SAUDI ARABIA - DAY 6 OF 6 · ~7 MIN
Mohammed bin Salman, Vision 2030, and the Future of the Kingdom
It is November 2017 at the Ritz-Carlton in Riyadh. Princes, ministers, tycoons, and senior officials are summoned, detained, or pressured into settlements under the banner of anti-corruption. The luxury hotel becomes a holding site for some of the most powerful men in the kingdom.
Contents — 7 sections
- OPENING SCENE
- HOW MOHAMMED BIN SALMAN ROSE SO FAST
- VISION 2030 AS ECONOMIC STRATEGY
- KHASHOGGI AND THE LIMITS OF REBRANDING
- ARAMCO, OPEC+, AND THE OLD POWER UNDER THE NEW BRAND
- FOREIGN POLICY UNDER MBS
- WHO BENEFITS, WHO PAYS
OPENING SCENE
It is November 2017 at the Ritz-Carlton in Riyadh. Princes, ministers, tycoons, and senior officials are summoned, detained, or pressured into settlements under the banner of anti-corruption. The luxury hotel becomes a holding site for some of the most powerful men in the kingdom.
The event is surreal because it is designed to be. Mohammed bin Salman is not only detaining rivals. He is staging a lesson about where power now lives. No branch of the royal family, no billionaire network, and no security patronage system is above the crown prince's reach.
This is the setting for the final Saudi chapter. The old kingdom was centralized, but power also circulated among senior princes, clerics, ministries, and patronage blocs. The new Saudi Arabia under Mohammed bin Salman is still monarchical, still oil-backed, and still authoritarian. It is also more vertically organized around one ruler-in-waiting than the kingdom had been for generations.
LOCKED AFTER THE PREVIEW
What's in the rest of Day 6
- HOW MOHAMMED BIN SALMAN ROSE SO FAST
- VISION 2030 AS ECONOMIC STRATEGY
- KHASHOGGI AND THE LIMITS OF REBRANDING
- ARAMCO, OPEC+, AND THE OLD POWER UNDER THE NEW BRAND
- FOREIGN POLICY UNDER MBS
- WHO BENEFITS, WHO PAYS