Paper short abstract:

The paper discusses frictions between foreign investment and nativist politics centring on Saudi Arabian real-estate investment in the alpine region of Zell am See in Austria. The introduction of a “burka ban” law revealed the importance of a multi-scalar perspective on foreign investment.

Paper long abstract:

Luxury chalets overlooking pristine lakes and alpine meadows are prime real-estate assets in Austrian capitalism. In recent decades, regions riddled by poverty and depopulation managed to attract billions worth of foreign investment by selling such property to foreign investors. In the region of Zell am See these investors are mainly Saudi Arabian businesspeople who sought to territorialize assets in Europe while the Austrian government sought to attract foreign investment.

“Silamsi”, as Zell am See is called among Arabian tourists and investors, is a conservative Catholic region fuelled by Saudi and Emirate foreign investment. The frictions caused by the combination were boiling beneath the surface until the 2017 introduction of the so-called “burka ban” by the federal government. The “burka ban” raised more than eyebrows in the curious combination of huge sums of real-estate turnover, Alpine tourism, and the growing visibility of wealthy Saudi Arabians on alpine meadows, along turquoise glacier streams and in high-class hotels in Silamsi. An improbable coalition of local investment brokers, conservative catholic politicians and Saudi Arabian investors joined forces to fight the law and to secure investment, chalets, and the right to wear head-scarves.

I use the Silamsi controversy to use “frictions” as conceptual lens to discuss the inherent contradictions of foreign investment and nativist politics in one of the wealthiest regions of Europe. The case reveals the importance of a multi-scalar perspective on containing and territorializing assets in the investment nexus.