A prince’s challenge

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If a former resident of Saudi Arabia were to visit today, they may think they're in a different country. Gone are the partitions that separated women and men in restaurants and lines at fast food chains. Music, once banned in public, can be heard on the streets, blaring from eateries and parties. Mosque loudspeakers can now only broadcast the call to prayer and not the full service, except on Fridays and Eid. This all comes as the kingdom's de facto ruler, Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman, chips away at the power of the religious establishment that had long controlled every aspect of social and legal life in the birthplace of Islam. The ascetic Wahhabi doctrine that had underpinned his family's rule, as well as hardline edicts, runs counter to the crown prince's five-year-old plan to diversify the economy and open up the country for tourists and investments. The prince is introducing the changes slowly and without a stated plan, in contrast to his vision for the economy which comes with public goals and deadlines. In the quest to tighten his grip on power, Prince Mohammed has muzzled critical voices, and the 2018 murder of Washington Post columnist Jamal Khashoggi on his watch drew international condemnation. The shift from theocracy to autocracy is dividing Saudis. Some wonder if they're still living in a Muslim state, while others welcome what they see as much-needed changes to open up the country. The strategy carries risks for the prince if his reforms are seen to challenge Saudi Arabia's special status in the Muslim world as the custodian of Islam's two holiest sites, at a time when regional rival, Iran, has just elected a hardline president. The question now, in a tightly controlled nation, is whether the religious hardliners regain their clout. — Donna Abu-Nasr

Guests at a Saudi Commission for Tourism and Heritage event in Riyadh in September 2019. Photographer: Faisal Al Nasser/Bloomberg Click here to follow Bloomberg Politics on Twitter and tell us how we're doing or what we're missing at balancepower@bloomberg.net.

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