Arab News runs an interesting opinion piece looking at education and unemployment. The writer finds that, opposite what one might expect, in the Saudi situation, most of the unemployed actually have some level of education, including 44% who are university graduates.

The situation is not unique to the Kingdom. Many Arab governments have found it easier and cheaper to keep students in school than to find jobs for them. I recall many students, working on their Masters and Doctorate degrees in Syria and Bahrain who had little chance for jobs. They ended up sitting in cafes, drinking their coffee and bemoaning the lack of any future. Governments would provide scholarships and stipends while students acquired degrees that would not lead to jobs, even in technical fields.

Syria, for example, was producing doctorates in Refrigeration Engineering by the score. That’s a legitimate field and a legitimate degree. The problem was that there is little demand for Doctors of Refrigeration Engineering. In fact, there were fewer jobs in the whole world than there were graduates from Syria. If every single Refrigeration Engineer in the world were to walk away from his job and be replaced by a Syrian engineer, there would still be hundreds of unemployed Syrian Refrigeration Engineers.

This is a situation that spans the globe. When I was in university, my school – Georgetown University – closed its Astronomy program. It was producing more doctorates in the field than there were jobs, too. But, instead of digging the employment whole deeper, the school essentially told would-be students: Find another field.

Social, structural, and economic conditions make this difficult to do in the Arab world. Saudi Arabia, with its restrictions on employing the female half of its population, faces an even tougher future. As noted above, keeping a body in school is far easier than finding a job for that body. There’s a problem with this, though.

The problem is that the graduate will eventually have to leave school. He or she will still be unemployable simply because there are no jobs in the field from which they graduated. The will, inevitably, become embittered with what turned out to be false promises. If it’s the government who made those false promises, they will be angry with government and demand change. And now, rather than uneducated dissidents, the countries end up with very well educated dissidents, far more capable of causing harm if they get angry enough. Clearly, keeping people in school is not a solution. At best, it’s a stopgap.

Saudi graduates are further challenged by the way in which expat workers, many with the same degrees, are hired in preference to Saudi nationals. They work more cheaply; they require fewer benefits; it’s easier to fire them for non-performance; they don’t come with unknown quantities of outside influence – wasta – that interferes with rational operations.

The government’s latest Saudization program, Nitiqat, is intended to address this latter issue. Its teeth start to bite next Saturday, when companies that have not met their Saudi:Expat employee ratios lose their ability to obtain visas. Those companies that have complied get benefits for keeping the ratio high in employing Saudis.

Does university education make you smarter?
ABDEL AZIZ ALUWAISHEG

Unemployment in Saudi Arabia has hovered around 10 percent for some time, according to official figures. It is unusual to experience such high levels of unemployment during times of rapid economic growth.

It is more puzzling that unemployed Saudis are more educated than the average, as if university education has made them less employable! According to official statistics, 44 percent of the unemployed are university graduates, 13 percent have post-high-school diplomas, and 26 percent have high school diplomas. That is a full 83 percent. Only 1 percent had no formal schooling.

This is the opposite of what you would expect. In most countries, unemployment is inversely related to schooling: More schooling results in lower unemployment levels. But we seem to have the opposite: The more education you get, the less likely you are to find a job!

During the past decade, spread of higher education has been quite impressive, as have the high levels of public spending on university education in Saudi Arabia. Enrollment and graduation levels have been on the increase, with rates of growth exceeding double digits in some years and number of graduates doubling in seven years!
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Arab News reports on the opening of a museum in Baha – principal city of the region of that name in southwestern Saudi Arabia – that honors the past history and cultures of the region. Interestingly, some of its collected artifacts go back to the Stone Age, with examples of Mousterian Culture stone tools. Mousterian tools are actually the creation of Neanderthals, later adopted by modern men, H. sapiens. Neanderthals are known to have lived in Israel, but there’s no evidence (of which I’m aware) that they lived in the Arabian Peninsula. So, these tools are probably more recent.

