A History of Advertising: The Decade of Globalisation

The third and and less significant change was a swathe of modernisation across the Middle East as oil prices increased, rulers decided they needed to invest in their country’s infrastructure, along with an acknowledgement that encouraging the West to invest would be beneficial. However these moves had to be treated cautiously as the greatest fear was that Western brands and their consumption would lead to unnecessary mixing of the sexes, a turning away from religion, and a general lowering of moral standards. 

None the less, the region would remain the runt in the litter of the advertising market, a place where ex-pat chancers and the ne’er-do-wells would gravitate. Yet the region has unique characteristics that are worth covering even if it had little impact on the global advertising business. This, then, is where this volume starts.