This article discusses relationships between temporariness and belonging among Pakistani middle-class migrants in Dubai. We explore reasons that push them to move to Dubai and how their professional position and temporary status affect their sense of belonging. Based upon unstructured interviews with 20 Pakistanis, our findings show that temporariness is problematized, but not explicitly contested, by the participants, who all expressed a strong sense of belonging to Dubai despite their lack of citizenship rights. We suggest that these findings relate to the participants’ ability to draw upon socio-economic resources and networks to enable further transnational mobility.

本文讨论了迪拜中产阶级临时居留权与归属感之间的关系。我们探究了促使他们移居迪拜的原因，以及他们的专业地位和临时身份如何影响他们的归属感。基于对20名巴基斯坦人的非结构化访谈，我们的研究结果表明，参与者的临时性是有问题的，但没有明确地提出质疑，尽管他们缺乏公民权，但所有人都表现出强烈的对迪拜的归属感。我们建议这些发现与参与者利用社会经济资源和网络以实现进一步跨国流动的能力有关。