhabi is facing a
series of challenges that could break its economic and political stability in the near
future. By 2030, the population is expected to grow to three million, a growth that
will have a strong effect on the limited natural resources of the country (Abu
Dhabi Urban Planning Council, 2008). Abu Dhabi has scarce freshwater reserves,
sufficient 40 years ago when the main city was still a small fishing village, but
inadequate for what is expected to become a global metropolis. If these projections
prove to be correct, the decreasing oil reserves will not save the emirate. Abu
Dhabi claims to have enough oil for the rest of the century, but there are
grounds to suppose that the royal family is overestimating its resources.
Leaving aside the general disagreement among leading oil companies, OPEC’s
public estimations are based exclusively on internal assessments, and for Leeb
(2004: 37) “it seems indisputable, then, that OPEC has less oil left than it
claims.” Davidson (2009) is right when he asserts that so far the political structure
of Abu Dhabi has been stable because of Zayed’s diplomacy, but nowadays the
Arab Spring is changing the politics of the Middle East and, above all, how
locals perceive these politics and react against them. Should nationals see their
wealth declining, Abu Dhabi would probably share the same fate of
countries such as Syria, Bahrain, and Libya. Also, the specter of climate change
leads scholars such as Luomi (2009) to believe that the region’s other problems
will be exacerbated. Abu Dhabi is now at a crossroads and has already chosen a
path to take. The launch of the Masdar City project is one of its first steps along
the new road.
Through History
In 2006, Abu Dhabi, in the midst of a grandiose program for social and urban
change called Vision 2030, decided to incorporate the ideology of sustainability
in its agenda. At that time, sustainability-related ideas were new to Abu Dhabi
as they were new to the majority of the Gulf countries. Although the origins of sus-
tainable development date back to the late 1980s, before 2006 the region had pro-
duced not a single policy influenced by this ideology. By means of its main
investment company, Mubadala, Abu Dhabi created the Abu Dhabi Future
Energy Company (commonly known as the Masdar Initiative or simply
Masdar) and took its first steps in the multifaceted world of sustainable develop-
ment. These steps were not small. The Masdar Initiative, right after its birth,
announced its flagship project: Masdar City, a new master-planned urban devel-
opment purported to become the model of sustainability and the blueprint for the
city of the future (Masdar, 2010). The idea was to build, for the first time in history,
a zero-waste, zero-carbon settlement, having no adverse environmental impact. In
order to accomplish this, Abu Dhabi bet on architecture and technology. Foster
and Partners (F + P), the renowned global architectural firm, planned a 6 km2
city whose design would facilitate the reduction of energy consumption and
possess a smart resources management system. This, along with the employment
of cutting-edge green technology, such as smart utility grids, concentrated solar
power (CSP), and electric personal rapid transport (PRT), was to be the recipe
for the ultimate completely sustainable city. The Masdar City project quickly
gained great visibility and attracted high profile companies eager to obtain a
spot in what promised to be a leading center for the development of green tech-
nologies. General Electric, Schneider, and Siemens were among the first to join
the Masdarian enterprise, seeing in the new city a perfect place to test, implement,
and promote their new products. Together with them, Masdar City gained the
attention of several international organizations of environmental experts, such
as WWF, that, soon after the construction of the city begun, started to promote
it as “a global benchmark for sustainable urban development” (WWF, 2011a).
However, things changed in 2008. The credit crunch hit and many of the Emi-
rate’s projects suffered major cuts. The Masdar City project managed to survive,
but in order to do so it had to adapt to the new financial situation. From 2008 to
the present, many changes have shaken the master plan and the net of power
underpinning it—changes that, up to now, the Masdar Initiative has not been
keen to disclose. The city stopped being zero carbon and became carbon
neutral, thereby considerably lowering the original target. “The concept is good,
but it is not feasible,” explains one of Masdar’s representatives. According to
him, buzzwords such as “zero-carbon” and “zero-waste” were unrealistic and
related to objectives impossible to achieve, especially in the construction phase.
“It simply was not working,” he continues, “and we had to change it.” This trans-
formation in turn led to several technical adjustments. Masdar City started to
acquire energy from off-site sources, no longer relying exclusively on its photovol-
taic and CSP installations. Moreover, what Nader (2009) presented as a car-free
city remained frozen in a utopian limbo. The PRT, originally planned to cover
the entire surface of the development, was limited to less than 10 percent of the
total area, and electric cars were allowed to run free within the city. The under-
croft, initially developed to separate people from transports, was not completed
and the master plan evolved in favor of a one-level Masdar City. In the meantime,
while the economic storm was still raging, a number of people left the project, and
a new director took control. It was clear that Masdar City was not going to be the
same, and Abu Dhabi confirmed the problems by decreasing its financial backing
of the project. The $22 billion investment became an $18 billion investment, and
the 2016 deadline was pushed back first to 2020, then to 2025. Today Masdar repre-
sentatives are talking of 2030.
