Saudi Arabia: A Modern History and Kingdom of Football: Saudi Arabia and the Remaking of World Soccer

Saudi Arabia has long been an important country because of the pilgrimage to Mecca, leadership in Muslim institutions, oil wealth, rapid economic and social change, and its controversial role in both opposing and fostering Islamic radicalism. In early 2015 King Salman's succession to the throne initiated a series of changes, particularly in foreign and military affairs, that have increased Saudi Arabia's importance. Understanding current affairs in the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia, a country that has historically been inhospitable to critical research, is therefore vital. The work under review here, Saudi Arabia in Transition: Insights on Social, Political, Economic and Religious Change, is a good source of information and analysis for the general public and for specialists.In the introduction (chapter 1) the three editors pose two questions: Why were there no mass mobilizations or protests in Saudi Arabia during the 2011 Arab Spring uprisings such as those experienced in other Arab countries? Why have so many analysts erred in their evaluations of Saudi politics? The answer to the first question may be found by reading many of the book's essays. In the view of the editors, the chief answer to the second question is that before the year 2000 few foreign scholars were able to conduct fieldwork in Saudi Arabia. The chief value of this book then resides in recent research conducted chiefly by foreign and some Saudi scholars, as epitomized in the fifteen chapters contained in this volume. The three editors also argue that an analysis of Saudi politics and society based solely on any one factor, such as oil, is inherently flawed, given the complex and dynamic nature of change currently underway in the kingdom. The introduction provides a rapid overview of developments in Saudi society and government, concentrating on the importance of the kingdom for the world, domestic and international challenges to the status quo, material and symbolic resources mobilized by the ruling family to meet these challenges, and contextualization of Saudi strengths and resources showing their strengths and weaknesses.The first theme treated in the book concerns oil, more specifically the role, impact, and effects of oil and the wealth it produces for Saudi Arabia. Oil plays a significant part throughout modern Saudi history and in all parts of this book. However, chapters by F. Gregory Gause, Toby C. Jones, Giacomo Luciani, Bernard Haykel, and Steffen Hertog most directly relate to this topic.Oil wealth is widely presumed to play a key role in determining political events. However, F. Gregory Gause, in his perceptive and timely analysis of this presumption in chapter 2, shows that periods of low oil prices do not automatically lead to political unrest and stress. Indeed, periods of high oil prices and high governmental revenues have often coincided with political mobilization, unrest, and violence, as in 1979–80, 1990–91, and 2003. The key determinants leading to such events were external crises in the Middle East or domestic non-oil factors. The Saudi rulers also were able to use saved investments, domestic borrowing, and tactics designed to raise world oil prices, thereby averting grave threats to the regime from low oil prices.Toby Jones in chapter 3 similarly argues that the benefits of oil wealth are sometimes overrated. Saudi Arabia has remained entirely dependent on oil revenues rather than using wealth to diversify the economy. The King Abdullah University of Science and Technology, which opened in 2009, was meant to re-emphasize the earlier role played by science and scientists in the centralizing of the state, the creation of its institutions, and the development of a political narrative emphasizing progress and development. Here, Jones discusses agriculture as a case study in the use of science by government, a process described at greater length in his book, Desert Kingdom: How Oil and Water Forged Modern Saudi Arabia (Harvard University Press, 2010).In chapter 5 Giacomo Luciani examines the often-volatile price of oil on the world market and consequent challenges to long-term planning and economic investment. After 1985 the Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries (opec) as a whole and Saudi Arabia in particular have not been able to play the role of price maker, leading the author to note that “statistically, our ability to model or project prices into the future is essentially nil” (74). Volatility has been increasing, as seen in dramatic swings in oil prices in 2007–9, and, one might add, more recently in 2015–16. Political-military upheavals also increase volatility, though Saudi Arabia has in the past increased marginal production of petroleum during such periods, as in 1990–91. Luciani argues for several changes in oil pricing policy that Saudi Arabia should, in his view, undertake; many of these proposed changes relate to the growing