THE FAMILY BUSINESS is one of the great Middle Eastern stereotypes. A sprawling empire impenetrable to any outsider; an ageing patriarch who consistently pops up on the Forbes rich list; a multitude of children vying for control of company assets; and, of course, a cosy relationship with politics.
Such is often the outside perception of the family-owned business groups that wield such influence in economic and political life in the Arab world, and nowhere more so than in the oil-rich states of the Gulf such as Bahrain, the UAE, Qatar, Kuwait and Saudi Arabia.
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