Inside the Core

As highlighted in the previous section, the history of Masdar City has been highly
affected by the recession of the late 2000s. Over the years, the master plan has gone
through different changes, as have the technological and economic strategies
applied to realize it. Given this series of transformations, one may surmise that
Masdar City is not itself anymore, and that the original idea behind its develop-
ment has been lost. However, this paper argues that the economic downturn
has not changed the nature of city, but rather strengthened and revealed it. The
aim of this section is to dig into the foundations of Masdar City and cast light
on what lies at its base.
The soul of Masdar City is strictly connected to the soul of its developers: the
Masdar Initiative. Here we are in front of a state-owned, commercially driven
enterprise, and the fact that attracting capital and making money are its main
goals should not surprise. However, Masdar is not a simple enterprise. It is an
enterprise committed to sustainable development which, if we take the UN
triple bottom line definition, the same definition officially adopted by Masdar
(Falconer, 2008;2 Masdar, 2010), is an integrated approach taking into account
the “social”, the “economic,” and the “environmental” (WCED, 1987). According
to this conceptualization, these three elements are equally important as only the
prosperous and just society is believed to be able to face the environmental
issues confronting cities. Does this interpretation reflect Masdar’s attitude
toward sustainable development? Before answering this question, it is necessary
to first understand how development is pursued in Masdar City and the impli-
cations it has on the nature of the city.
Masdar City presents itself not only as “one of the world’s most sustainable
urban developments,” but also as an “unmatched platform for the commercial-
scale demonstration of sustainable technology” (Masdar, 2010). The project
pivots on attracting leading and emerging companies in the renewable energy
and clean tech sector by providing them with a high-profile location where new
green technologies can be researched, developed, tested, implemented, marketed,
and showcased. As a business development manager from Siemens explained, the
collaboration with Masdar involves multiple and interconnected steps. The
process is linear: Siemens has an idea for a new sustainability-related technology
and proposes it to the Masdar Initiative which collaborates in shaping the concept.
Secondly, when an agreement is reached, and both parties agree on the character-
istics of the product to be developed, the project is carried out by Siemens and
Masdar’s experts in laboratories located in Masdar City. In many respects, Masdar

City itself can be seen as a huge living lab, and this is one of the main reasons why
companies choose it. “Masdar City offers a real life environment,” stated Sie-
mens’s manager, "to test new technologies and see how they respond in a concrete
urban context."
This is only the first part of the process. After being tested, the product is
implemented into the city, thereby becoming a permanent feature of the built
environment. Masdar City grows along with the projects carried out within its
boundaries, changing its shape day by day, following the patterns dictated by
the technologies it must absorb in order to survive. When companies start a part-
nership with Masdar, they do not just bring capital; they also claim and rent an
area of the city where they install their buildings. Masdar’s partners then
become the citizens of Masdar City, but it is not simply houses that they add to
the urban fabric. After the quality of the newborn product is certified by the
experts working for Siemens and Masdar, it is showcased, using the company’s
buildings and the city itself as a showroom. “We want to bring as much portfolio
as possible to showcase” stated a marketing manager from Siemens. A statement
that reflects what Masdar and its partners want from the city, and what the ideas
behind the construction of the so-called “eco-city” are. Masdar City does not
simply offer a permanent showroom. Masdar City is a permanent showroom, to
display new technology ready to be sold. And this is the end of the circle,
closed by the Masdar Initiative getting a percentage of the revenue when at last
the final product is sold globally.
The whole process, from the attraction of new companies to the delivery of
new technologies, is supported by a series of commercial devices, arguably an
integrant part of the development. The cardinal tool to foster the business
machine inside Masdar City is a web portal called The Future Build (TFB),
launched in March 2010 by Masdar itself. TFB consists of an international platform
where vendors and vendees from the green technology sector meet to buy and sell
the latest sustainability-related products for the built environment. Architects,
engineers, and contractors can find the materials to “build sustainability” and
learn more about the subject, following in the footsteps of “one of the most
sustainable, visually stunning, and livable developments on earth”: Masdar
City (TFB, 2011). The companies in partnership with Masdar display their portfo-
lios, showing products developed and tested in Masdar City. Through the portal,
new technology and engineering solutions circulate, expanding the green market
and consequently Masdar City. “I want to use the same aluminum they are using
in Masdar City,” said a representative from Masdar, exemplifying the clients’
requests. For him, the project started as a niche, but now, by means of TFB, it
aims to mass produce the products of Masdar and its business partners.
