Most people tend to forget that at the beginning of the twentieth century, the country now called Saudi Arabia was practically a war zone between different tribes and different regions that lacked any form of political cohesion or cultural homogeneity. Even linguistically some regions found it somewhat difficult to understand the dialects of some other regions. To unify such a disparate assortment of tribes and regions into a political amalgam was no mean feat. By whatever name you call him and by whatever title you address him King Abdulaziz was a real national hero and a great historical figure. But after conquest and political unification comes the no less demanding task of nation building; how to induce warring tribesmen and hostile villagers to bury the hatchet and come together as one nation with shared objectives and common interests, how to change diversity into complementarity and fragmented parts into an integrated whole.

Traditional loyalties and associations, tribal, regional and sectarian, still run deep. In the absence of effective institutions, professional organizations and viable unions of civil society, people are often forced to rely on such traditional associations to get their rights and protect their interests. To transfer their loyalties completely from traditional associations to the state, people have to make sure that the state is a viable alternative, which could fully meet their needs and serve their interests.

To commit themselves fully to the state, people need to be convinced that it is a neutral apparatus with no favoritism or preference for one point of view or one group over the others, and that its organs treat all citizens fairly and equally, regardless of origin or background, especially in applying the law and in the dispensation of justice and material benefits. But if you were to talk to Saudi citizens from outside of Najd, the Central Region of Saudi Arabia, you would sense a tinge of simmering resentment for what they consider to be the cultural hegemony of Najd and the imposition of its Wahhabi version of Islam on the other regions. Cultural hegemony takes many manifestations. For example, the Najdi dress code has become the national Saudi costume and the Najdi sword dance has become almost like a national anthem.

The saga of the Saudi state goes back to 1744, when the religious reformer Muhammad b. ‘Abd al-Wahhab concluded a pact with Muhammad b. Saud, the baron of ad-Dir’iyyah, a town in central Najd. So, the history of the Saudi State is intrinsically linked to Najd, its geographical and political center.  But Najd is rather poor economically and culturally compared to other regions in the Kingdome. The wealth of the Kingdome comes mainly from the oil fields in the Eastern Province. However, a good percentage of the population in that province are Shi’a. The sectarian tension between Shi’a and Wahhabis is as exasperated as that between Catholics and Anabaptists, if not worse. On the other hand, the Hijazis think that it is pilgrimage to the two holy places in Mekkah and al-Madinah that, in addition to providing a good portion of the state’s annual revenue, gives the Kingdome the unique and leading position it enjoys in the Muslim World. Furthermore, Hijaz had a long history of self-rule under the Sharifs and it has always been a center of learning, therefore, it is considered more advanced culturally than Najd. Due to the flux of annual pilgrims to Hijaz from all corners of the world and due to its long contacts with Egypt and Syria, the Hijazis enjoy a more urbane and open outlook on life, therefore, they feel ill at ease with the way they are subjected to the strict Wahhabi doctrine.

There are other issues and points of social tension that need to be addressed by the state in order to strengthen loyalty and solidify national feeling. Saudi Arabia is mainly desert and until recently nomadic camel herders constituted a large percentage of the total population. The remaining percentage were mainly settled villagers and cultivators. The relation between the two groups was a combination of economic complementarity and socio-political antagonism. The nomads used to exchange with the villagers their animals and animal products for agricultural produce. In the past the nomads constituted, due to their military advantage and possession of means of mobility in the forms of camels and horses, the nobility of the desert who lorded it over villagers and farmers. But in the present situation, they are at a great disadvantage. They lost their military superiority over the townspeople and they no longer have any thing to contribute to the economy. They lack education and technical skills that would qualify them for descent employment.  Modernization, technological advances and depletion of desert resources made nomadic existence no longer viable. The nomads were forced to settle down in shanty towns on the outskirts of big cities and urban centers. Although the nomad had exceptional survival skills for living in the desert, he lacked the skills to lead a successful life in the town. Illiteracy is very high among the Bedouins and they disdain manual labor and look at it as something below their dignity. The situation is aggravated by the historical prejudices, biases, and ethnic slurs entertained by nomads and settlers against one another. The townspeople tend to forget all the positive contributions made by the desert nomads to Arab culture and concentrate only on negative characteristics and the prejudices inherited from the past.

The social stratification in Saudi Arabia has its own complexities. For despite the prejudice of settlers against the nomads, a settler who cannot trace his genealogical descent to an aristocratic nomadic tribe is considered lacking in nobility. Nontribal citizens form a class unto themselves called Khadieri. They cannot intermarry with those who can claim tribal descent. Even the tribes are not ranked equally. Depending on camel wealth and military strength in the past some tribes are still considered noble while other weaker tribes are considered pariah and ignoble. No intermarriage is allowed between the two categories. Value systems do not die fast. An example of the conflict between the old and the new value systems is when a simple, low paid, unskilled employee of a tribal background is bossed by a highly qualified manager of non-tribal genealogy. On the job, the employee resentfully gives in to his boss but outside the job the roles could easily be reversed. You still could see a poor illiterate man in rags of tribal origin, nomad or settler, who would look contemptuously to a nontribal citizen and would refuse to give him his daughter in marriage even if he were a very successful businessman or high ranking official. One of the cases which is being discussed intensively these days in Saudi Arabia is a case of a woman whose marriage was forcefully annulled by a judge because she was tribal while her husband was not. The legal reason on which the judgment is based is genealogical incompatibility.

In addition to all these regional, sectarian and social points of tension, Saudi women in the last few decades are getting restless. They started to be vocal and express their dissatisfaction with the oppression and discrimination to which they have been subjected. They are pressing for better education and better jobs and equal treatment in courts of law.

To create a stable, viable country, it is not enough to draw borders and set up a central political authority. In addition, you need to establish effective institutions that would meet people’s need and create a national consensus and a national culture with shared values and common interests. That is why, for example, I think the creation of a stock market where people from different walks of life could invest is a good idea. Also, joint business ventures and big interregional national companies contribute a great deal to cementing the social structure. On the whole, economic integration as well as well planned educational and communication systems contribute a great deal to the achievement of an effective social assimilation.

No less important is the fosterage of academic freedom and freedom of press, with no official intervention, neither from the political authorities nor from the religious establishment.  There is a dire lack and a noticeable negligence of the establishment of think tanks and centers for social, cultural, and psychological research that would help us to diagnose our society and dissect its deep underlying structure. The value and efficacy of true objective scientific knowledge are still not fully recognized and truly appreciated in Saudi Arabia, especially in the fields of the humanities and social sciences. We need less dogma and more true knowledge based on facts and experience that would help us understand ourselves as we really are. Without such knowledge we will not be able to plan correctly for the future and chart the course of our society for the coming decades. Our problems will not go away by simply ignoring them and denying that they exist. We have to look them in the face and tackle them directly. Only cave people, a la Plato, are afraid to face the light of true knowledge.

The objective is not to eradicate variations and differences but it is to turn complications into complexities and work out social diversities into an integrated mosaic before they fall apart into crumbs and disintegrate. Nor is the aim to eliminate social tension but to turn it into a moving force towards progress and positive change. This calls for planning based on true knowledge and scientific research. Modern history has proven that social and political systems that ally themselves with scientific knowledge fare better and have a better chance of survival than those that ally themselves with dogmas and mere ideologies.