Understanding Saudi Arabia has never been easy: leaks, rumours and official denials surrounding the disappearance of journalist Jamal Khashoggi are a grim reminder of a notoriously opaque system. Historian Madawi al-Rasheed (herself the scion of a powerful dynasty that lost out to the Al-Saud in the formative years of the 1920s) provides a focused and up-to-date political and social guide as the editor of Salman’s Legacy: The Dilemmas of a New Era in Saudi Arabia. The promotion of the king’s ambitious son, Mohammed (MBS), to crown prince in June 2017 proves that “the survival and mystique of the monarchy are closely linked to its unpredictability,” she writes, noting the taboo on public discussion of royal struggles and intrigues.
For the background to the heavily spun narrative of modernisation under the thirtysomething MBS, a highly readable account is provided by Robert Lacey’s Inside the Kingdom (2009). Lacey wrote an earlier book describing the transformation of a pastoral and nomadic society – when traditional Bedouin raids were what Sir John Glubb called “a cross between Arthurian chivalry and county cricket” – into one when the soaring price of oil was producing unimaginable wealth. Lacey revisited it in the long shadow of 9/11, Osama bin Laden and the souring of the special relationship with what political scientist Robert Vitalis dubbed “America’s Kingdom”.
In The Siege of Mecca, Yaroslav Trofimov reconstructs the pivotal event of 1979 when Juhayman al-Utaybi and hundreds of jihadis stormed the holy city’s Grand Mosque and unleashed the forces that would lead to the rise of al-Qaida, months after the earthquake of the Iranian revolution. The after effects of both included pressure from the Saudi clerical establishment for tougher laws and sparser school curricula and the promotion of Sunni-Shia sectarianism as a strand of the rivalry between Riyadh and Tehran. The fate of the ordinary people of neighbouring Yemen, whose Houthi rebels are backed by Iran, has been part of that story since MBS launched an unwinnable war in 2015.
Andrew Hammond’s The Islamic Utopia was published at the height of the Arab spring in 2012. His radical critique scorned what he called the “illusion of reform” under Salman’s predecessor Abdullah. “Al Saud are happy to entrap all those who will expend mental energy on their realm in the intricacies of internal debates, Islamists versus liberals, progressive princes versus retrograde clerics and hawks, the Kremlinology of who’s in and who’s out,” he argued. “But it’s largely a ruse to distract attention from the more fundamental issue of the arbitrary and massive power of a hyper-dynasty haunted by fear of losing it all.”
Rajaa al-Sanea’s novel Girls of Riyadh portrays young women trying to cope with conservative cultural norms and be good Muslims while watching American TV and having fun like their 21st century sisters elsewhere. The Arabic original (2006) was the subject of an (unsuccessful) lawsuit filed for tarnishing the kingdom’s image and encouraging immodest behaviour. It provides a poignantly entertaining backdrop for assessing the significance of recent social reforms, including allowing women to drive and attend sports events. The institution of male guardianship, however, remains firmly in place. And despite being a country where the use of mobile dating apps is reportedly rising sharply, it is worth remembering that 12 female activists who disappeared in May have not been seen since.
• Ian Black’s Enemies and Neighbours: Arabs and Jews in Palestine and Israel, is out in Penguin paperback on 25 October. To order a copy for £9.45 (RRP £10.99) go to guardianbookshop.com or call 0330 333 6846. Free UK p&p over £10, online orders only. Phone orders min p&p of £1.99.