However, the TFB is not the only portal that Masdar is using to promote its cre-
ations. Every year, the Masdar Initiative is responsible for the organization of two of
the world’s biggest events focusing on renewable energy and on the dissemination
of sustainable development: the World Future Energy Summit (WFES) and the
European Future Energy Forum (EFEF). Both are publicized as leading platforms
for politicians, entrepreneurs, architects, planners, engineers, developers, and
academics, to explore global energy issues and find real solutions (EFEF, 2010;
WFES, 2011). Even if the geographical location differs, the structure is the same.
Exhibitions form the core, conferences, knowledge exchange workshops, and
round table discussions, the background. Inside the conference halls, important
personalities, such as Ban Ki-moon, Rajendra Pachauri, and Tony Blair, list the
environmental problems affecting the world. Outside, an endless mass of stands
where sustainability-related products, from cutting-edge solar panels to low-
impact concrete (the majority of them tested and implemented in Masdar City),
are showcased. There is no real discussion, nor participation, and the very words
“forum” and “summit” do not seem appropriate. Describing these events as
trade fairs would be more correct. The difference between TFB, the WFES, and
the EFEF is only superficial. Objectives and effects are the same, and they all lead
to Masdar City and thence to Abu Dhabi. Capital circulates through the networks
of the green technology market; it is magnetized by Masdar City (where part of it
solidifies into the built environment), and eventually flows into the emirate’s finan-
cial pool where it is again set in motion to diversify the local economy. This is why
this “eco-city” was conceived, and it is this purpose which defines its nature.
Around the Core

Emerging from this vortex of high-tech capitalism, the question arises: where is
the social dimension of Masdar City? Since its early development, the Masdar
City project has followed a theoretical approach considering sustainable develop-
ment as an amalgam of environmental, economic, and social elements (Falconer,
2008; Masdar, 2010). This conceptualization goes back to the late 1980s, when
the World Commission on Environment and Development recognized the inter-
connections among the economy, the society, and the environment, thereby
laying the foundations for the triple bottom line definition of sustainability
(WCED, 1987). The importance of the social aspects was further developed over
the years, assuming after the Rio Summit and the implementation of Agenda 21
more specific connotations. Issues of social cohesion became prominent, produ-
cing a plethora of urban policies focusing on equity, poverty reduction, health,
and environmental justice (Brand and Thomas, 2005). The passage from sustain-
able development to sustainable urban development was fast, and ideas of
equity and justice were internalized within the concept of eco-city. The relevance
of the social dimension to achieve sustainable forms of development, and ulti-
mately for planning cities in balance with nature, has been recognized by a
number of scholars (see for instance Haughton, 1999 and Satterwaite, 1997),
directly and indirectly flowing into projects for sustainable settlements such as
Masdar City. However, while Masdar purports to have incorporated the social
aspects of sustainable development, the reality presents a different situation.
Although, Masdar City has been alleged to be built according to the triple
bottom line of sustainability, none of the concepts exposed in this section has
been included nor considered. Masdar has its own ideas of the social aspects of
sustainable development, and this section examines them.
As illustrated above, the core of the Masdar City project is made of pro-
duction and diffusion of green technology, and without companies developing
new products in partnership with the Masdar Initiative, the entire city would col-
lapse. Capital would simply stop circulating, and so would the funding coming
from Mubadala. Attracting new partners and keeping the old ones is, therefore,
vital to Masdar City for social as well as other reasons. As a representative for
Masdar pointed out, “Masdar City must be attractive.” The city must convince
potential partners not only to research, develop, and test new technologies in
cooperation with the Masdar Initiative, but also to move their offices to Abu Dhabi
and settle down in Masdar City. Although shaped as a huge living lab and show-
room, Masdar City is a city, and a city requires citizens: people willing to spend
part of their lives in a place that, even if financially appealing, remains in the
middle of the desert. For this reason, among the Key Performance Indicators
(KPIs) that Masdar is using to measure the social aspects of its new city, customer
satisfaction occupies a prime position. This KPI, along with other indicators such
as occupancy, post-occupancy, and turnover, assesses the attractiveness of the
settlement, thereby helping its developers evaluate which strategies work best
to draw companies to Masdar City.
