Emerging Digital Economies

Abstract

Abstract This chapter explores how digital economies emerge as the harbingers of more comprehensive changes to business practices and ecosystems in the Middle East. Three cases of trailblazing ventures are illustrative examples: the e-shopping platform Souq, the ride-hailing app Careem, and the music-streaming service Anghami. Despite these ventures’ success, the digital economy in the region remains subject to conflictual pulls. As some of the inherent contradictions associated with the introduction of the Internet of Things (IoT), artificial intelligence (AI), and cloud computing suggest, the nature of this emerging economy is intricate, and its supporting ecosystem is precarious. While the digital represents the next frontier in the region’s economy, its development is neither uniform nor analogous to more established digital economies associated with the network society, which calls into question discourses that elevate the region to be “the next Silicon Valley.”