Country Profiles
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Saudi Arabia
The Kingdom of Saudi Arabia covers the bulk of the Arabian Peninsula and has a land area of about 830,000 sq miles (making it the largest country in the Middle East). It is bordered by the Red Sea to the west; Jordan, Iraq, and Kuwait to the north; the Arabian (or Persian) Gulf, Bahrain, Qatar and the United Arab Emirates to the east; Oman to the southeast; and Yemen to the south.
Maps & Flags
With a population of almost 32.2 million (as of 2025), Saudi Arabia is the fourth most populous country in the Arab world; yet there are actually only 18.8 million Saudis amongst this number.
Introduction
Saudi Arabia has made significant oil production cuts for over a year, as part of the OPEC+ alliance decisions. The most recent voluntary cut of 1 million barrels per day (mbpd) was initiated in July 2023 and extended to expire in Q2 2024. A recent World Bank (2024a) summary of the Saudi economy is as follows:
The OPEC+ decision to cut oil production is adversely affecting Saudi Arabia’s overall GDP, fiscal, and external balance positions. Meanwhile, the performance of non-oil private sector is robust and continue to reap benefits from reform implementation. Inflation remains contained supported by generous subsidies, tight monetary policy, and cheaper imports. An escalation in regional and global armed conflicts, volatility in oil prices, and tighter-than needed global financial conditions are key risks to the outlook.
According to the World Bank (2024a), those oil production cuts “did not prevent a decline in oil prices,” as the average per barrel price fell from US$100 in 2022 to US$83 in 2023 (see: Arabian Gulf data). Other downside risks and uncertainties for Saudi Arabia’s economic outlook include downward revisions of China’s growth prospects, “which will have an adverse impact on Saudi Arabia’s main export market” (World Bank, 2024a). Further escalation of the conflict in the Middle East and Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, in addition to tighter-than-needed global financial conditions, all risk affecting regional and global economic activity. Delays or digressions in implementing structural reforms in support of the diversification goals highlighted in the country’s Vision 2030, perhaps due to other global shocks or an uncomfortable fiscal position, would reduce prospects for stronger long-term growth and employment.
Political-Economy
According to the EIU (2024), Saudi Arabia is ranked 150th (out of 167 countries and territories) on its Democracy Index and is thus categorised as an “authoritarian” state by the London-based think-tank. [1] As Reporters Without Boarders (Reporters sans frontières, RSF) wrote in 2024, independent media outlets are “non-existent in Saudi Arabia, and Saudi journalists live under heavy surveillance, even when abroad.” RSF state that, the number of imprisoned journalists and bloggers has tripled since 2017. Virtually all Saudi media operate under direct official control. Self-censorship is ever-present, including on social networks. Even privately owned Saudi media follow government guidelines set out by the Saudi Press Agency.
The penal code, and anti-terrorism and cyber-crime laws allow imprisonment or suspension of journalists who venture any criticism, on grounds of “blasphemy”, “inciting chaos”, “jeopardising national unity”, or “harming the image and reputation of the king and the state”. Since 2018, the government has been tightening its grip on social networks. Most journalists who are imprisoned were put behind bars arbitrarily. “Electronic brigades” that are active on social networks hunt and harass journalists. Saudi Arabia also “uses high-tech espionage tools to monitor journalists in exile.”
According to Freedom House (2024), Saudi Arabia’s absolute monarchy restricts almost all political rights and civil liberties. “No officials at the national level are elected and the regime relies on pervasive surveillance, the criminalisation of dissent, appeals to sectarianism and ethnicity, and public spending supported by oil revenues to maintain power.” Furthermore, women and members of religious minority groups face extensive discrimination in law and in practice (Freedom House, 2024).
According to Human Rights Watch (2024), Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman has consolidated political and economic power, including by making himself chairman of Saudi Arabia’s Public Investment Fund (PIF) — one of the world’s largest sovereign wealth funds. PIF investments in high-profile sports and entertainment events domestically and internationally are used to whitewash the country’s abysmal human rights record. Migrant workers, including on PIF-funded projects, face widespread abuses under the kafala (labour sponsorship) system. The New York based NGO adds that, “Saudi Arabian authorities harshly repress any dissent, including by handing down long sentences after unfair trials on charges related to peaceful online expression.”
