The Politics of Qat

How one plant explains Yemen's dysfunction.

BY PEER GATTER | FEBRUARY 18, 2013

Above, qat sellers man their booths in the Suq Farwa market in the Shu'ub quarter of Sanaa. The Farwa market -- Sanaa's first modern qat market -- was build outside the old city walls in 1973.

Peer Gatter/The Politics of Qat

 

Peer Gatter is a political scientist and Middle Eastern and Islamic studies scholar who served as an advisor to Yemen's Ministry of Planning and Water during the 2000s for the U.N. Development Program and the World Bank. In 2002, he organized Yemen's "First National Conference on Qat." He is the author of Politics of Qat -- The Role of a Drug in Ruling Yemen.