ABSTRACT
In the few years since he acceded to the throne on August 1, 2005, King ‘Abdallah bin ‘Abdul ‘Aziz has instituted far-reaching reforms that, by general recognition, altered the face of the kingdom. Among the significant changes that were introduced were: fundamental reforms concerning the judiciary; launching a national dialogue mechanism that allowed Sa‘udi citizens to engage each other in addressing issues that concerned society; holding interfaith dialogues that culminated in the July 2008 Madrid conference; establishing a brand new body to select the monarch and his Heir Apparent from among the sons and grandsons of the founder; introducing unprecedented bureaucratic transformations to manage the religious establishment, including the appointment of a new chairman for the Supreme Judicial Council, making changes within the Commission for the Promotion of Virtue and the Prevention of Vice; appointing a woman as Deputy Education Minister, and authorizing women to serve in the Majlis al-Shurah; along with a myriad additional alterations of a reformist nature in such areas as human rights, particularly women's rights, and in the ongoing struggle against extremism and terrorism. To say that ‘Abdallah bin ‘Abdul ‘Aziz was a man in a hurry would indeed be an understatement, and it was likely that history will record his legacy as that of a reformer-monarch who sensed the time was long past for a fundamental socio-political evolution, in which his own yearnings matched those of his subjects.