Graphs & Tables
What follows are a selection of graphs and tables from credible and cited sources. It is worth comparing those of Saudi Arabia (below) with those of the other Arabian Gulf countries.
Press freedom in Saudi Arabia
Bertelsmann Stiftung’s Transformation Index analyses the transformation processes toward democracy in transitional economies across the globe. In 2024 it was stated that throughout MENA, “autocratic rule festers” and that MENA’s scores for democracy and the quality of governance are at “all-time lows” and that “the quality of governance is deteriorating, and military forces are gaining power.” The German Non-governmental organisation adds that many countries within this region on “flashy imagery and marketing under the banner of modernisation, rather than making actual progress (BTI, 2024).
Saudi Arabia’s 2024 BTI scores
Expand Chart →
Saudi Arabia’s 2024 BTI matrix:
Saudi Arabia’s 2022 BTI matrix:
Saudi Arabia’s 2020 BTI matrix:
Saudi Arabia’s 2018 BTI matrix:
Fraser Institute rankings
The Fraser Institute’s Human Freedom Index presents a broad measure of human freedom, understood as the absence of coercive constraint.
Saudi Arabia, Human Freedom Index, 2024 scores
Freedom House rankings
Freedom House point out that their Freedom in the World annual rankings are “the most widely read and cited report of its kind, tracking global trends in political rights and civil liberties for over 50 years.” They chart Global Freedom scores and Internet Freedom scores for some 210 countries and territories. More latterly, Freedom House have begun to chart Internet Freedom scores (currently 70 countries are tracked, of which three are in the Arabian Gulf: Bahrain, Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates).
Saudi Arabia, Freedom in the World, 2024 scores
notes
Country profile information is compiled from, amongst others, the following sources; a full References list for this page is also given below:
Academic
Cambridge University Press →
Elsevier 
Intellect Discover →
Oxford Academic →
Routledge →
Sage →
Springer →
Media outlets
The Economist Intelligence Unit →
Financial Times →
Middle East Economic Digest →
Organisations
Arab Monetary Fund →
Bertelsmann Transformation Index →
Energy Information Agency →
Energy Institute →
Eurostat →
Fraser Institute →
Freedom House →
International Energy Agency →
International Monetary Fund →
Organisation of Petroleum Exporting Countries →
Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development →
Reporters sans frontières →
United Nations Development Program →
Varieties of Democracy →
The World Bank →
World Economic Forum →
World Intellectual Property Organisation →
World Trade Organisation →
References
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Arab Monetary Fund. (2025). Economic Statistics [Dataset]. https://www.amf.org.ae/en/arabic_economic_database
Asker, J., Collard-Wexler, A., & De Loecker, J. (2017). Market power, production (mis)allocation and OPEC. National Bureau of Economic Research, Working Paper Series, 1(September, w23801), 1–54. https://doi.org/10.3386/w23801
Assidmi, L. M., & Wolgamuth, E. (2017). Uncovering the Dynamics of the Saudi Youth Unemployment Crisis. Systemic practice and action research, 30(2), 173–186. https://doi.org/10.1007/s11213-016-9389-0
Baumeister, C., & Kilian, L. (2016). Forty Years of Oil Price Fluctuations: Why the Price of Oil May Still Surprise Us. The Journal of Economic Perspectives, 30(1), 139–160. https://doi.org/10.1257/jep.30.1.139
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The Six GCC Economies:
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| i | This is the website of Dr Emilie J. Rutledge who, with almost two decades’ worth of experience in managing, designing and delivering university-level economics courses, is currently Head of the Economics Department at The Open University.
 erutledge.com  Dr Emilie J. Rutledge Emilie has published over 20 peer-reviewed papers and is the author of “Monetary Union in the Gulf.” Her current research focus is on employability, the feasibility of universal basic incomes and, the oil-rich Arabian Gulf’s economic diversification and labour market reform strategies. On an ad hoc basis, Emilie provides consultancy on developing interactive university courses, alongside analytical insight on the political-economy of the Arabian Gulf. |