importance of China, Japan, and India in world oil consumption. The author predicts that barring such changes the international oil market as presently constituted will collapse.A very different analysis of oil's impact may be found in chapter 7, where Bernard Haykel first briefly discusses opinions and writings about oil among popular poets (Bandar bin Surur), among the ulama (ʿAbd al-ʿAziz ibn Baz), among Arab nationalists (ʿAbd Allah al-Turayqi), and among the royal family and technocratic bureaucrats. A particularly effective discussion involves the religious-legal claims of the state to ownership of mineral resources (134–35). Even more valuable is Haykel's analysis of al-Qaʿida's radical views on oil wealth that should lead to Saudi oil wealth being shared by all Muslims, and al-Qaʿida's changing opinions on the advisability of attacking oil facilities.In chapter 6 Steffen Hertog describes the regional impact of central government oil revenues, pointing out the key role of this money in the Saudi political economy and in the creation of an integrated business elite. The Najd in the central part of the country has received a higher proportion of spending than its population would warrant. Hertog argues that the most disadvantaged regions are neither the oil-rich east nor the cosmopolitan Hijaz in the west, but rather the southern regions close to Yemen. Government employment, promotions to high office, population growth, registration of private companies, real estate loans—in all these matters government most promotes the Najd, then the Hijaz, and last the southern regions. This argument expands upon and revises the earlier work of Kiren Chaudhry, The Price of Wealth (Cornell University Press, 1997).The second theme of the book is the role of Islam in Saudi Arabia. Chapters by David Commins, Nabil Mouline, Stéphane Lacroix, Saud Al-Sarhan, and Thomas Hegghammer discuss various aspects of Islam in the kingdom.In chapter 8 David Commins addresses the terminology used to describe the strand of Islam begun by Muhammad ibn ʿAbd al-Wahhab in the eighteenth century, often labeled Wahhabism. Foreign defenders of this approach first labeled it as a variety of Hanbali Sunnism that followed medieval thinkers like Ibn Taymiyya. After the third Saudi state led by King ʿAbd al-ʿAziz conquered the Hijaz in the mid-1920s some supporters in Egypt, including the influential Rashid Rida, argued that so-called Wahhabism was a variety of Salafism, seeking to return Islam to the practices of early Muslims. By the 1970s establishment Saudi clerics used the term Salafism to describe themselves, though they rejected the liberal strand of Salafism. Identification with Salafism became a tool used by Saudi religious figures against the pretensions of the Muslim Brotherhood and various Muslim radicals.Nabil Mouline's chapter argues that the Saudi political authorities sought to gain ascendancy over the Wahhabi ulama by the creation in 1971 of the Committee of Senior Scholars and a raft of similar groups designed to curb and organize the clerical power. However, the ulama expanded their own organizations, bureaucratized them, and adapted themselves to the new challenges of the 1990s. Mouline examines the powers, working arrangements, and political importance of the Committee of Senior Scholars. In this regard his chapter could be usefully supplemented by reading Muhammad al-Atawneh, Wahhabi Islam Facing the Challenges of Modernity: Dar al-Ifta in the Modern Saudi State (E. J. Brill, 2010), though both works need to be revised to include recent changes.One aspect of Islam in Saudi Arabia that has gained a great deal of attention since the 2003 attacks on New York City by al-Qaʿida Saudi recruits is radical terrorism. Stéphane Lacroix in chapter 9 looks at the opposite of this phenomenon: urban Islamist networks, particularly in educational institutions, that implicitly mobilized support for the regime from the 1960s onward. Employing social movement theory, Lacroix discusses the Islamic networks' effective opposition to al-Qaʿida in the Arabian Peninsula in 2003–5, thereby denying al-Qaʿida support from most Saudi religious youths. The Islamic networks played a dominant part in the 2005 municipal elections as well.In chapter 10 Saud al-Sarhan adopts a more familiar point of view, by analyzing the ideas and actions of three jihadi-salafist radicals—Humud ibn ʿAbd ʿAllah al-ʿUqla al-Shuʿaybi, Nasir ibn Hamad al-Fahd, and ʿAli ibn Khudayr al-Khudayr—for the years 1997–2003. These three opposed the monarchy, the official ulama, the alliance of Saudi Arabia with the United States, and the prevalent Saudi interpretation of the obligation to wage jihad (holy war), but their influence waned after 2003.Chapter 11 contains an informative essay on the causes of the weakness of violent radicalism in Saudi Arabia written by Thomas Hegghammer. In his view, “transnational Islamist militancy” is divided into those favoring “foreign fighter activism” such as ʿAbd Allah ʿAzzam and those espousing “anti-Western