Perhaps even more interesting, the collection includes rock engraving of the Thamud civilization. I find this interesting because the Thamud are among those people mentioned in the Quran as having been destroyed for not accepting the word of God, as given them by the Prophet Salih. Mada’in Salih, was interpreted in the Quran as having been a city blasted by either lightning or earthquake as a result of its apostasy. In fact, the building carved into stone post-date the Thamud considerably. That the government is sponsoring recognition of this pre-Islamic culture is commendable.

Baha museum: Housing history
ARAB NEWS

BAHA: The archaeological museum in Baha houses artifacts that tell stories that go back thousands of years. Some of the showcased artifacts and historical objects date back to the Stone Age. Some of them are 10,000 years old while some other pieces of antiquity are believed to be dated around 3500 BC.

The museum also houses a mushaf copy dating back to 1864 donated by Crown Prince Naif, deputy premier and interior minister.

The museum operating under the supervision of the Saudi Commission for Tourism and Antiquities (SCTA) was built in 2003 in the ancient architectural style of the Baha region.

It also has engraving and pictures belonging to the Thamud society, who lived in the south during the first millennium BC. Some of the rock pictures of the Thamud people portray camels and humans.

Most of the ancient inscriptions in the museum were discovered in the Baha region especially pictures of ancient villages.
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After the plot to assassinate Saudi Ambassador to the US Nail Adel Jubeir, and attacks on the Saudi Embassy in Damascus, the Saudi government is going to establish its own bureau of Diplomatic Security, Saudi Gazette reports. The move seems to be setting up an office somewhat similar in its mission to that of the US State Department’s Diplomatic Security Service (DSS) in that it will protect missions and diplomats abroad as well as foreign missions within the Kingdom. This latter job is currently being done by both police and the Saudi Arabian National Guard.

Special unit to protect embassies

JEDDAH — The government is setting up a special security unit to protect Saudi ambassadors and diplomatic missions abroad.

The unit will also be responsible for providing protection to foreign diplomatic missions in the Kingdom.

Teams of commandos, officers and non-commissioned officers will be trained specifically for the unit known as the “Special Forces for Diplomatic Security”.

It will fall under the Ministry of Interior, said Al-Hayat Arabic daily, quoting informed sources.
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The to-be-formed Saudi service, based on this Saudi Gazette article, seems more in line with the former State Dept. office of Security, SY, in that it does not appear to have investigatory or arrest powers, as does DS. That may come in time.

The Middle East Policy Council (MEPC) offers commentary by Nathaniel Kern and Matthew Reed on the changes in the Saudi government resulting from the death of Prince Sultan.

The piece notes that again, the process of succession went smoothly, more smoothly, in fact, than in the past. While the process did not have to deal with who would become King at the moment, it did contend with the Saudi system of lining up future leaders. More, though, is that Pr Sultan’s death opened an opportunity for the King to realign government, taking many of the roles that Sultan had assumed for himself out of the Ministry of Defense. The piece also notes that several senior princes, including members of the Sudairi cohort, have been moved out of their positions by the King.

The article concludes with a discussion of the role of the Allegiance Commission, organized by King Abdullah in 2006. It highlights changes in the membership and that its powers have increased. Now, with the rise of Pr Naif to the position of Crown Prince and eventually King, he will be subject to regulations concerning his replacement – temporary or permanent – if his health were to incapacitate him.

Change and Succession in Saudi Arabia
Nathaniel Kern and Matthew W Reed

In the three weeks since Saudi Crown Prince Sultan passed away, many Western pundits have speculated about succession, given the advanced age of senior members of the family, and the uncertain prospect of a generational turnover. At stake are oil market stability, Saudi Arabia’s status as the West’s strategic partner in the region, and the many gains the Kingdom has made against al Qaeda over the past decade. However, when considered cumulatively, the deliberate moves made by King Abdullah in recent weeks suggest careful and prudent planning for the continuity of policy.

Although little commented upon, the succession order now in place is much more robust than the dicey uncertainty which prevailed over the past several years, when a very ill Crown Prince was nevertheless a heart-beat away from the throne.
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[Disclosure: I occasional write, for compensation, book reviews for the Middle East Policy Council's journal.]

