ABSTRACT
This chapter explores the sociocultural context and gives a chronological overview of the published works on women in organizations in Saudi Arabia. The focus is on the master narrative, which emphasizes the following: (a) Saudi women's organizational advancement are products of national reforms only (e.g., Saudization, Vision 2030); (b) women are constructed under the control of the masculine authority: state, father, and/or husband; and (c) women are confined to the private sphere as cultural and religious transmitters of knowledge. The literature on Saudi women in leadership highlights the challenges the women face. Micro-politics of resistance remain largely untapped areas of exploration. The chapter concludes by encapsulating the three various ways the literature colonizes the narratives of Saudi women, rearticulating the structural domination and suppression of the heterogeneity of Saudi women (e.g., organizational challenges set as powerful stories against Saudi women); the production of a singular Saudi woman (e.g., complacent Saudi woman, under male patronage, reproducing an idealized Islamic identity); and the codification of knowledge on Saudi women (e.g., repetition of similar studies on Saudi women with similar identifications only codifies it as “knowledge”).
