UNIV 1212: Critical Thinking and Problem Solving Muhammad Siraj Khan Assignment 3 20% A topical Issue in Saudi Arabia Written Report (Individual) Group Debate Purpose of Assignment Each student will write an essay (individually) about “Pros and Cons of Saudi Vision 2030 and its Influence on Saudi Lifestyle.” The purpose of this assignment is to help students understand the structure of a critical essay and be able to identify the issue, conclusion and reasons supporting and opposing an issue. Objectives The student will be able to identify an important issue in the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia The student will be able to identify reasons supporting and opposing an issue The student will be able to identify evidence supporting the reasons for and against an issue The student will be able to use the internet for research The student will be able to use the university library for research Instructional Media: Tools and Resources You will be provided with an article that will assist you in understanding background and future benefits of Saudi Vision2030. Requirements Written Assignment: 1. The analysis must use your own language and should specify the reference(s) from which the information is taken. If you cut and paste a sentence you must use quotation marks and write the author, year, and page number in brackets in the text after the quotation. 2. Each paragraph must start with a topic sentence that introduces the paragraph idea (see sample essays under “Useful Resources”). 3. The report must: have a cover page use Times New Romans, font size: 12 have a space of 1.5 between lines, be 3-4 full pages in length (not including the reference list) start each paragraph with a topic sentence be written in the first person (use “I” or “my” or “our” or “we”) use full sentences (and no bullet points) have an Assessment Rubric 4. At the end of the task, please suggest at least 2 books and 4 articles written on the same topic (providing a PDF copy 2 % For Group Debate Class will be divided in 2 Groups of 4, 1 group in favor of the issue, 1 against the issue. If a student is absent on the day of the debate he will receive 0% grade for this task. Education or Money? The format for the debate is as follows: Each group of students will read the article and prepare his/her arguments to discuss in the class. 5. Group 1 (For) Introduces his team, introduces the issue, justifies the importance of the issue, outlines what his team willdo, provides first reason/evidence supporting the issue Group 2 (Against) Introduces his team, outlines what his team will do, opposes other team’s first reason, provides his team’s own first reason/evidence Group 1 (For) Opposes other team’s first reason, provides his team’s own second reason/evidence Group 2 (Against) Opposes other team’s second reason, provides his team’s own second reason/evidence Group 1 (For) Opposes other team’s second reason, summarizes his team’s reasons, concludes with a strong statement Group 2 (Against) Summarizes his team’s reasons, concludes with a strong statement The report must use the following headings: Introduction Include a clear thesis statement, justify the importance of the topic, a reference to justify assignment, say what your report will cover Reasons for the Issue Give four strong reasons in support of the topic. Provide relevant evidence for each reason. Evidence might include relevant statistics, argument by authority, argument by analogy, argument by example etc. Each reason should have a separate paragraph. (Include references) Reasons Against the Issue Give four strong reasons against the topic. Provide relevant evidence for each reason. Evidence might include relevant statistics, argument by authority, argument by analogy, argument by example etc. Each reason should have a separate paragraph. (Include references) Conclusion Restate the issue, write a final paragraph where you summarize the key reasons and say how the reasons and evidence supported the issue. Also, state your group’s overall opinion about the issue. References Include at least 5 references. The references can be from books, newspapers, or the internet (but not lecture slides). You must cite the author and year in the body of the essay. Also, you must list the author, year, article or book title, and publisher under References at the end of the essay. Submission Criteria Submission : Blackboard. Date Due: Check blackboard for the details or ask instructor in the class. Please feel free to send me an email if you have a question. Who must submit assignment: Each student must post the assignment before the deadline. Where to deliver hard copies: at the campus) In class (one hard copy by each student of every group if we have classes Where to place soft copies: ‘Assignments’ in Black Board. Each student must post his group’s report on to BlackBoard. The following piece of info must appear on the cover page: UNIV 1212: Critical Thinking and Problem Solving Fall …… Instructor: Muhammad Siraj ul Huda Khan Section XXX Names: IDs: Majors: Assignment 3: Group Debate about a Topical Issue in Saudi Arabia (20%) Late Assignments No late assignments are accepted. Late assignments will receive 0% marks. Your assignment must be on blackboard on the due date before the start of class. Also, a hard copy of your assignment must be given to me in class on the due date. There are NO exceptions to these rules. See discussions, stats, and author profiles for this publication at: https://www.researchgate.net/publication/346531524 SAUDI ARABIA’S VISION 2030 Conference Paper · December 2020 CITATIONS READS 0 7,525 1 author: Dominika Kosárová University of Defence 26 PUBLICATIONS 16 CITATIONS SEE PROFILE Some of the authors of this publication are also working on these related projects: DZRO OZKON View project DZRO STRATAL View project All content following this page was uploaded by Dominika Kosárová on 01 December 2020. The user has requested enhancement of the downloaded file. SAUDI ARABIA’S VISION 2030 Dominika Kosárová1 ABSTRACT Saudi Arabia adopted Vision 2030 four years ago to diversify economy and reduce dependency on oil. Since then, certain