In an op-ed for Arab News, Gwynne Dyer thinks that the Arab League has awoken from its moribund state and is actually trying to do something positive for the Arab world. That certainly does seem to be the case. In its 66-year history, the League has been nothing more than a talk-shop, uttering platitudes about the Arab world and condemnation for those outside it, never seeking accountability and always finding excuses.

This year, the Arab League appears to have grown up a bit. It has actively condemned Libya and now, Syria. By kicking Syria – if temporarily – out of the League, it sends a very clear signal that the behavior of Bashar Al-Assad’s government is unacceptable. In seeking UN action against Syria, it is using tools it does not itself have. This is indeed a profound change.

Dyer’s article goes on to note what some individual Arab states are doing in the face of Syria’s crackdown on its internal dissidents. He also points out that Qatar is politically punching far outside its weight class.

Welcome change in Arab League’s attitude
GWYNNE DYER | ARAB NEWS

For most of its 66-year history, the Arab League was a powerless organization, dominated by regimes that made sure it never criticized their lies and crimes. But suddenly, this year, it woke up and changed sides.

Last March the Arab League suspended Libya’s membership because of dictator Muammar Qaddafi’s brutal attempts to suppress the revolution, and voted to back a no-fly zone in Libya. That led directly to the UN resolution authorizing the use of force to protect civilians from Qaddafi’s army, and ultimately to the tyrant’s overthrow and death.

Last Saturday the Arab League acted again, suspending Syria’s membership. It did so because President Bashar Assad has not carried out the commitments he gave the League about ending the violence against Syrian civilians (an estimated 3,500 killed so far), pulling the army off the streets of Syrian cities, releasing the thousands of recently imprisoned protesters, and opening a dialogue with the opposition within two weeks.

On Sunday the League’s Secretary-General Nabil Al-Arabi called for “international protection” for Syrian civilians as the organization lacked the means to act alone. “There is nothing wrong with going to the UN Security Council because it is the only organization able to impose” such measures, he added. And he said that during a visit to Tripoli, the newly liberated capital of Libya.

Everybody understood the significance of his saying it there. The League explicitly rejects foreign military intervention in Syria, and NATO would never take on Assad’s regime anyway. But Al-Arabi was implicitly saying that what is happening in Syria now is comparable to what was happening in Libya six months ago, and that all measures short of war are justified to stop the slaughter in Syria and remove the dictator’s regime. Then on Monday, King Abdallah of Jordan finally said aloud what almost every other Arab leader has been thinking: “If Bashar (Assad) has the interest of his country (at heart) he would step down.”
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For his most recent column in Arab News, Abdulateef Al-Mulhim takes on the US relationship with China. He finds that the US blindly blundered into an economic relationship that ended up hurting the US, a position with which many American conservatives would tend to agree.

The argument, however, rests on the assumption that how the Chinese report their economy is actually how that economy operates. I’m not sure that’s a safe assumption. It’s coming to light that much of the Chinese economy is not as rosy as might have been thought. There’s a problem with how the government stifles innovation by directing its investments into state firms at the expense of entrepreneurs, where innovation actually takes place. This economic essay notes nine areas in which China is facing economic problems, including environment, unemployment, income disparities, and the like. This essay from Economist notes the long-term, structural problems in the economy. This Foreign Policy Research Institute piece (14-page PDF) seeks to identify the limits to China’s growth.

The US is hardly innocent of economic miscues, but I think it mistaken to assume that China has avoided them.

America fired itself from a job
Abdulateef Al-Mulhim

Households in the US have more Chinese products
than in Chinese homes

Americans have no secrets. They even tell their enemies what they have up their sleeves. For example, Aviation Week & Space Technology Magazine contains the type of information no country would have revealed about aviation/space program, aircraft and missiles or national defense. The magazine is always translated into Russian and put aboard an Aeroflot plane from JFK Airport to Moscow before it hits the newsstand on Broadway. And American $100 bills are the best trademarks in the world. Yet, there are more $100 bills in the Gulf region than in the states of Washington, Oregon, Idaho, Montana, Wyoming, North Dakota, South Dakota and Nebraska put together.

