The positive reception of Saudi Arabia’s King Abdullah bin Abdul Aziz’s planned reforms that will allow women to vote, run for municipal seats, and be appointed for the Shura Council belies just how vacuous democratic reforms are in the Kingdom. The ongoing restrictions on the woman’s movement renders her right to vote and participate in political life merely theoretical. For instance, how do women go to polling stations, embark on a campaign trail or attend forums and meetings? Women’s political participation is and continues to be under male discretion; and insofar as this paternalistic structure of “male supervision” exists, women’s right to vote will only serve a symbolic nod to a concept the Kingdom is altogether unfamiliar with: reform.
Optimists suggest this particular change will inevitably lead to more expansive (or rather fundamental) rights for women, including the right to drive and travel without male consent or chaperone. After all, the freedom to participate cannot be divorced from the freedom to move. Unfortunately, some of these reforms do not actually kick in until 2015, making their implementation someone else’s “problem.” So as other Arab leaders scramble to implement immediate and at times hasty reforms to save themselves from the downward spiral their dictator club is falling into, the Saudi King seems to be coasting down a highway paved with cash handouts and distant promises. If the King was indeed serious about change, he would be concerned about the high likelihood that ultra-conservative elements like Prince Nayef will be in charge of implementing these reforms — that is four long years from now or also known as a lifetime in politics. While political reform in the Arab world has become synonymous with consolidation of authoritarian powers or at best failed experiments, there is a grain of optimism in this otherwise delapitated field of dreams — that is perhaps just now dictators are actually beginning to fear their people.