terrorism” such as Usama bin Ladin (207). Saudis generally favored classical jihadist theory and practice, thus participation in anti-Russian fighting in Chechnya and post-2003 Iraq was far more popular than al-Qaʿida's attacks against the United States or its terrorism inside Saudi Arabia itself in 2003–5.The third theme of the book, social change, is treated in two chapters dealing with Bedouins and genealogy (chapters 12 and 13, both written by Abdulaziz H. Al Fahad), and two chapters dealing with Saudi women (chapter 14 by Madawi Al-Rasheed, chapter 15 by Amélie Le Renard).Abdulaziz Al Fahad looks carefully in chapter 12 at the lament of the Najdi Bedouin poet Bandar bin Surur for the ending of nomadic lifestyles as a means to show one of the crucial aspects of modern Saudi rule—a centralization of political power that represented the settled inhabitants (hadar) at the expense of the nomadic tribes. The Saudi government ended tribal raiding, so Bedouins like Bandar bin Surur had to pursue other careers—in his case, becoming a truck driver and itinerant poet who celebrated the heroism, hospitality, and anti-hadar values of his ancestors, but who despised the new social order. Along the same lines, Al Fahad in chapter 13 discusses the flood of genealogical writings that starting in the 1980s seemed to show “a reaction against the decline of traditional modes of social and political organization, the atomization of society, the homogenizing powers of the modern state, and the failure of civil society to take root” (265–66). Both tribal and town identities were diminished; instead, the author argues that the Saudi state insisted on direct power over individuals, as seen, for example, in a national system of allocating male names or in the state selecting tribal leaders. In response, family associations emerged as private kin groups filling a void in civil society. The author supplements the pioneering work of Hamad al-Jasir on genealogy with his own ample research on the topic.Madawi Al-Rasheed in chapter 14 begins her incisive discussion of contemporary changes in the role of Saudi women by outlining the masculine state's subordination and exclusion of women from the public sphere through rulings by the ulama, regulation of women's attire, revival of polygamy, channeling of women to certain limited occupations, and in many other ways. However, in the 2000s there took place especially for female elites an “increased visibility of women [as] a product of modernizing authoritarian rule, economic liberalization, and, finally, the war on terror” (302). The author's analysis is presented at greater length in her book, A Most Masculine State: Gender, Politics, and Religion in Saudi Arabia (Cambridge University Press, 2013).Amélie Le Renard discusses the importance of shopping malls in Riyadh for young Saudi women, who thereby gain access to urban public spaces despite strict gender segregation. The author discloses the negative practical consequences of religiously inspired social rigidity, while also pointing to recent changes in education and employment that have opened some new opportunities for middle-class women to interact with each other in a consumption-oriented milieu. Her analysis is more fully presented in her book, A Society of Young Women: Opportunities of Place, Power, and Reform in Saudi Arabia (Stanford University Press, 2014).This excellent collection of essays is highly informative and well worth reading. However, it does contain a few weaknesses. More contributions from Saudi scholars would have been beneficial. Some authors invoke theoretical frameworks in which they situate their work, but many do not. A dominant question among scholars who study Saudi Arabia is whether the kingdom is so exceptional that it cannot be usefully compared to other countries, though some researchers reject this exceptionalist narrative. In this book Gause, Jones, Lacroix, Le Renard, and the three editors in their introduction might be put in the anti-exceptionalist category. A more explicit discussion of this topic by the other contributors would have been welcome.One problem found in most of the chapters is that they end their coverage in the decade of the 2000s and thereby do not cover recent developments in Saudi Arabia, even though the book has a copyright date of 2015. This problem is somewhat alleviated by the introduction as well as a brief afterword written by Bernard Haykel, in which he discusses the Saudi ban on the Muslim Brotherhood enacted in 2014, the addition of women to the Majlis al-Shura, the spread of social media, and rising expectations among young people because of great wealth that accrued to the state when oil prices were high. The reader who wishes to pursue in greater depth the topics discussed in this book is encouraged to take a close look at the thorough bibliographical coverage presented in J. E. Peterson, “The Arabian Peninsula in Modern Times: A Historiographical Survey of Recent Publications,” Journal of Arabian Studies 4, no. 2 (December 2014): 244–74.