In the past, all you needed to sell a product was just put three words on it (Made in America). People in Saudi Arabia would use Pillsbury baking products, G.E. products, GM products and American tools. America was on top of the world. Every country owes America a favor. They liberated Europe, rebuilt Germany and Japan, discovered oil in Saudi Arabia and freed China from Japanese atrocities. In the 1960s the American blue passport was the best protection anyone can have. Now, it is simply a good target for any anti-capitalism crusader. America has the best economic schools and the brightest brains in banking, but they couldn’t see an approaching trade competitor. America has the best spy satellites, but they failed to see what one country with a billion inhabitants could do. So, if America has the best highway system, the biggest banks, the most prestigious universities and the most educated people, then how can they lose their job to a country they saved from the Japanese atrocities in the 1940s? This country is called China.
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Dr. al-Qarni appears to have gotten up on the wrong side of the bed in his most recent Asharq Alawsat column. In doing so, his grasp of history seems to have suffered.

The good doctor rails against nonproliferation, the idea that more nuclear weapons does not make for a peaceful future. Instead, he sees a ‘hegemony’ on the part of the Non-Proliferation Treaty countries and their quest to reduce the spread of nuclear weapons as an attempt to keep others from threatening their power. He certainly subscribes to the ‘might makes right’ view of the world.

In doing so, he overlooks many things. Does the world not respect non-nuclear states? That’s a rather difficult thesis to support. Switzerland certainly gets a bit of respect yet it is non-nuclear. Australia, Canada, and Brazil seem to manage okay on the world stage, yet they possess no nuclear weapons. Is there widespread disrespect for Japan or the Scandinavian countries?

Perhaps the problem is in countries that see war as a normal part of politics.

Nor, as Dr. al-Qarni represents, did the US reach world power status through its acquisition of nuclear weapons. It achieved that status following WWI, long before atomic bombs were even a dream outside, perhaps, the science fiction of H.G. Wells. The US role in WWII and its economy asserted that status with nuclear capabilities only putting a cap on the matter.

In this piece, Dr. al-Qarni is actually saying more about himself than about the world around him.

The West wages jihad but forbids us from doing so
Dr. Aaidh al-Qarni

How can the West wage jihad but prohibit us Muslims from doing so?

Here I am talking about the fact that the West has produced nuclear missiles yet prevents us from doing so; occupies our lands whilst protecting its own territory, and colonizes our seas and oceans whilst defending its own seas and oceans. Its factories produce rockets, bombs, missiles, frigates, rocket-launchers and aircraft carriers, whilst our factories only produce bubble-gum and Pepsi. The West warns us against acts of aggression and acquiring weapons, whilst it launches attacks and stockpiles arms day and night.

This is because the West is intelligent and knows that power is the source of all stature and grandeur. Allah the Almighty said: “Prepare against them what force you can”. The world respects no one but the strong. As for diplomacy, romanticism, and political sentimentality, this is mere superficial talk to distract and deceive foes, because war is an act of deception. Preoccupying the Middle East with arts, folklore, and cultural ceremonies at the expense of military factories is an open joke. To produce one tank would be better than a thousand poems, a rocket more useful than a hundred cultural shows, and a bomb more effective than a hundred epic tales to remind us of the glory of our forefathers, and what it used to be like in the old days. Does the world respect a state for its peaceful reputation, finesse, tact, and modesty, or for its strength and power? Iran realized this secret, and indeed the Persians are among the most cunning people, described by Umar Ibn al-Khattab as having “the virtue of the mind, with which they rule”.
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Saudi women are calling on the Ministry of Labor to get with the program, the program outlined by King Abdullah in his recent extension of political rights to all women, Arab News reports. The Ministry, they complain, has not gotten rid of bureaucratic barriers to women’s working. It’s past time for them to do so.