The attention toward the customer’s needs is the key driver of Masdar’s
concept of “social.” The mechanism at the base of The Future Build is for the
Masdar Initiative an example of the social aspects of sustainability as defined
by the triple bottom line UN approach. One manager was not reluctant to say
that the portal is and “must be socially acceptable.” Clients can see the character-
istics of the products tested and implemented in Masdar City, and acknowledge
the ratings they have achieved before buying them. Ratings are calculated by
Masdar itself, and then posted along with the description of the product to let
potential buyers understand its environmental impact. The idea is that you
know what you are buying, and you know that what you are buying has been
approved by the “globally recognized and respected, and locally nurtured
Masdar City brand” (TFB, 2011). This “fairness,” is for Masdar what makes the
whole project “socially acceptable,” and portrays the way the social aspects of sus-
tainable development are put into practice in Abu Dhabi.
The only exception is represented by the “20 percent policy” that, echoing
concepts of social justice and equity, reserves a small area of the city for low-
income workers. This policy does not come from Masdar, but from the Abu
Dhabi Urban Planning Council (UPC), which imposes the same regulation on
each new development in the emirate. However, as a member of the UPC
admits, the “20 percent policy” is underdeveloped, and it is unclear how it will
be applied in Masdar City. There is no neat definition of “low-income worker.”
In addition, where this protected category of citizen will be allocated and how
he will be absorbed by the remaining 80 percent of the social fabric has not yet
been considered. The impression here is that lurking behind this policy there is
an attempt to reach social cohesion merely at the symbolic level, which is what
Brand and Thomas (2005) describe as a requirement of ecological modernization.
As also Harvey (1996) notes, environmental equity is a recurring element within
ecological modernization theories, where economic and technological develop-
ment is generally seen as bringer of growth and distributive justice. However,
how this marriage between environmentalism and technology-driven capitalism
could lead to a consistent equal allocation of goods is still under debate, and
Masdar’s example confirms how the social aspects of sustainable development
orbit its core without really being part of it.
The Surface
Since the launch of the project, Masdar City has been associated with a series of
images, ideas, and concepts. Even when the site was only sand and dust, the
Masdar Initiative was already investing a lot of energy in constructing the
image of the development, arguably paying more attention to the representation

of the city than to the city itself. The Masdar City project draws from a specific
imaginary, constantly referring to mainstream ideas and symbols related to sus-
tainability ideology. Here there is a blurred link with ideas of nature, urban
space, and the natural world, and the broader ecological imaginary, recently inter-
preted in a number of studies (see for instance Benton-Short and Rennie-Short,
2007; Gandy, 2006; Kaika, 2005). The connection is with the invasive (and hitherto
under-theorized) ideological pool made of sustainability-related ideas that have
become prominent in contemporary society. Moving from the lexis to the praxis,
ultimately this pool of ideas relates to Masdar City by the low environmental
impact of the settlement. Although over the years Masdar’s claims have been
reduced in terms of scope and ambition, the city is still said to be one of the
most sustainable places in the world. By means of an integrated approach,
based on renewable energy production, water management, waste reduction, a

sustainable supply chain, clean-energy supplied transportation, and eco-plan-
ning, Masdar City has supposedly reached a balance with nature, becoming an
example of the paradigm shift that is needed to tackle global environmental pro-
blems (WWF, 2011b; Masdar, 2011). This is what the Masdar Initiative puts at the
forefront.
However, this section argues that, in Masdar’s case, what stays at the fore-
front does not correspond with what stays at the core, and that image and
nature do not reflect each other. By scratching the surface, the reality of the
Masdar City project comes out. First, Masdar does not disclose any data regarding
the environmental performance of the city. Although “independent and public
verification of Masdar City’s performance in meeting these standards is just one
of the features distinguishing the project,” so far, no outsider has been able to
verify the foundations of the claims (WWF, 2011a). The only official release
dates back to April 2009, when the Masdar Initiative commissioned an advisory
company named Hyder to undertake an Environmental Impact Assessment
(EIA). The report was supposed to assess the environmental effects yielded by
the development along with its ecological impact, but no empirical evidence
has been offered. When the EIA was conducted, the first phase of the city was
still under construction, and the document presents a series of projections in
relations to what Masdar City will be (Hyder, 2009).3 Masdar City is not expected
to have adverse environmental effects; Masdar City is anticipated to have no
significant impact on soil resources; Masdar City is predicted to minimize waste
(Hyder, 2009). What Masdar City actually is, the document does not tell.
