Saudi Arabia

Tony Neidecker

Wednesdays 9:30–11:30 AM
September 29 through November 17, 2004
Lebanon College
(no class on October 13th)

This course will focus on the Kingdom’s dual responsibilities deriving from its preeminent position in the world of Islam and the world of oil. To give emphasis to the Saudis’ belief that they are heirs to the pristine Islam of the 7th century, the first session will be held jointly with Dick Nolte, an expert on Islam. The material for the course will include excerpts from the Koran, and other books to examine how the benevolent Saudi monarchy uses its income from oil to improve the lives of Saudis while maintaining adherence to the Wahhabi interpretation of Islam.

Topics will include:

Session #1: Mohammed, the annual Haj, joint session with Dick Nolte, who will show an excellent videotape on the life of Mohammed.
Session #2: Islam: the Koran, the Sunni and its Wahhabi sect, the Shia in the Kingdom’s oil-rich areas bordering the Arabian Gulf, Iraq, and Iran.
Session #3: History of the House of Saud, the tribes, the National Guard and Army.
Session #4: ARAMCO & History of oil exploration in the Kingdom. The economy, absence of taxes, money flowing from the government to the people, foreign workers, stipends to princes, corruption.
Session #5: Women, marriage, education, and social customs.
Session #6: Politics of dissent, Usama bin Laden, King Abdul Aziz’s reaction to the creation of a Jewish homeland.
Session #7: Strong yet uneasy U.S.-Saudi alliance. A look into the future.

The readings in the course material are in the general order of the seven class sessions. You may find it useful to glance through the excerpts taken from the Koran as preparation for the first three sessions. The Koran is difficult to read in translation. One reason the Koran continues to exert such influence is that the luxuriant poetic language reproduced in its suras is attributable to God. Pious Muslims continue to see the Koran as the unfiltered word of God. There is no third person narrative in the Koran. God, according to Muslim belief, speaks directly in all of the text’s 6200 verses.

The other readings are intended to give pictures of various facets of Saudi religious, social, and economic life. I have found no single book that can do this.

Class is limited to 40 participants.

TONY NEIDECKER lived in France for the first thirteen years of his life. After graduating from the Harvard Business School in 1949 he worked in financial positions in an Oregon bank, in an Iowan electronics company, with the John Deere Company in France, and for the last twenty years of his career in various international capacities in the Chase Manhattan Bank. On one assignment he spent four years in Saudi Arabia. Since his retirement, he has been involved with Historic Windsor, Volunteers in Action, Windsor County Partners, and is on the Board of Lebanon College. From 1990 – 1993, as part of a program of the Transnational Institute of Norwich, VT, he visited Russia annually to teach courses in finance.