Sarah Yizraeli’s Politics and Society in Saudi Arabia: The Crucial Years of Development, 1960-1982 is an empirically rich and thorough survey of economic and political transformation in twentieth century Saudi Arabia, yet is founded on some questionable assumptions. Yizraeli’s book is one in a flood of recent studies on Saudi Arabia that have helped draw attention to some unrecognized dynamics in the kingdom’s modern history. Among these new titles, Politics and Society is most closely aligne...

The modern city and the making of sport

Saudi Arabia and Iraq as Friends and Enemies: Borders, Tribes and a History Shared, by Joshua Yaphe. Brighton, UK: Sussex Academic Press, 2022. 256 pages. $89.95.

Modern Saudi Arabia is a nation struggling to adopt its eighteenth-century political and religious system to the demands of the new millennium. Governed by an absolute monarchy, the Saudi state confronts the multiple challenges of globalization with a cautiousness that has characterized its modern history. Unlike in most previous centuries, when events in the peninsula were of little note outside the Islamic world, Arabia is presently a state of critical importance. With the largest share of the world's proven petroleum reserves, a dominant role in OPEC, key political and geographic terrain in the Middle East, the international prominence that comes with controlling the holy cities of Mecca and Medina, and a major role in promoting fundamentalist Wahhabi Islam, the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia is arguably more significant and relevant to the world than at any time in its history, at least since the lifetime of the Prophet Mohammed during the sixth and seventh centuries. This book examines the history of Saudi Arabia and its attempts to transform to the new world while maintaining its past. Ideal for students and general readers,The History of Saudi Arabiais part ofThe Greenwood Histories of the Modern Nationsseries. With the histories of nearly 40 nations in print, these books provide readers with a concise, up-to-date history of countries throughout the world. Reference features include a biographical section highlighting famous figures in Saudi Arabian history, a timeline of important historical events, a glossary of terms, and a bibliographical essay with suggestions for further reading.

China today is a powerful state and an influential player in the global arena, as was demonstrated during the Syrian crisis, when China took a counterposition to the United States’ stance in Syria and supported the Assad regime. Beijing put a veto on the international resolutions related to the Syrian crisis and abstained from voting, as it did in the past when dealing with the crises in the region. In a move that marked a new page in China’s foreign policy, Beijing backed what was known as the sixpoint plan, calling for a ceasefire and settlement of the crisis through internal dialogue and proclaiming the inviolability of Syrian national sovereignty. In a subsequent move, China sent its envoy Li Huaqing (former Chinese ambassador to Syria) to Damascus to encourage the initiation of a dialogue between government forces and opposition. Following that, China sent Assistant Foreign Minister Zhang Ming (who had previously visited Egypt, Saudi Arabia and France) to the region to discuss ways of approaching the Syrian crisis. For the first time in its modern history, China renounced its policy of non-interference in crises outside its direct interests and immediate geopolitical space. The following paper will focus on China’s stance in the Syrian crisis (supporting its peaceful settlement and keeping equal distance from all the parties in the conflict) and the future of Sino-Syrian relations based on the common history of the two countries.

