Dubai goes on media counter-offensive

You did not have to be Emirati to be outraged by some of the western media coverage of the UAE in the early months of the war.

There were missiles in the skies, of course, and some people left Dubai. Hotels emptied, flights were cancelled and businesses suffered. All of that was legitimate news and deserved to be reported.

But something else crept into the coverage, and it was keenly felt by long-term residents who have made this place their home. In parts of the Western media there were unmistakable splashes of schadenfreude and sensationalism: the sense that Dubai, with its skyscrapers, millionaires and inconvenient prosperity, was finally getting its comeuppance.

“Ghost town” pictures and tales of an expatriate exodus – pets heartlessly left behind, of course – fitted a narrative formed in European and US newsrooms. Occasionally the facts justified the headlines; sometimes the headlines seemed desperately in search of facts.

That experience hurt, and it will provide the backdrop to next week’s Arab Media Summit in Dubai, which brings together some of the region’s most influential media and business leaders alongside senior international journalists and executives.

There will be plenty to discuss about artificial intelligence, digital disruption and the future of journalism. But Dubai has a more immediate media issue on its hands: how does a city whose international reputation is one of its greatest economic assets respond when it believes that reputation is being attacked abroad?

Of late, the answer has been to fight back.

The most formal manifestation is the Media Narrative Committee established last month. Chaired by Dubai media doyenne Mona Al Marri, its aim is to coordinate how Dubai presents itself locally and internationally; ensure consistency between government and private-sector organisations; respond rapidly to misinformation; strengthen engagement with international media; and communicate the emirate’s economic and social story more effectively.

Alongside it have come briefings organised by the National Media Authority and direct encounters between journalists and some of the people running Dubai’s most important economic sectors.

Hamed Ali, chief executive of the Dubai Financial Market, delivered the prognosis for the emirate’s financial markets in July. Paul Griffiths, chief executive of Dubai Airports, did the same for aviation this week.

These initiatives are welcome. Dubai cannot complain about inaccurate reporting while leaving an information vacuum for others to fill. Putting journalists in front of people who have the numbers, know their businesses and are prepared to answer difficult questions is far more useful than another rose-tinted press release.

But the counter-offensive will only succeed if it gets two things right.

The first is that it must not get ahead of the facts. Dubai is recovering, but the economic damage inflicted by months of war, disrupted aviation, weakened tourism and uncertainty cannot simply be wished away. The strongest response to extreme pessimism is not extreme optimism.

Indeed, nothing would damage Dubai’s case more quickly than insisting that everything is back to normal when serious journalists, economists and international investors can see hard evidence that it is not.

• Dubai developers switch focus from flippers to occupants
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The second is more subtle, and perhaps more difficult.

So far, much of the response has understandably come from business leaders, government officials and communications professionals. They know Dubai extraordinarily well, but understanding Dubai is not necessarily the same as understanding how it will be reported elsewhere.

Western journalists arrive with their own assumptions, prejudices and professional instincts. Some may be hostile, but most are simply sceptical – which, irritating though it can be, is part of the job.

That means the response cannot simply be about providing better statistics or coordinating a better “narrative”. It also has to recognise how independent newsrooms work: why an editor chooses one photograph rather than another; why a correspondent may distrust an official reassurance; and why an approved narrative, however well intentioned, can sometimes make journalists more suspicious of it.

The most effective engagement will acknowledge those instincts rather than resist them, and recognise that credibility is built on evidence, not boosterism.

Dubai has recognised that it has a battle for international perception on its hands. Establishing the Narrative Committee, opening up senior business leaders and engaging more actively with foreign media are important steps.

The next stage is ensuring that the counter-offensive is informed not only by the people who know how Dubai works, but by people who understand how the international media works too.

Perhaps that is an appropriate subject for the Arab Media Summit itself.

Next week Dubai will have many of the people it most wants to influence sitting in the same room. It will be a golden opportunity.

Frank Kane is Editor-at-Large of AGBI and an award-winning business journalist