For decades, and ever since its creation, the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia (KSA) has maintained its image as a conservative country closed to the world where the entry of foreign visitors was mostly restricted to Muslims who came for religious tourism and to international businessmen. The international community knew very little about life inside the Kingdom, and the leaders were happy to keep it that way. With the growing importance of creating an attractive and favorable nation brand, the Kingdom is now keen on projecting its own image globally. In this regard, the Kingdom is using the public diplomacy tools at its disposal when it comes to policy making to shape and influence a wider foreign audience, and this culminated in the creation of the Vision 2030.

The cultural and entertainment revolutions launched with this Vision not only intend to boost the economy and attract more foreign investments, but also to assert the Kingdom as a regional cultural hub. One of the resources currently at the Kingdom’s disposal is the King Abdulaziz Center for World Culture (Ithra) which believes in the importance of using arts and the human potential as drivers of change. It is a place that facilitates building cultural bridges by merging traditional culture with global perspectives and creating new experiences.

Saudi Arabia’s Public Diplomacy

KSA is not unfamiliar with the public diplomacy tools at its disposal to fulfill its foreign policy goals and objectives, the most important one being its religious position in the Arab and Islamic worlds. The Kingdom is home to the Two Holy Mosques, al-Masjid al-Haram (The Sacred Mosque) in Makkah and al-Masjid an-Nabawi (the Prophet’s Mosque) in Al-Madinah, and after the creation of modern day Saudi Arabia, Riyadh has assumed the responsibility of serving and protecting these Two Holy Mosques, thus becoming the Custodian of the Two Holy Mosques. The annual Islamic Hajj, pilgrimage, attracts millions of Muslims from all over the world each year to Makkah.

The Kingdom also focuses on cultural diplomacy, such as educational exchange programs and international broadcasting. KSA’s investment in educational exchanges has enabled it to share its culture and values with the Arab and Islamic world on one hand, and non-Muslim nations on the other. These exchange programs create room for cultural interactions that turn into mutual understanding and respect for other cultures. Not only does it send its students abroad, the Kingdom has attracted foreign students by providing them with generous fellowships at its top institutions, such as King Abdullah University of Science and Technology (KAUST). Additionally, it has created the pan-Arab news channel, Al-Arabiya, that propagates its ideologies and policies across the Arab world, and to the Western world through its English online platforms.

The Kingdom is also home to social and non-governmental institutions and organizations such as Rabitat al-Alam al-Islami (Muslim World League) and International Islamic Relief Organization. With most of its soft power traditionally targeted at the Arab and Islamic world and less so in the west, and in efforts to change that, Crown Prince Mohammad bin Salman established the MiSK Foundation (Prince Mohammed bin Salman bin Abdulaziz Foundation) in 2011, a non-profit foundation devoted to cultivate learning and leadership for the youth of Saudi Arabia which focuses on providing them with different means of fostering talent, creativity, and innovation through establishing programs and partnering with local and international global organizations in various fields.

Another important tool at their disposal is providing humanitarian and development aid and relief to various regions in the world, and most recently, in May 2011, the Kingdom established the King Salman Humanitarian Aid and Relief Center that works in 37 countries across four continents, Asia, Africa, Europe, and Latin America.

All the above-mentioned efforts have been ongoing for decades, but they were recently institutionalized when the public diplomacy agency, previously a media and communications office, at the Ministry of Foreign Affairs was created less than a year ago. According to Saud Kateb, the Undersecretary for Public Diplomacy at the Saudi Foreign Ministry, the agency’s main strategic goal for all its efforts and programming is to spread the Saudi culture abroad. Its work encompasses two main activities, media communications and cultural exchanges, with a greater focus on communicating cultural diplomacy. “It is of utmost importance for us to expose people from different parts of the world to Saudi culture,” Kateb said, adding that “Saudi Arabia has a diverse culture, thus we need to show people a side of the Kingdom they haven’t seen before.”[1]Saudi Arabia is making sincere efforts to facilitate access for cultural diplomacy. “It is when we hide our faces that others paint it as they please,” Kateb said[2], emphasizing the urgency for the swift spread of the Saudi culture globally. “It is difficult when one part of the narrative is taken and blown out of proportion,” added Abdullah Al-Rashid, the head of learning programs at Ithra.

