The Hidden Globe

Yves Bouvier is a colorful character whose biography grounds the discussion of freeports in Chapter 3: “White Cube, Black Box.” Bouvier, “once known to the world as the ‘freeport king’” (54), was a Swiss freeport developer and art broker. Bouvier is a key figure in the contemporary analysis of the use and development of freeports. Typically, the management and use of freeports is largely obscured in private business records inaccessible to the public or journalists. However, Bouvier’s business dealings were revealed through a series of lawsuits filed against him by his former client, Russian billionaire Dmitry Yevgenyevich Rybolovlev. The relative availability of documentation, coupled with his former prominence in the field, made Bouvier an ideal figure around whom Abrahamian could build her narrative.

In addition to relying on others’ reporting about Bouvier, Abrahamian was able to meet and interview Bouvier in October 2021. It was this meeting that provided Abrahamian with the vivid personal details she uses to describe him. She notes, for instance, that “he is a chain-smoker, a tea drinker, and a self-professed workaholic” (54). Bouvier represents the one percent of the one percent, spending his days flying around the world in a private jet, buying millions of dollars of fine art, and exercising his “profligate spending habits” (54). Abrahamian notes that his flashy lifestyle is at odds with the discretion and tastefulness expected of Genevese businessmen and bankers. She reflects that “in all of his peregrinations, [Bouvier] had forgotten where he came from” (75). This analysis, and Bouvier’s rise and fall, illustrate the importance of cultural cachet in the elite economy.

Claude de Baissac had a long career as a consultant in the creation of special economic zones (SEZs). He is at the center of Chapter 4: “In the Zones.” Claude de Baissac is a Frenchman from the département of Réunion, an island off the east coast of Africa and “the EU’s farthest outpost” (82). His family has lived in the region for hundreds of years. His parents come from the nearby island of Mauritius, a former Dutch, then French, then British colony that gained independence in 1968. His ancestors were “sugar barons who owned hundreds of slaves” (84) on Mauritius. Baissac sees himself as “a white African” (83).

Baissac claims that his interest in SEZs was sparked as a child when he saw the export processing zone (EPZ) on Mauritius. As relayed by Abrahamian, Baissic describes the moment in romantic, neocolonial terms, noting, “‘I remember the great poverty and the very primitive dwellings,’ he says. Then, as though grafted onto the sugarcane fields was an industrial zone […] ‘[T]o me, it was like, wow, this is something special’” (84). Baissac takes a somewhat critical approach to these structures, eventually becoming disillusioned. It is implied through the words of one of his close colleagues, Jean-Paul Gauthier, that he disapproves of the cookie-cutter approach to SEZs that does not take into account local economies and peoples.

Paul Romer is a leading proponent of charter cities, as discussed in Chapter 5: “Hacking the World.” Romer received a Nobel Prize in Economic Sciences in 2018 for his work in endogenous growth theory, or the notion that ideas contribute to economic growth. He also served as the chief economist of the World Bank from 2016 to 2018. Romer’s notions of a charter city, or “transplanting foreign legal systems onto new cities on foreign soil […] to kick-start more comprehensive nationwide change” (113), were very popular in the early 2010s, although they never materially came to fruition. However, as documented in the chapter, his notion was adapted and changed by more extremist libertarians. As a result, he is now “trying to keep [his] distance from the idea” (114). Abrahamian drolly notes that this distance is “perhaps an occupational perk” (114).

Abrahamian’s reporting and analysis characterizes Romer as an overly academic man who does not necessarily have a view into how economics operates in the real world. For instance, she notes that Romer was late to acknowledge his own blind spots regarding how his theory smacks of neocolonialism: “As anybody, I guess, besides me will notice, this raises all kinds of alarms about colonialism” (120). She also highlights how Romer has attempted to distance himself from some of the nationalist ideologues seeking to make at least an interpretation of his ideas a reality. In this way, Romer is emblematic of how the utopian ideals of economic theorists can have unintentional or unforeseen consequences when acted upon.

Mark Beer is “the chairman of a consulting firm called the Metis Institute that advises free zones, governments, judiciaries, and more” (138). Beer is a lawyer who has worked in some capacity with the DIFC from 2008 to 2017. His biography serves as the organizing throughline for Chapter 6: “The City and the City.” Abrahamian provides many personal details about Beer, characterizing him as charming, intelligent, and ambitious. She also emphasizes his eccentric streak, humorously documenting his participation in a theoretical project called Asgard, “the world’s first space-based nation” (154): “Beer was either light-years ahead of most political thinkers when it came to predicting the silhouette of state sovereignty […] or he was on a different planet. Perhaps they weren’t mutually exclusive” (156). Abrahamian’s perspective on Beer suggests that it takes a certain kind of creative thinking and quirkiness to work effectively within liminal jurisdictions. Abrahamian illustrates Beer’s eccentricity extending into his personal life by noting that his family was “using walkie-talkies to communicate across town” (156).

Abrahamian critiques Beer’s work in the autocratic regimes of Dubai and Kazakhstan. While he dismisses concerns about the off-shore courts he’s created by saying that “[i]f the court is credible and independent, it must be making a positive contribution” (151), Abrahamian notes that his defense of the authoritarian Kazakh regime is strained. This dynamic highlights the moral ambiguity of liminal jurisdictions. Abrahamian’s critique of Beer, despite her seeming appreciation of him as a person, is further emphasized when she paraphrases legal scholar Katharina Pistor’s idea that “capital ‘always needs a state’s helping hand’ […] and any state that is willing to do its bidding, regardless of its respect for humanity, will do” (152).