The barriers they complain of pertain to guardianship, the fact that women cannot work without the written permission of their male guardians. This is in violation of the King’s intent and the Saudi Constitution they say, as well as against what Islam teaches. They’re right.

Women intensify campaign against legal guardian
WALAA HAWARI | ARAB NEWS

RIYADH: Women campaigning for the abolishment of a rule stipulating they name a legal guardian every time they apply for a job say their patience with the Ministry of Labor is running thin because the government department has not responded to their initial demands.

They said they wrote to the ministry a month ago and are now preparing to take their campaign to the very top.

“We requested that the ministry only confirms they have received our demands,” said campaign spokesperson Alia Banaja, adding that a two-week deadline given to the ministry is over and the campaign would contact either Custodian of the Two Holy Mosques King Abdullah or Crown Prince Naif.

In the letter the campaigners stated the king had granted Saudi women many rights in his latest historical speech.
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Saudi Gazette/Okaz follow up the report on the arrests of would-be terrorists who were targeting the Saudi Embassy and King Fahd Causeway. The article states that Qatari officials found documents that would have the men travel on to Syria; they also had Syrian, American, and Iranian currencies in their possession.

Terrorists confess targeting Causeway, Saudi embassy

DAMMAM – Members of a terror cell arrested by Bahraini authorities have confessed to planning to assassinate officials and blow up the King Fahd Causeway, the Saudi embassy, Ministry of Interior and a number of vital facilities.

Colonel Tariq Al-Hasan, spokesman for the Bahraini Ministry of Interior, said four of the members were arrested in Qatar. They said they left Bahrain and passed through Saudi Arabia illegally on their way to Qatar, then Syria and Iran. Their aim was to form a cell to carry out their terror operations.

The four suspects confessed to their relationship with a fifth suspect who was arrested in Bahrain. They were all referred to the General Prosecution in Al-Manama.

A spokesman from the Bahraini interior ministry said the suspects were arrested by vigilant Qatari Customs officers. They were found in possession of documents and a computer that contained sensitive security information and details about vital facilities. They had flight tickets to Syria and cash in American dollars and Iranian rials.

Bastard, illegitimate, ‘born out of wedlock’… call it what you will, it still has strongly negative connotations and consequences in Saudi society. Arab News carries a piece that discusses the social opprobrium levied on bastards in the Kingdom. Due to Saudi Arabia’s strict views on marriage and sex outside marriage, those born outside the laws and social rules are seen as less than fully human. It doesn’t help that they are all tagged with names that will forever identify them as the product of an illicit relationship. Clearly, the sin of the father (and mother) are passed down to the child.

The article does not discuss the legal issues that come along with the onus of illegitimacy. Until quite recently, bastardy was a serious legal issue in the West. Now, with large proportions of children being born to unwed parents or single mothers, the laws have changed. Not completely, though, as even in the US, as recently as 2001, the Supreme Court held that citizenship does not automatically convey to the child of an American father solely on the basis of the father’s citizenship.

Social boycott of illegitimate kids unjustified
RIMA AL-MUKHTAR | ARAB NEWS

JEDDAH: Saudi society looks down upon children with unknown parents, claiming they are seeds of the devil as they were born illegally. A big part of society is prejudiced against them, refusing to marry them or even socialize with them.

“Saudis do not accept orphans with unknown parents psychologically and socially, because they see them as results of sins, even though they know this was not their mistake but that of their parents,” said Salma Seibeih, a family psychologist and founder of the “Orphans With Anonymous Parents” online campaign. “We live in a tribal and racial society that only mingles with people of its own. We exclude anyone else from our society,” she added.

The main problem these orphans face is having family names like Abdullah, Abdulmajeed or anything that starts with Abdul and one of God’s names, according to Seibeih. “All Saudis know that people with such family names are orphans with unknown parents, and they automatically push them away thinking that it is bad to marry them or even be seen with them,” she said. “Being rejected by society is what drives these orphans toward developing mental problems. Society makes them feel they are worthless and less of a human,” she added.
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Saudi embassies in both Manama, Bahrain and Damascus, Syria have become the targets of attacks. BBC reports that Qatari and Bahraini officials broke up a plot to attack the Saudi Embassy in Manama, as well as the King Fahd Causeway that links Bahrain to Saudi Arabia. Bahraini government offices were also targeted.