_ In June, another US supermajor made a big bet on the still-emerging practice of extracting lithium from what some call brine and what those in the oil patch tend to just call produced water. The investments coming from oil and gas companies mostly hinge on the use of direct lithium extraction (DLE) technologies that capture the precious metal that is suspended in oilfield wastewater. The latest entrant is Chevron, which now holds 125,000 net acres across Texas and Arkansas atop the Smackover Formation, a reservoir that began its industrial life more than a century ago as an oil field. Chevron joins ExxonMobil and Equinor in the Smackover, which the Dallas Federal Reserve Bank recently described as “ground zero” in the race to commercialize lithium-laden brine. ExxonMobil revealed plans more than 2 years ago to produce enough lithium from the Smackover to make the batteries for 1 million electric vehicles by 2030, with first production expected in 2027. Norway’s Equinor entered the play last year through a joint venture with US-based Standard on the still-emerging practice of extracting lithium from what some call brine and what those in the oil patch tend to just call produced water. The investments coming from oil and gas companies mostly hinge on the use of direct lithium extraction (DLE) technologies that capture the precious metal that is suspended in oilfield wastewater. The latest entrant is Chevron, which now holds 125,000 net acres across Texas and Arkansas atop the Smackover Formation, a reservoir that began its industrial life more than a century ago as an oil field. Chevron joins ExxonMobil and Equinor in the Smackover, which the Dallas Federal Reserve Bank recently described as “ground zero” in the race to commercialize lithium-laden brine. ExxonMobil revealed plans more than 2 years ago to enough lithium from the Smackover to make the batteries for 1 million electric vehicles by produce 2030, with first production expected in 2027. Norway’s Equinor entered the play last year through a joint venture with US-based Standard Lithium. That venture recently drilled its fifth well that averaged 582 mg/L. That is the highest lithium concentration seen on the lease since drilling began. A final investment decision on scaling up commercial production is expected by year-end. The Dallas Fed, which monitors industrial activity in Texas and surrounding states, has cautioned that the Smackover may be more the exception than the rule when it comes to lithium-rich brines in US oilfield wastewater. However, that hasn’t slowed interest. Companies are exploring upstream synergies beyond the Smackover which straddles parts of east Texas and southern Arkansas. One example comes from the Permian Basin, where a Canadian company called LibertyStream (formerly known as Volt Lithium) reported at the start of the year that it achieved up to a 99% lithium recovery rate from a facility capable of processing more than 10,000 B/D of brine. The same firm announced another successful field trial in July using its DLE system in North Dakota’s Bakken Shale where it achieved an average lithium recovery rate of 96% from oilfield brine at a saltwater disposal facility. A 2024 paper, SPE 220910, authored by researchers from the petroleum engineering departments at the University of North Dakota and the University of Texas, estimated that with enough capital investment the Bakken could yield up to $1.6 billion annually in lithium from the region’s produced water over the next 40 years. The potential rise of a new lithium industry in the US isn’t going unnoticed elsewhere. In fact, some of the forerunners in this space are based in Canada where multiple projects are underway in Alberta and Saskatchewan. Among them is E3 Lithium, which plans to launch a phased demonstration of a new DLE facility this year and continue into next. The project will start with two new wells but is seeking permits for up to 56 to tap Alberta’s Leduc oil and gas field north of Calgary. Discovered in 1947, the Leduc field established the region as a major petroleum hub. Today, with an estimated 3 million metric tons (Mt) of lithium reserves, it may be looking at a new future in helping make battery packs. E3 has highlighted that the reservoir is “well understood” thanks to decades of oil and gas development and that “Alberta’s workforce will require little to no upskilling to transition from oil and gas to lithium.” In Saudi Arabia, university researchers have joined forces with Saudi Aramco to pilot DLE technology using the oil giant’s various sources of brine. The UAE is following suit with similar early-phase work. German producer Neptune Energy is also dabbling in this space. In June, it was announced that the German gas producer was partnering with a California-based DLE developer to pull lithium from its produced water in Saxony-Anhalt, Germany. Every DLE pilot seems to come with claims of a “breakthrough” process. But there are still significant hurdles before oil and gas companies can secure a meaningful foothold in the lithium business. DLE is one of the most expensive ways to produce lithium, largely due to high energy requirements. The process is also inherently water-intensive, raising concerns about both freshwater use and the reinjection of the stripped brine. Simply sending lithium-free water back into the reservoir can further dilute the remaining resource. The handful of oil and gas firms entering the lithium space is also doing so at one of the worst times in the sector’s modern history. The International Energy Agency reported that despite global lithium demand surging 30% year-over-year in 2024, supply continues to outpace even that record growth. Since topping more than $74,000/Mt in 2022, lithium prices have plunged by 80%. Among those issuing a few words of caution is Wood Mackenzie, which has outlined how the lithium map is undergoing tectonic shifts. In a May 2025 report the energy consultancy projected that Australia’s share of global lithium supply will fall from one-third to one-quarter over the next decade. Outside North America, Africa is expected to play a larger role, while Argentina is poised to overtake Chile as the world’s second-largest exporter before 2030. WoodMac also warned that the global lithium market remains “on the brink of a significant supply glut” that may peak in 2027 before switching to a potential shortage sometime next decade. It’s not just about upstart producers chasing peak prices. China, the lithium industry’s longtime leader, is operating at overcapacity and playing a major role in pushing prices down. Others blamed for the oversupply include producers in Indonesia and the Democratic Republic of the Congo. The downturn in lithium production has already resulted in project delays and cancellations, particularly for those developers that have not locked in investors. The outlook is further clouded by trade and geopolitical tensions between the US and China, which currently controls about two-thirds of global lithium refining capacity and remains firmly in the driver’s seat when it comes to market dynamics. Meanwhile, US oil producers looking to enter the market—such as ExxonMobil, with its goal of supplying enough lithium for 1 million battery packs each year—may be in for a dose of supply chain reality. According to WoodMac, the lack of domestic refining infrastructure means that US-produced lithium must still be shipped to Asia before it can become a battery. All of this should be a familiar story to the oil and gas companies looking on. Tight supply raises prices, prompting a rush of new projects that are then followed by oversupply and falling margins that squeeze weaker players out. But just as with past attempts to diversify into other energy sectors, oil companies are not the incumbents. They are just getting in line which for now makes them the underdogs in the great lithium race. For Further Reading SPE 220910 - Economic Analysis of Lithium and Salts Recoveries From Bakken Formation by M. Jakaria, K. Ling, D. Wang, and J. Crowell, University of North Dakota; and D. Zheng, The University of Texas at Austin.

