The announcement that Halliburton, the Houston, Tex.-based oil services company, was moving its headquarters to Dubai may have surprised many Americans. But for people in Dubai, it simply ratified decades of hard work.

With scant oil reserves, Dubai’s ruling family, the Maktoums, long ago realized that their state’s future lay in serving as the commercial hub of the Arab Middle East, not pulling petroleum from the desert sands. “They have had to live on their wits,” says Bulent Gultekin, a Wharton finance professor. “So they’ve tried to build Dubai into the business platform for the region.”

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