Women in Saudi Arabia are often described as either victims of patriarchal religion and society or successful survivors of discrimination imposed on them by others. Madawi Al-Rasheed's new book goes ...beyond these conventional tropes to probe the historical, political and religious forces that have, across the years, delayed and thwarted their emancipation. The book demonstrates how, under the patronage of the state and its religious nationalism, women have become hostage to contradictory political projects that on the one hand demand female piety, and on the other hand encourage modernity. Drawing on state documents, media sources and interviews with women from across Saudi society, the book examines the intersection between gender, religion and politics to explain these contradictions and to show that, despite these restraints, vibrant debates on the question of women are opening up as the struggle for recognition and equality finally gets under way.
In Oil and security: Saudi Arabia 1950-2012 Islam Y. Qasem explains how the world's largest oil producer and exporter, Saudi Arabia, used oil resources to maximize internal and external security ...since the mid-twentieth century.
Of Sand or Soil Samin, Nadav
2015, 2015., 20150901, 2015-09-01, Letnik:
59
eBook
Why do tribal genealogies matter in modern-day Saudi Arabia? What compels the strivers and climbers of the new Saudi Arabia to want to prove their authentic descent from one or another prestigious ...Arabian tribe? Of Sand or Soil looks at how genealogy and tribal belonging have informed the lives of past and present inhabitants of Saudi Arabia and how the Saudi government's tacit glorification of tribal origins has shaped the powerful development of the kingdom's genealogical culture. Nadav Samin presents the first extended biographical exploration of the major twentieth-century Saudi scholar.
Imperial Mecca Low, Michael Christopher
2020, 2020-10-06
eBook
Michael Christopher Low analyzes the late Ottoman hajj and Hijaz region as transimperial spaces, reshaped by the competing forces of Istanbul's project of frontier modernization and the ...extraterritorial reach of British India's steamship empire in the Indian Ocean and Red Sea.
Since the mid-twentieth century, the United States and Saudi Arabia have built a close but often troubled alliance. In this critical history, Victor McFarland reveals the deep ties binding the ...leaders of the two nations. Connecting foreign relations and domestic politics, McFarland challenges the view that the U.S.-Saudi alliance is the inevitable consequence of American energy demand and Saudi Arabia's huge oil reserves. Oil Powers traces the growth of the alliance through a dense web of political, economic, and social connections that bolstered royal and executive power and the national-security state. McFarland shows how U.S. and Saudi elites collaborated to advance their shared interests against rivals at home and abroad. During the 1970s, as higher oil prices enriched the Saudi government, destabilized the American economy, and changed the balance of power in the Middle East, leaders of both countries responded by consolidating their alliance. Facing objections from their own people, Washington and Riyadh chose to shield their partnership from public oversight and accountability. While American support empowered the Saudi royal family and helped the kingdom expand its influence across the Middle East, Saudi elites also encouraged a rightward shift in U.S. foreign and economic policy-with profound long-term effects. Oil Powers reveals the role of the U.S.-Saudi alliance in laying the groundwork for American military involvement in the Middle East and the entrenchment of a global order fueled by oil.
Of all the countries in the world that are vital to the strategic and economic interests of the United States, Saudi Arabia is the least understood by the American people. Saudi Arabia’s unique ...place in Islam makes it indispensable to a constructive relationship between the non-Muslim West and the Muslim world. For all its wealth, the country faces daunting challenges that it lacks the tools to meet: a restless and young population, a new generation of educated women demanding opportunities in a closed society, political stagnation under an octogenarian leadership, religious extremism and intellectual backwardness, social division, chronic unemployment, shortages of food and water, and troublesome neighbors. Today’s Saudi people, far better informed than all previous generations, are looking for new political institutions that will enable them to be heard, but these aspirations conflict with the kingdom’s strict traditions and with the House of Saud’s determination to retain all true power. Meanwhile, the country wishes to remain under the protection of American security but still clings to a system that is antithetical to American values. Basing his work on extensive interviews and field research conducted in the kingdom from 2008 through 2011 under the auspices of the Council on Foreign Relations, Thomas W. Lippman dissects this central Saudi paradox for American readers, including diplomats, policymakers, scholars, and students of foreign policy.
Combining vast scholarship and a deep understanding of Arab culture, Nadav Safran has written a sophisticated book about the politics of Saudi Arabia. In a narrative that emphasizes the Saudis' sense ...of the precariousness of their state and of their position in the Middle East, Safran demystifies the behavior of the Kingdom's rulers. Security has long been the predominant concern of Saudi Arabia. In 1981, the Kingdom's defense and security budget was an immense $25 billion, the fourth largest in the world, after the United States, the Soviet Union, and China, and the highest in the world on a per capita basis. Safran traces the roots of Saudi preoccupation with security through half a century, discerning political struggles and policy differences in the Saud family and how they have affected the position of the country. His treatment provides an enlightening perspective on the interplay of the politics of the elite; shifting inter-Arab alignments and rivalries; war, revolution, and other cataclysmic events in the Persian Gulf; the ongoing Arab-Israeli conflict; and the involvement of the United States in the Middle East.