Boks reviewed: Africans: The History of a Continent. By John Iliffe In Pursuit of History: Fieldwork in Africa. Edited by Carolyn Keyes Adenaike and Jan Vansina Wars of Imperial Conquest in Africa, 1830–1914. By Bruce Vandervort The Moon is Dead! Give us our Money! The Cultural Origins of an African Work Ethic, Natal, South Africa, 1843–1900. By Keletso E. Atkins Work, Culture and Identity: Migrant Laborers in Mozambique and South Africa, c. 1860–1910. By Patrick Harries ‘We Spend our Years as a Tale that is Told’: Oral Historical Narrative in a South African Chiefdom. By Isabel Hofmeyr The Seed is Mine: The Life of Kas Maine, a South African Sharecropper, 1894–1985. By Charles van Onselen Liberals against Apartheid: A History of the Liberal Party of South Africa, 1953–1968. By Randolph Vigne From Obscurity to Bright Dawn—how Nyasaland became Malawi: An Insider's Account. By Henry Phillips Revealing Prophets: Prophecy in East African History. Edited by David M. Anderson and Douglas H. Johnson Mountain Farmers: Moral Economies of Land and Agricultural Development in Arusha and Meru. By Thomas Spear Dilemmas of Democracy in Nigeria. Edited by Paul A. Beckett and Crawford Young All the Pasha's Men: Mehmed Ali, his Army and the Making of Modern Egypt. By Khaled Fahmy The Ottoman Turks: An Introductory History to 1923. By Justin McCarthy The Holy War Idea in Western and Islamic Traditions. By James Turner Johnson The History of Saudi Arabia. By Alexei Vassilev The Ottoman Gulf: The Creation of Kuwait, Saudi Arabia and Qatar. By Frederick F. Anscombe The Making of Iraq 1900–1963: Capital, Power and Ideology. By Samira Haj Great Britain, the United States, and the Security of the Middle East: The Formation of the Baghdad Pact. By Magnus Persson The Politics of Jerusalem since 1967. By Michael Dumper Palestine and the Palestinians. By Samih K. Farsoun with Christina E. Zacharia Palestinian Identity: The Construction of Modern National Consciousness. By Rashid Khalidi Empire of Free Trade: The East India Company and the Making of the Colonial Marketplace. By Sudipta Sen Theft of an Idol: Text and Context in the Representation of Collective Violence. By Paul Brass Science and Power in Colonial Mauritius. By William Kelleher Storey Valour: A History of the Gurkhas. By E. D. Smith The Golden Needle: The Biography of Frederick Stewart (1836–1889). By Gillian Bickley Sun Yat‐sen. By Marie‐Claire Bergère. Translated by J. Lloyd Passivity, Resistance and Collaboration: Intellectual Choices in Occupied Shanghai, 1937–45. By Poshek Fu Korea's Place in the Sun: A Modern History. By Bruce Cumings

Rift Valley fever: still an emerging infection after 3500 years.