Bahrain breaks up terror cell – state media

Bahrain says it has broken up a group which was planning to carry out attacks in the Gulf kingdom.

Four members of the group were held in neighbouring Qatar and one in Bahrain, the state-run BNA news agency said.

The group had reportedly planned to target the interior ministry building in the capital Manama, the Saudi embassy and also the causeway linking the island with Saudi Arabia.
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In Damascus, Asharq Alawsat reports, supporters of Bashar AlAsad and the Ba’ath Party attacked embassies of several countries, including those of Saudi Arabia, Turkey, and Qatar. This, the article says, was in retaliation for the Arab League’s suspension of Syria as a member. Syria has shown a wont to have government-sponsored mobs attack embassies of countries with which it has a quarrel; the American and French embassies were attacked earlier this year. Turkey, not a member of the Arab League, has been harsh in its criticism of the Syrian government and appears to be offering support to anti-regime groups.

Interesting to me is that both the Syrian government and some Bahraini dissidents are supported by Iran. Iran, as we recall, was alleged recently of supporting a plot to attack the Saudi Embassy in Washington, DC and to assassinate Ambassador Adel Al-Jubeir. I’m not a big on conspiracy theories, but I think I’m seeing a pattern here…

Syria: pro-regime protesters attack Gulf embassies
Asharq Alawsat

London, Asharq Al-Awsat- Angry pro-regime demonstrators attacked both the Qatari and Saudi embassies in Damascus late Saturday, after The Arab League suspended Syria and called for its security forces to stop killing civilians.

Saudi Arabia has condemned the storming of its embassy, which according to reports saw protesters break into the kingdom’s diplomatic compound and ransack some parts within.

The state-run Saudi News Agency quoted an official source at Saudi Arabia’s foreign ministry as saying that the kingdom strongly condemned the attack, and that Syrian authorities should shoulder the responsibility for the security and protection of Saudi interests and employees in Syria.
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Arab News covers both issues.

There’s a discussion going on in Saudi Arabia about markets. It’s not the commodities or financial markets, but the shops and stores, groceries and pharmacies and the hours that they keep. It seems that the Shoura Council is studying a bill to set firm hours of operation for all commercial establishments across the Kingdom. While conservation of electricity seems to be the main reasoning behind this, the article makes it clear that a blanket regulation isn’t very workable. Other reasons given include security and the convenience of female employees who have families to attend.

Different kinds of businesses need to keep different hours. Some, like pharmacies and gas stations – especially those on the roads connecting cities – need to be open when customers need their services. For some, that means 24 hours per day. Given that Saudis enjoy nighttime activities in preference to daytime ones (the article notes that 40% of all shopping is done between 9pm and 11pm), closing shops when people want to use them does not seem wise. I would think, too, that by funneling all commercial activity into a narrow window would also exacerbate traffic problems.

I’m not sure whether these markets need regulated hours, but unregulated hours do create problems. I think regulating them, though, only creates different problems though not any less important.

Market watchers divided over calls
for restricting shopping hours
ARAB NEWS

RIYADH: The debate on unifying the opening and closing hours of commercial outlets, such as restaurants and supermarkets, in various parts of the Kingdom continues with people supporting different options adamant in their views.

The Shoura Council had discussed the issue of introducing a new regulation binding all commercial shops to open at 7 a.m. and close at 9 p.m. There was also the suggestion in the council to exclude grocery stores and coffee shops located on highways from the purview of this time schedule. It was suggested to levy special fees from these shops by the concerned municipalities to allow them to work around the clock.

Some people say that there should be a total review of the matter, taking into account public interests. They noted that weekdays are quite different from the weekend, as far as sales of commercial shops and cafes are concerned.

Speaking to Al-Riyadh Arabic newspaper, a number of prominent figures and traders examined various aspects of the issue.
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