This is where the importance of immersive cultural and educational programs like Gateway KSA lies. This 10-day program exposes young non-Saudis to different aspects of life in the Kingdom where they engage with government officials, representatives from both the public and private sectors, and most importantly the Saudi population. Participants get a chance to explore the country and its cities, from its historical and archeological sites, to its scientific research centers, and to hold open discussions about Saudi’s history, culture, and geopolitical influence. Engaging firsthand with locals is essential to break cultural barriers and change preconceived notions about the people of the country.

The Rise of Tourism and Cultural Diplomacy

The Vision 2030 aims at changing the global image of Saudi Arabia to go beyond its religious role and its oil-based economy and to include cultural and diverse economic factors, so the Kingdom has been working tirelessly on establishing a powerful brand by highlighting tourist destinations and activities, and providing an assurance of quality experiences, and this in turn offers a way for destinations to establish a unique selling proposition.

For example, in efforts to increase cultural tourism in the country, Vision 2030 set as one of its goals to increase the number of Saudi heritage sites registered with UNESCO. There are currently five registered cultural sites, Al-Ahsa Oasis, Mada’in Saleh, ad-Dir’iyah, Historic Jeddah, and rock art in the Ha’il region of Saudi Arabia, with eleven on the tentative list.

Mada’in Saleh in Al-Ula, the Nabatean’s second largest city, has been less known than the Nabatean capital Petra in Jordan, but the Kingdom is sparing no efforts in changing that where it has been placed at the forefront of the Kingdom’s tourism efforts to make it a key part of the Kingdom’s economic future. This plan has created numerous job opportunities for people of Al-Ula who are grateful to have the opportunity to share their home with the rest of the world, and receive the world with an open heart where the enthusiasm of young Saudis combined with the generosity of old Bedouins are the heart of this experience.

Conclusion

The Kingdom’s efforts to rebrand itself, however, have not gone unhindered. From the raging war in Yemen on the Kingdom’s southern border, to the Kingdom’s more aggressive policies at home and abroad, and the murder of the Saudi journalist and Washington Post columnist Jamal Khashoggi in October of last year in the Saudi consulate in Istanbul, a topic that still lingers in Western media headlines, casting the new favorable image continues to be a challenge. Additionally, the main target audience of the Kingdom’s public diplomacy efforts is the Western world. With the launch of the new electronic visa targeting 49 countries, none of which are Arab, the Kingdom is discarding an essential portion of the world’s population –its neighbors.

Effective nation branding strategies are ones that generate a wide impact and that actually embody the communicated brand, but for a nation to change its image it needs to change its behavior and then communicate its changes globally. Despite the efforts put into the construction of the Vision 2030, its launch, and its promotion, it remains of utmost importance for the Kingdom to map out detailed steps to be followed in fulfilling it to rebrand the country. The concepts and their implications, the nuances, the possibilities, and their outcomes should be carefully assessed before the launch of a nation branding program like Vision 2030. It is still too early to assess KSA’s efforts in creating and communicating its new global brand, and while these strategies usually have long-term impacts, it is important to continue to closely monitor the Kingdom’s rebranding efforts.

****************************************

Dena Taha is a recent graduate of the Master of Public Diplomacy program at the University of Southern California. Prior to her studies at USC, she was a news producer at Al-Arabiya News Channel at its United Nations/New York Bureau. She was responsible for covering daily proceedings there related to the Middle East and the Arab world, and US foreign policy in that region. She received a B.S. in Mathematics from the American University of Beirut in 2013 and was a visiting non-degree student at the Near and Middle Eastern Civilization department at the University of Toronto for the academic year 2013-2014. Dena is fluent in English and Arabic, with basic knowledge of French.

REFERENCES