I shall lead my steedand hurl us both at the target.Oh Lord, if my end is nigh,may my tomb not be drapedin green mantles.No, let it be the belly of an eagle,perched up on high with his kin.So let me be a martyr,dwelling in a high mountain passamong a band of knights who,united in devotion to God,descend to face armies.When they leave this world,they leave trouble behind,and meet their Day of Judgment,as told in the Scriptures.– Osama bin Laden, Eid al-Adha sermon, February 14, 2003

Editor's column Global demand shows no signs of slowing, increasing another 2 million B/D in 2011. Both international and national oil companies are anticipating continued strong energy demand and sustained reliance on fossil fuels as the energy product of choice. Two new long-term outlooks agree that global population growth and rising incomes will propel energy demand, primarily in developing countries. The most significant shift in the energy mix going forward is increasing reliance on natural gas and a decline in coal use for electricity. BP’s Energy Outlook 2030 predicts that world energy consumptions will grow 1.6% a year from 2010 to 2030, although energy efficiency will improve sharply, restraining overall growth in energy consumption. Almost all of the growth will come from non-OECD countries. Use of natural gas and nonfossil fuels will gain at the expense of coal, with gas expected to meet 31% of the growth in global consumption. Although heavy reliance on fossil fuels will continue, gas consumption also will take market share away from oil. The report forecasts that oil demand growth will come largely from China, India, and the Middle East. Supply for meeting that expected growth in demand will come primarily from OPEC countries, with production increases in natural gas liquids and conventional crude from Saudi Arabia and Iraq. ExxonMobil recently extended its long-term energy forecast to 2040 for the first time. The Outlook for Energy: A View to 2040 predicts that global demand will be about 30% higher in 2040 compared with today, with demand in developing countries rising about 60%. “Less carbon-intensive fuels, particularly natural gas, gain market share, while coal peaks and begins a decline for the first time in modern history,” the report says. The shale revolution continues, as the report predicts that natural gas from shale and similar sources will make up roughly a third of total global gas production by 2040. Executives speaking at last month’s International Petroleum Technology Conference in Bangkok, Thailand, generally agree with these assessments. Fossil fuels will remain the dominant fuel choice for years to come, but their development will require increased technical capability and efficiency to meet global demand, panelists at the conference executive plenary session concluded. The future will demand a “higher intensity” of E&P efforts, said Nasser Al-Jaidah, chief executive officer of Qatar Petroleum. The industry must give assurances that it can develop resources to meet world demand and must make a commitment to introducing new technologies that increase recovery factors. Additionally, the industry must confirm that it can operate in more efficient ways to mitigate greenhouse gas emissions. Several game-changing technical opportunities exist, said Dato Wee Yiaw Hin, executive vice president of E&P at Petronas, among them increasing recovery factors through enhanced oil recovery, carbon capture and sequestration, Arctic exploration, and the development of biofuels. Speakers at the conference agreed that the growth in shale supplies is promising, but the sector will not develop as quickly as it did in the US. The main hurdle for shale is acceptability, both from governments and the public.

BackgroundThe global threat of the COVID-19 pandemic continues to evolve forming the most impactful health crises in modern history, necessities of individuals adhering to mandatory behavior change that limits the spread of the pandemic. The purpose of the current study is to identify behavioral responses of the health sciences university students during the period of the COVID-19 pandemic and determine risk perceptions using the health belief model (HBM).MethodsA cross-sectional study using an online survey distributed among health sciences female university students in Riyadh, KSA. The questionnaire was used to assess sociodemographic characteristics; knowledge about COVID-19 and its preventive measures, risk perceptions, and beliefs using the HBM; and their actual adoption of precautionary measures.ResultsThe mean age of 286 respondents was 21.6 years (SD 2.5). They had good knowledge, positive risk perception, and good practice. Fifty-seven percent of the respondents adhere satisfactorily to COVID-19 precautionary behavior. Respondents with positive overall risk perception had around 6 times significantly higher adherence compared to those with negative risk perception. Perceived benefits have higher odds of adherence to COVID-19 precautionary behavior. Similarly, cues to action were a significant determinant of adherence to COVID-19 precautionary behavior.ConclusionsThe constructs of the HBM provided good measurement of risk perception and the respondent students had good knowledge. Yet, significant gaps were shown between COVID-19 perceived risks and the students’ actual practice of personal hygienic measures, particularly hand hygiene. To put an end to the present COVID-19 and its upcoming waves, it is highly recommended to direct COVID-19 training programs specifically tailored towards university students.

