Saudi Arabia Exposed : Inside a Kingdom in Crisis, Updated Edition [Paperback]

John R. Bradley (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: May 11, 2006

Saudi Arabia: land of oil, terrorism, Islamic fundamentalism, and a crucial American ally. John R. Bradley uniquely exposes the turmoil that is shaking the House of Saud to its foundations, including the problems within the new leadership. From the heart of the secretive Islamic kingdom's urban centers to its most remote mountainous terrain, he provides intimate details and reveals regional, religious, and tribal rivalries.
Bradley highlights tensions generated by social change, the increasing restlessness of Saudi youth with limited cultural and political outlets, and the predicament of Saudi women seeking opportunities but facing constraints.
What are the implications for the Sauds and the West? This book offers a startling look at the present predicament and a troubling view of the future.

Editorial Reviews

From Publishers Weekly

An Arabic-speaking Westerner who seized a rare opportunity to travel freely throughout Saudi Arabia, Bradley offers a dense, abstract study that reads more like the "culture and history" section of a guidebook than a juicy, insider account. But Bradley did get access to high-profile Saudis, most memorably to Osama bin Laden's nephew, with whom Bradley went on a picnic. An accomplished journalist and scholar who prefers facts to sensory-let alone salacious-details, Bradley successfully compiles research, information, geographical data and flat-footed descriptions of observed events to explain the political dynamics and historical roots of a strong authoritarian state, characterized particularly by the close relation between the Al-Saud ruling family and the conservative Wahhabis. He conveys a sense of a country fraught with fear, hostility and suspicion while remaining aloof from much of the drama he describes. Bradley is at his best when he writes about the press, providing what is truly an insider's look and untangling some of the knotted ties between the media, the Saudi government and the United States.
Copyright © Reed Business Information, a division of Reed Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved. --This text refers to the Hardcover edition.

From Booklist

Bradley arrived in Saudi Arabia to work as a journalist from 2001 to 2003 for the -English-language Arab News just as a ban on internal travel by Western journalists was lifted. Recounting visits to Saudi Arabia's regions, Bradley underscores the quasi-imperial composition of the regime: rule by the centrally situated al-Saud clan, and acquiescence to varying degrees by the tribal south, the Shiite east, and the historically commercial Hijaz along the Red Sea. The al-Saud alliance with the Wahhabi clergy completes Bradley's picture frame of the regime, although the picture itself is provided in details from the day-to-day lives of ordinary Saudis whom the author meets. The image posits the modern alongside the medieval, and the attractively hospitable against the repellently barbaric, though Bradley remains curious and engaged throughout. The geopolitics of oil is beyond the author's scope, but for readers interested in the social forces at work in the country, including terrorism, Bradley provides perceptive access to current trends. Gilbert Taylor
Copyright © American Library Association. All rights reserved --This text refers to the Hardcover edition.

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Product Details

• Paperback: 256 pages
• Publisher: Palgrave Macmillan; First Edition edition (May 11, 2006)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 1403970777
• ISBN-13: 978-1403970770
• Product Dimensions: 9.2 x 6.5 x 0.7 inches
• Shipping Weight: 9.6 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 4.2 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (38 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #485,535 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
  • #92 in Books > History > Middle East > Saudi Arabia

More About the Author

John R. Bradley (johnrbradley.wordpress.com) was born in England in 1970. He was educated at University College London, Dartmouth College in the United States, and Exeter College, Oxford.

Between 1998 and 2010, Bradley was based in the Middle East. Fluent in Arabic, he is the author of four books on the region that draw heavily on his personal experience: Saudi Arabia Exposed: Inside a Kingdom in Crisis (Palgrave Macmillan, 2005), a Foreign Affairs bestseller; the critically acclaimed Inside Egypt: The Land of the Pharaohs on the Brink of a Revolution (Palgrave Macmillan, 2008; reprinted in January 2011 in an updated edition with the subtitle The Road to Revolution in the Land of the Pharaohs), which uniquely and accurately predicted the Jan. 25 Cairo uprising; Behind the Veil of Vice: The Business and Culture of Sex in the Middle East (Palgrave Macmillan, 2010); and After the Arab Spring: How the Islamists Hijacked the Middle East Revolt (Palgrave Macmillan, 2011).

Bradley's essays, dispatches, reviews, and op-eds have appeared in many publications, including: The Washington Quarterly, The New Republic, The Times Literary Supplement, Salon, The London Telegraph, The London Daily Mail, The Forward, The London Evening Standard, The Jewish Chronicle, The Spectator, The New York Post, The London Sunday Times, The Financial Times, Foreign Affairs, The Independent, The Washington Times, Newsweek, Asia Times Online, Prospect, and The Economist.

He has been interviewed about the Middle East by CNN, the BBC, PBS, NPR, CBS, Fox News, Al-Jazeera English, Sky News, Channel 4 News, Bloomberg TV, and many other media outlets. And he has participated in public debates at The Washington Institute for Near East Policy, Intelligence Squared in London, and The Pacific Council for International Affairs in Los Angeles.