important reforms have been introduced, however, there are numerous challenges that still need to be addressed for the Vision to successfully transform economy and society. The objective of this article is thus to evaluate Saudi Vision 2030 in terms of its implementation, challenges and implications on domestic as well as regional level. It points out to several issues that may influence Vision’s implementation negatively, one of them being the impact of the Vision on the social contract. If the social contract is violated without successfully transforming the economy, people might call for compensation in the form of political benefits, thus endangering the Saudi regime and stability. Key words: Saudi Arabia, Vision 2030, rentier state theory, social contract Introduction Saudi Arabia introduced Vision 2030 in 2016 to overcome the economic dependency on oil. It was adopted under specific circumstances which revealed that the rent-based social contract managing state-society relations since decades would not be sustainable if no major economic restructuration occurred. Saudi Vision 2030 is thus an ambitious project of socioeconomic transformation. However, its implementation, to be successful, requires dealing with numerous challenges and obstacles. The aim of this article is thus to evaluate Saudi Vision 2030 in terms of its implementation, challenges and implications. At first, circumstances of its adoption will be examined with a particular focus on the rentier state theory and social contract between the royal family and Saudi citizens, and the content of the Vision will be briefly outlined. Afterwards, we provide an overview of major reforms that have been initiated already as part of the Vision’s implementation since its adoption four years ago. The final part is focused on challenges that could prevent successful implementation of the Vision, while some authors including H. Khashan consider them as insurmountable obstacles that predetermine the Vision’s failure. Finally, potential implications of the Vision’s success or failure are suggested. This article thus provides a complex overview of Vision 2030, by first looking in the past (why was it adopted, what does it aim for and what has been done so far), then in the present (what are the 1 Dominika Kosárová, Mgr., Ph.D., assistant professor, Centre for Security and Military Strategic Studies – War College, University of Defence in Brno, Kounicova 65, 662 10 Brno, Czech Republic, dominika.kosarova@unob.cz. 124 challenges that need to be addressed) and finally providing possible future scenarios and their implications. The most relevant source was the Vision itself and Saudi government’s official websites devoted to the Vision. This part was written in the Czech Republic given that in Slovakia, were the author has her personal background, the access to these websites is denied. In addition, this article stems from numerous analyses that evaluate Vision 2030 critically including the articles written by A. A. Ghafar, M. Nuruzzaman or J. Kinninmont, who focused on the Vision’s impact on Saudi Arabia’s social contract. 1 Vision 2030 explained Saudi Vision 2030 needs to be understood in a specific context of statesociety relations which are determined by the kingdom’s enormous oil resources. Until the USA took over its position last year, Saudi Arabia was the world’s major producer and exporter of oil and its economy was highly oil-dependent. In 2018, oil incomes represented as much as “42% of the kingdom’s GDP, 90% of export earning and 87% of budget revenues.” (Nuruzzaman, 2018) Similar to other Gulf monarchies rich in natural resources, enormous wealth coming from the oil industry enabled the royals to establish a rentier system of governance. The rentier state theory stems from the premise that oil revenues determine the relations between the state and society. When revenues are high, an authoritarian government is able to buy popular support and fidelity by means of subsidies for water, fuel, electricity and other commodities, high wages in public sector and freeing citizens from taxes. It literally means “no taxation, no representation”, in other words the state provides people with economic benefits in exchange for loyalty. (Baumann, 2019) In this system, people are only passive beneficiaries who do not contribute to the state budget. (Mohammadzadeh, 2019) It may work only as long as the state has enough revenues to fulfill its part of this rent-based social contract. In Saudi Arabia, the social contract has been working since oil became its prime economic commodity. However, oil-dependency makes Saudi economy highly vulnerable to changes in oil prices which was manifested not once in the history. Being aware of risks stemming from the excessive oil-dependency, Saudi Arabia has been trying to diversify its economy since 1970s, when the first fiveyear development plan was adopted. Its objective was to transform the Saudi oilbased economy and achieve balanced development, however, the above-stated numbers from 2018 reveal that even nine successive development plans did not manage to accomplish this goal. (Ghafar, 2018) Vision 2030, adopted in 2016, and a more detailed National Transformation Program 2020, are sometimes perceived as the continuation of the ninth development plan. (Khashan, 2017) However, since 1970 it has been probably the most ambitious attempt to transform 125 the Saudi economy. There are two specific reasons behind the adoption of the Vision and its high ambitions. Vision 2030 was initiated by Mohammad bin Salman in reaction to two major trends that the kingdom has been facing: decrease in oil prices and demographic challenges. Combination of these two tendencies have potential to significantly endanger the rentier system and hence the social contract that exists between the royals and the people, and thus endanger the legitimacy of the regime and stability of the state. The drop in oil prices in 2014-2015 (from 115 USD to 40 USD per barrel) forced Saudi Arabia to adopt a deficit budget, which reemphasized the need of economic diversification. (Nuruzzaman, 2018) Not to mention that oil is not a renewable