Second, the image of Masdar City as an eco-city predates any forms of assess-
ment and evaluation. Masdar City became an eco-city prior to its birth, and this
representation began to circulate before the cornerstone was laid. Discourses
came first, solidifying around the project and shaping its perception. As a
member of the UPC confirms, their examination has been limited to the design
phase and they do not hold empirical data regarding the environmental perform-
ance of the city. Everything goes back to the project, as it was once envisioned by
the Masdar Initiative and F + P. Discourses, images and assessments refer to an
ideal plan that, as has elucidated in the previous sections, was soon changed
when it crashed against the economic reality of the late 2000s. What the images
portray simply does not exist and never has. Above all, it must be noted that
less than 10 percent of the original master plan has been realized, and only 100
people are living in the site as of this writing. Masdar City is not a reality. It still
is a project under development with only the potential of becoming an eco-city. But
one element has already been implemented and is now fully functioning.
The commercial enterprise based on production and circulation of new green
technology started from the very beginning to generate revenues, becoming not
a simple feature of the Masdar City project, but its very engine. In conclusion,
the business is real, and this is what emerges by scratching the surface of
images and discourses deposited.
Conclusions
At the end of the journey through Masdar City, it is time to evaluate what has been
explored so far. As discussed in the previous sections, behind the Masdar City
project there is a much bigger project aimed at capital accumulation, and little
attention is paid to what is unrelated to the business plan. At the core of
Masdar City lies a powerful mechanism fueled by technology-driven capital
flows pumped directly into the development to become part of it. Capital
streams through Masdar City, solidifying into the built environment and sustain-
ing Abu Dhabi’s economy. In this process, supported by a series of commercial
devices such as TFB, the WFES, and the EFEF, there is little space for the social
aspects of sustainable development and for the basic social dimension of the
city. Unless it can help profit maximization, the “social,” whatever form it may
take, is not part of the agenda. The Masdar City project is covered by a thick
layer of discourses concealing this economic domination, and it is not easy to
detect its essence. The image of the city is constructed according to the broader
sustainability ideology, made of concepts and symbols portraying an ideal
urban development in balance with nature. All despite the fact that the ecological
performance of the city remains a mystery, and projections are based on a never
realized project maimed by the utopian paradox. But what is Masdar City then?
“Masdar City at the end of the day is a business;” this is how a representative
from Masdar described it. “It is not a charity and it should not be treated as a
charity” and “actually it is very good if you treat it as a business” because “if
you can’t make money it is not sustainable.” This statement reflects ecological
modernization strategies and all their limits when applied in urban politics.
Leaving aside the absence of the social aspects and the repercussions this may
have on community formation, building a city exclusively on liquid capital
means unstable foundations, and ultimately a settlement prone to collapse at
the first economic downturn. In other words, a sandcastle. As an architect from
F + P explained it, “Masdar City is a demand responsive development so there
must be major tenants in play.” If the green technology market is affected by nega-
tive fluctuations and the circulation of capital is interrupted, Abu Dhabi’s new city
would follow the same fate. Capital does not bother to fix crises, Harvey (2010)
observes, it moves past them following new geographical trajectories in search
for more profitable areas. In Masdar City’s case, however, it would not be only
capital that moved. Given the nature of the social fabric of the city, 80 percent of
the population is comprised of what we can define in essence as capitalists.
What would stop them from abandoning Masdar City should their business
activities come to an end? They are not physically bound to the space as they
do not own their houses. And they are not emotionally bound to the place as
the social dimension is absent. There is no attachment of these sorts. Masdar
City is what Augé (2008) calls a non-place: a non-anthropological spatial entity

bereft of an organic society. A space where identity is suspended, and little or
nothing is left for emotional relations. Is this what the eco-city phenomenon is
all about? We leave Masdar City hoping that Abu Dhabi’s example will not
cross the desert.
Notes
1. Among the approved projects for new master-planned eco-cities: Masdar City (Abu Dhabi), Zira
Island (Azerbaijan), Logrono Montecorvo eco city (Spain), Tianjin, Xinjin Water City, Caofeidian,
Wanzhuang (China), Babcock Ranch (Florida), Greensburg (Kansas), Whitehill-Bordon, Imerys,
North West Bicester, Rackheath eco-towns (UK), Owenstown (UK), Incheon, Songdo (South
Korea), Rawabi (Palestine), Punggol (Singapore), Blue City (Oman), KACARE (Saudi Arabia).
2. When Gordon Falconer organized this presentation (Falconer, 2008), he was Head of Strategy and
Real Estate for Masdar City, and one of the most prominent figures behind the development.
3. This document (Hyder, 2009) was available on Masdar City’s official website, and it was down-
loaded in April 2011 for purposes related to the present paper. However, the assessment is not
public anymore, and it is as if it never existed.
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Although characterized by peculiar contextual variations, all these projects seem

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City is what Augé (2008) calls a non-place: a non-anthropological spatial entity

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