First let it be said without reservation that Saudi Arabia is a police state. There are some exemptions depending on one's proximity to the royal family, but at the end of the day, everything is subordinated to the security of the House of Saud. Saudi Arabia actually has a fairly rich and active underground democratic movement that enjoys both popular support and a measure of patronage from some leading families of the country that are not content with the country's policies. The kingdom has on and off implemented incremental and sometimes only symbolic reforms but there is a recognition from the royal family that there is a strong democratic opposition (at least in sentiment if not in organization). The problem in Saudi Arabia (and Egypt, and other security-obessed states) is that in the havoc of the War on Terrorism, these movements are marginalized to the extent that the only alternative to the clearly repressive status quo is Islamic fundamentalism.Originally Posted by Dayuhan
The U.S. plays a significant role in this because it's the U.S. that often reinforces the status quo. The U.S. has a special deference towards the political stability of the House of Saud that it does not show elsewhere - i.e. Yanukovych's Ukraine. Unfortunately, our policies have placed us in a position to choose between economic security and national security. Islamic fundamentalism is a response to the repressive conditions in these states, the perception that the U.S. is a major patron of these states, and the marginalization and violence inflicted upon the general populations by these regimes (and at times by the U.S.). Fifty years ago when it took an army to do any serious damage that was not a major problem. But now that one man can become a walking weapon of mass destruction, that changes the calculus.
The first step in reform is loosening the controls of the police state. For Saudi Arabia, that means disbanding the vice police, marginalizing the National Guard, and constraining domestic intelligence. It also means challenging who controls the mechanisms of power, namely the management and distribution of the country's oil wealth. Gradual political agitation and reform is preferable - the dilemma is that when authoritarian regime's recognize they're not as popular as they believed, they cease the reforms out of fear of losing power. The consequence is an escalation in the opposition's radicalism. At this point, the spigot that produces Islamic fundamentalism won't be turned off any time soon so that will be a problem for many years.
The issue for the U.S. is that it's going 'mainstream' and becoming better organized as a consequence of war and the lack of alternatives. Where the tipping point is, and what will trigger it, remains to be seen at least in Saudi Arabia. I think in Iraq and in some extent Syria that tipping point has been crossed with ISIS, which will make such movements far more difficult to uproot. This is no longer a simple counter-terrorism program where the aim is to dismantle an organization. We can destroy the organizations but now more will appear to replace them. The U.S. needs to start attacking the root of the problem - and that's the repressive and elitist political economies of Arab states (where are the Turkish, Indonesian, and other terrorist groups in Muslim-majority democratic states?).
And just a thought - it might be worthwhile to consider a transition period that includes a reform-minded strong-man to be followed by the implementation of democratic governance. The strong-man could provide the stability necessary to actually implement reforms and challenge the old guard while also preventing the mob from essentially wrecking the whole project. There are a couple of post-Cold War examples of something similar occurring.
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