resource and there is an ongoing debate how many reserves Saudi Arabia actually has. Therefore, there is an urgent need to prepare for the post-oil future, which is in fact the ultimate ambition of Vision 2030. Moreover, Saudi Arabia’s population is rapidly growing. In 2016, approximately 70% of the Saudis were under the age of 30, (Reed, 2016) while by 2030, half of the population is expected to be under 25. (Ghafar, 2018) It means that the state will have to create millions of new jobs for young people in the near future which will further increase pressure on state budget. The combination of these two trends, decreasing oil prices and growing population, makes the rentier social contract system unviable and points to the need to reassess the Saudi economic model. (Alhussein, 2019) Under these circumstances, the Council of Ministers approved Vision 2030, a new strategy for the kingdom, in April 2016. Vision 2030 is regarded as a “mega-project” or a “monumental experiment” of Saudi economic transformation with the ambition to reduce dependency on oil revenues and enhance economic diversification. Although considered as a primarily economic project, and by the crown prince presented even as a purely economic program, (Reed, 2016) its implementation requires also considerable social reforms. The Vision consists of three major pillars, while each of them has its strategic objectives defined (see the table below). Pillar Vibrant society Thriving economy Ambitious nation Strategic objective Strengthen Islamic and national identity Offer a fulfilling and healthy life Grow and diversify the economy Increase employment Enhance government effectiveness Enable social responsibility Each pillar also consists of numerous directions (ways to achieve the desired end state) and specific goals (means to do it). The Vision outlines 96 goals all together such as enhancing tourism including welcoming more than 30 million pilgrims annually; increasing the private sector’s contribution to the GDP to 60%; enabling partial privatization of several sectors such as health care, air travel and 126 housing; increasing foreign direct investment to 5.7% of GDP; enhancing non-oil exports and the role of SMEs; manufacturing half of all military gear; reducing unemployment to 7% by Saudization of private sectors; increasing women’s participation in the workforce to 30%; increasing the average life expectancy to 80 years; increasing ratio of people exercising regularly or encouraging people to spend more on entertainment and cultural events. Ultimately, it seeks to move into the world’s top 15 economies. The achievement of these goals requires human capital, therefore, the Vision seeks to invest in education and training of both men and women and attract qualified workforce. (Vision 2030, Strategic objectives…) Vision 2030 is regarded as an ambitious plan of socioeconomic liberalization. 2 Implementation Given its high ambitions and relatively short timeframe, some analysists remain skeptical on whether it will achieve its objectives, (Nuruzzaman, 2018) while others even believe that it is “bound to fail”. (Khashan 2017). Nevertheless, since its adoption four years ago, there has been certain progress and several important reforms have been implemented. Already in 2016, the competencies of the Committee of Promotion of Virtue and Prevention of Vice, also known as religious police, have been diminished. The Committee was an important instrument of clerics to enforce the social order based on their ultra-conservative interpretation of sharia. It imposed severe social restrictions on public spaces as well as harsh punishments for violation of law. Curbing its powers was regarded as a prerequisite for economic liberalization and social change. Moreover, the ban on cinemas was lifted after 35 years and since then, concerts, operas and movie screenings have been organized in the country. (Abdellatif, 2019) Certain liberalization is required if Saudi Arabia wants to attract more tourists, not restricted solely to pilgrims. In 2019, an unprecedented decision was taken to allow citizens from 49 countries to apply for tourist visa. Female tourists do not even have to wear abaya although there are certain dressing norms that need to be respected. More liberties have been granted also to Saudi women, which had been treated from the Western perspective as second-rated. They were not allowed to drive and without the consent of their male guardian they were forbidden to work, get married, visit hospital or travel inside or outside the country. Many female activists campaigning for women empowerment were imprisoned. Yet finally, in 2018 women were officially granted the right to drive, and since 2019, they are allowed to apply for passport and travel without requiring the guardian’s consent. These steps were imperative in order to increase the women’s participation in the workforce as stipulated in one of the Vision’s goals. When it comes to employment in general, most Saudis (approximately 70% of the workforce) are employed in public sector where they are paid high wages. (Ghafar, 2018) However, this will be unsustainable given the demographic trends 127 and increasing pressure on the budget. In response to these trends, Saudi Arabia needs to support the private sector, which has been traditionally dominated mostly by foreigners, who work for much lower salaries when compared to the public sector. The public sector employs twice as many Saudi citizens as the private sector, (Kinninmont, 2017, p. 3), while in the overall it is estimated that 80% of the Saudi workforce are expatriates. (Khashan, 2017) Saudi Arabia thus announced the so called Saudization program which requires private companies to employ certain quota of Saudi nationals. Yet, as Khashan (2017) points out, it remains questionable whether Saudis will be willing to work in the private sector for less money and if they are adequately qualified for such work. Yet the major rupture with the social contract came with lifting subsidies from fuel and introducing taxes on undeveloped urban lands, which was later
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