The Arabian Peninsula has played a central role in modern history. It is the birthplace of Islam and where Mecca, the destination of the annual Muslim pilgrimage, is located. It holds the world’s largest petroleum reserves and has been central to the global flow of economic, political, intellectual, and cultural networks since the early twentieth century. Yet these realities are not reflected in the scholarship on the Middle East. If anything, the latter largely approaches the peninsula as a backwater of politics, culture, and civilization. This chapter interrogates the politics of knowledge production on the peninsula, especially as they intersect with questions of power, culture, and imperialism. Addressing some of the critical scholarship in Arabian Peninsula studies, it moves on to a discussion of the politics of history-making in Saudi Arabia before concluding with a brief note on the role of Yemen therein.

For the first time in modern history, leading emerging nations have a real chance to shape the evolution of the world economy. Key actors in this scenario are the BRIC countries - Brazil, Russia, India, and China - whose growing presence on the global stage has been the defining feature of the world economic landscape in the early 21st century. Backed by rapid economic growth, growing financial clout, and a newfound sense of assertiveness in recent years, the B RICs are a driving force behind an incipient transformation of the world economy away from a U S -dominated system toward a multipolar one in which developing countries will have a major say. Meanwhile, increasing economic cohesion in Europe - particularly among the 16 member states of the euro area - is a separate source of pressure on the international governance structure. Both the BRICs and the euro area will contribute to the continued evolution of the international monetary system as they work to strengthen their relative positions and mould the system to their purposes.It is true that multipolarity is not evident in all aspects of contemporary international relations. In politics, where much of the discussion has been focused, the debate centres on nonpolarity, in which numerous concentrations of power exist with no single centre dominating - a viewpoint forcefully argued by Richard Haass.1 In trade, multilateralism reigns, in the sense that a formal framework of rule-making and compliance has emerged from successive rounds of trade liberalization under the aegis of the World Trade Organization. However, the stalling of the current Doha round of international trade negotiations shows the challenges that multilateralism feces in contentious areas, such as agricultural subsidies and services, where the interests of developed and developing countries diverge. In the international monetary arena, the notion of bipolarity or multipolarity - the existence of two or more dominant poles - also stimulates vigorous debate. Some, such as Barry Eichengreen, argue that there is no substitute for the US dollar at the top of the international monetary system.2 This position, however, ignores the recent dramatic shifts in relative economic power and the deep interdependencies between the United States and other major players. Broadly speaking, important decisions regarding the international monetary system must now account for the interests of Europe and fastgrowing emerging market countries (the BRICs for certain, but for some purposes also such countries as Korea, Mexico, and Saudi Arabia). In our view, the debate has been wrongly defined: the issue is not whether other national currencies will take over from the dollar, but instead whether the international monetary system will once again be managed at the global level - as it was under Bretton Woods - rather than being the result of uncoordinated actions of member governments. The BRICs have laid down a powerful challenge to the existing system, where US hegemony persists in a laissez-faire world of flexible exchange rates and monetary policies focused on domestic objectives. They argue that some international currency - managed not by a single country but by international agreement - should eventually supersede the current unmanaged, dollar-dominated international monetary system.Though they are rivals in some respects, the three emerging poles - the United States, the euro area, and the BRICs - share a common interest in maintaining financial stability and facilitating trade and economic growth. Trade and investment between the three of them account for a large part of global flows. About one quarter of US exports go to the euro area and a similar amount to the BRIC countries, while 16 percent of total BRIC exports go to the United States and 29 percent to the euro area. Dense crossborder foreign direct investments have created strong mutual interests and interdependencies. American multinationals hold more than one third of their total direct overseas investments in companies located in the euro area, and European banks have established a strong presence in the BRICs through extensive networks of subsidiaries and branches. …

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