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5.5.2 The Surprising Stability of the Arab Monarchies: Saudi Arabia

Course video 13 of 67

Independence and revolutionary politics in the Arab world

Возникновение современного Ближнего Востока - часть II

Тель-Авивский университет

This course will discuss the developments in the Middle East from the early 20th century to the present. It will discuss the rise and retreat of Arab nationalism, the problems of internal cohesion of the Arab states, issues of religion and state, and the evolution of Islamist politics. It will also focus on the evolution of the Arab-Israeli conflict and its impact on the region and will conclude with an in depth analysis of the “Arab Spring” by placing these contemporary revolutionary events in their historical context. Please note that this course builds upon a previous course - The Emergence of the Modern Middle East - Part I (https://www.coursera.org/learn/modern-middle-east-1/home/welcome) Learn about the history of the Middle East for a deeper understanding of current regional developments!

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Преподаватели

Professor Asher Susser
Senior Research Fellow

Текст видео

Another example of monarchical stability is that of Saudi Arabia.

The same regime of the Saudi family has been in power

in Saudi Arabia since the establishment of the state in 1932.

In the words of Joseph Kostiner and Joshua

Teitelbaum, the institution of the monarchy in the

Kingdom of Saudi Arabia has traditionally been regarded

as fundamentally congruent with

the Kingdom's basic sociocultural characteristics.

A factor that has accounted for

the institution's stability and popular support.

The Saudi royal family, which heads the monarchy is integrally linked with it

and structured to befit the tribal formations that underpin Saudi society.

The royal family has married into the main tribal

groups, urban centers, the business community and the religious establishment.

And to that, one must add what one could call the Wahhabis factor.

The fact that the Saudi monarchy also evolved in congruence

with the Wahhabis extremely puritanical religious tenets of most of Saudi society.

The Saudi family has been in alliance with

the Wahhabis puritanical Islamists for two centuries and more.

The Saudi king, therefore, is also the leader or the imam of the Saudi Wahhabi

community of believers and is subordinate only to the Sharia.

A combination of lasting and effective tribal religious

alliances and great wealth, have provided for prolonged stability.

Though not without problems, and sometimes serious ones, too.

The leaders of major tribes are conciliated with pensions,

jobs for their followers and privileged treatment in legal matters.

The ulema, the men of religion, were frequently recruited to support government

policy and were given in exchange full and unfettered control of the legal system.

Which remained based entirely on the Sharia according to the moratical

Hanbali school of Islamic jurisprudence.

Saudi Arabia is a classic rentier state.

That is, a state whose revenues come almost entirely from the

sale of natural resources, oil in this case, and not from taxation.

The state, as embodied by the Saudi royal family, act as a distributor of resources.

And the citizens of the state as beneficiaries.

In accordance with an unwritten social contract, whereby

the royal family runs a cradle to the

grave social welfare system and guarantees employment in

the public sector in exchange for the people's loyalty.

The state has assumed the role of provider, a function

that fitted well with earlier tribal practices, patterns and values.

In Saudi Arabia, is therefore, no taxation and no representation.

A large proportion of public spending has

gone to public health, hospitals, housing and education.

So, Saudi Arabia has developed into a modern and far more centralized state.

It has a huge bureaucracy and the

government is the largest employer in the country.

Saudis are therefore healthier, better educated but also far more numerous.

Population growth has been more than threefold since the mid-1970s.

From some 7 million to around 26.5 million, of whom

21 million are Saudi nationals and others are foreigners from various countries.

Income capita has therefore actually declined

in Saudi Arabia in recent decades.

And in the economic downturn of the 1990s, there was increasing criticism coming

from the so-called new middle class

of academics, and professionals, and educated technocrats.

They were negatively affected by the declining oil prices, and a consequent

limitation on the state's ability to

absorb the effects of rapid population growth.

There are domestic critics of various kinds in Saudi Arabia.

The more extreme puritans for whom the regime is not religious enough.

Thus, it was people like these who seized the Grand Mosque in Mecca

in November 1979, radical tribesmen and Islamic fundamentalists,

who were engaged in this act of opposition to the regime.

They accused the monarchy of corruption, religious

deviation, and called for rolling back modernization.

By banning television and professional soccer and

the employment of women in public places.

These rebels were eventually subdued by force and many were

executed, actually beheaded in public to teach everyone a lesson.

In the 1990s after the Iraqi invasion of Kuwait and the

deployment of hundreds of thousands of US troops in the country, a

group of younger clerics repeatedly challenged the regime on the grounds that

it was humiliating the country by seeking the protection of Christian powers.

Or was not generally upholding Islamic values as it should.

While Senior Ulema continued to defend the royal

family, a culture of opposition was said to

have developed amongst younger Ulema, raising serious questions

about the Islamic legitimacy of the Saudi monarchy.

There are Muslim militants in Saudi Arabia influenced

by the likes of Osama bin Laden, who

have carried out isolated attacks as they deny

the right of the Saudi family to rule.

Other critics come from the Shi'ite minority in

Saudi Arabia, some 12% of the total population.

But this minority is located in the oil rich Eastern Province and they

have generally been severely suppressed by

the Wahhabi's who regard them as polytheists.

They are

opponents of the Saudi order, but have expressed this opposition only

occasionally, and have not been a serious threat to internal stability thus far.

Another group of opponents is the generally young generation of

Saudis, who are more questioning and are also often unemployed.

This could become harder to deal with if oil income declines

and people may feel that the social contract is being violated.

Therefore, the upswing in oil prices in the early

2000s made life a lot easier for the Saudis.

And thus the transition from King Fahd to

King Abdullah in 2005 was very smooth and untroubled.

Worried by the outbreak of the Arab Spring, the Saudis

quickly distributed no less than $130 billion in social

spending to keep domestic peace, and have thus far been successful.

The state tribal family system is working well and as

long as oil prices remain high enough and the regime has

the largesse to dispense to the citizenry, there is more than

a fair chance that stability in Saudi Arabia will be maintained.

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