This book, first published in 1987 and by one of Saudi Arabia s most distinguished academics, reviews the experience of the Arab oil producers in social, economic and political development in the key period of the Seventies and Eighties. It is broadly pessimistic about the prospects for future development and sceptical about past achievements. It argues that the petro-bureaucracy in the Arabian Peninsula has failed to establish the basic principles of effective development because it has been mesmerised by the vast oil revenues it has attempted to administer. The book suggests that in many...