JEDDAH, 27 June 2007 — The Bedouin are not the only nomads in Saudi Arabia; rather different in lifestyle yet still likely to move on at little or no notice, diplomats on active duty are directed where the interests of their respective governments require them to be. In the best diplomatic and nomadic tradition, Dr. Hubert Lang, the German consul general to Jeddah, will leave at the end of June after a two-year term to take up the post as ambassador to Bahrain.
“Personally I would like to have stayed longer as my interest in this country and its people is today stronger than ever and I feel very comfortable in the social and cultural climate here,” he told Arab News last week. “In a way my wife Michèle and I hesitate to leave after only two years; emotionally, we have not finished with this country, as if there were some unfinished business. It’s like music, you want to hear it till the end.”
An academic and orientalist by inclination and training, Lang served three years in Washington covering Middle East affairs before coming to Jeddah. He described the posting here as one of the defining experiences of his diplomatic career. He admitted to a sense of pride to have served in the Kingdom as it played an important role, politically and economically, in the greater foreign policy spectrum of Germany. But for Lang, a reflective and deeply thoughtful man, his tenure in Jeddah meant far more than that.
As a scholar of Arab and Islamic studies, he got part of his Arabic language training in the Middle East Center for Arab Studies in Shemlan/Lebanon, a British Institution, which is well known for having produced many generations of Arabists, mainly British diplomats, but also some Germans, Swiss and Japanese.
“That also helped me understand the British way of looking at the Middle East,” he said. “They have a long history of involvement here and their experience is quite valuable.” His posting to Jeddah came many years after having served in other countries of the Arabian Peninsula, in Abu Dhabi, Dubai and Muscat in the seventies and eighties.
“To be here was an enormous chance to put all the learning and languages into practice first hand, to experience the culture and empathize with the people — something that could not be easily done from a distance or over language barriers.”
Speaking about the good health of the economic relationship between his country and the Kingdom, Lang feels that Saudis generally liked products of all kinds, not only cars, carrying the label “Made in Germany” as they liked the service, and that both added strongly to the success in German exports to Saudi Arabia. He noted though that quality products were emerging from the east and sounded a note of caution to German exporters to be aware of this.
After declining insignificantly in the first years of the new millennium, export figures showed steady growth from 2004 onward when they jumped from 3 billion euros in 2004 to over 4 billion in 2005, giving Germany the second rank, after the Unites States, among the countries supplying Saudi Arabia’s imports. There are currently about 220 German companies active in the Kingdom.
“Before I came here I saw that this was a country with an enormous potential — it had a system of values very much based on its unique role as the home of the two holy sites of the Muslim world,” he said. “That confers a legitimacy to its leading position in the region and beyond.”
Lang found working in the Kingdom both a personal challenge and a professional experience much stronger and richer than he had expected. At the end of his tenure he draws a positive balance: “At the end of the term here I look back and can see the accumulation of small successes which on balance makes it an overall success.”
Intellectually Lang knew about the importance of personal relationships in treating with people in Saudi culture. Once here he found that they were of prime importance. “We should develop the social and relations-building side of our work much more because here more than any other place, business is done between people — and people want to know and appreciate each other first,” he observed. “It is much more important here than in any other place in the world. In the Orient, the personal relationship comes before business”.
He thought that Western cultures should understand the strength and currency of Arab and Saudi family structure if they wanted to connect with people in the Kingdom either for business or socially. “Here, family ties and community are far stronger and last through life in a way different from our culture — we should be aware of that. One aspect is that respect is more natural here than it is in Europe — and any society functions better for that.”
Much of Lang’s time was spent in what he calls “Networking” or “Outreaching”, meeting members in all walks of the Saudi society and he found a genuine sense of interest. It was in these informal and apparently social meetings, the Diwaniyyas,” where information, insight and understanding was developed and exchanged — rather than in the public media. “It was good to be accepted, and the informal and social contacts were as valuable as the official ones because they helped me overcome this wall of misperceptions, prejudgements and clichés that you meet every day.”
He found the Saudis often had trouble, as did the West, at breaking down the barriers formed by misunderstanding. “I felt it one of my tasks to deliver honest answers whenever they asked for them — especially to visiting delegations and businessmen.”
Lang judged that the social structure of Saudi society was still very much intact, but that there were some aspects in their traditions that even Saudis were not entirely happy with.
The Kingdom, thought Lang, gave an impression of great stability that stemmed from its economic weight but also from the uniqueness of the Saudi monarchy which has the responsibility for the two holiest places in Islam and which extends great hospitality at huge expense to the millions of Haj and Umrah pilgrims who come to the Kingdom every year. “I have a great admiration for that,” he said. “It is a huge commitment.”
He also noted the Kingdom’s quiet and low-profile but effective role in regional politics — especially the very active part in the Palestinian issue. “The Saudis act as moderators; they see where the dangers are and look to carrying through policies effectively.” He thought the style of diplomacy to be very much of the school of negotiations and conversations behind the scenes to achieve results. “It is very much the Saudi way and it is effective in this region.”
