| Summary/Abstract |
This article considers religious, social, political, and economic dimensions of the
Saudi-Wahhabi state imagination. Since the inception, the Saudi state has relied on two
main pillars: the monarchy and Wahhabism, which have been in a symbiotic relationship.
In time, the state imagination in Saudi Arabia has been determined and reconstructed
by factors like Wahhabism, monarchism, rentierism, internal and international political
and economic obligations, and modernization efforts imposed by being a “nation state.”
Those factors made Saudi Arabia a sui generis state. The legitimacy of the monarchy has
been ensured through tribalism and, on a larger scale, religion. Foreign aid, booties, oil
revenues, and, on a rather insignificant scale, tax revenues have created a material infrastructure
to build citizenship.
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