Salman’s Legacy, edited by Madawi al-Rasheed

Salman’s Legacy, edited by Madawi al-Rasheed:

"Mohammed bin Salman, the young crown prince of Saudi Arabia, has set out to transform the kingdom he stands to inherit from his aged father, Salman bin Abdulaziz al-Saud. Since King Salman acceded to the throne in 2015, his favourite son (who is known as MbS) has not so much gripped his people’s imagination as taken it by storm, propelling social and economic reform at home and conducting foreign and defence policy with impulsive aggression against the influence of Iran, the Saudi rival for regional hegemony. A lot hangs on the outcome of the MbS revolution. Saudi Arabia’s pivotal position in the Arab world, the Middle East and Islam, makes it analogous to three systemically neuralgic banks whose collapse would bring down the financial system. The kingdom is simply too big to fail. That is why Salman’s Legacy, a collection of essays by leading scholars on the subject, is a valuable report card. This is a story as gripping as any game of thrones. The 32-year-old crown prince has ruthlessly taken absolute power. He has done away with the House of Saud’s ponderous consensus-building among competing clans and family fiefs. Last year, he elbowed aside more experienced cousins and potential rivals: Mohammed bin Nayef, then interior minister and crown prince; and Prince Miteb bin Abdullah, who inherited command of the National Guard from his father, the late King Abdullah. These states-within-the-state, each with its own army, submitted without a peep."



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