Saudi Renaissance

King Abdullah bin Abdulaziz quietly ascended the throne in August after the death of his long ailing brother. Though his rise was expected and captured little media attention, he just may be one of the most important and little-known world leaders today.

Here's why: Saudi Arabia remains the central bank of oil. Its role as a moderating price influence on OPEC in an environment of price volatility is more important than ever. As home to Islam's two holiest mosques and a financier of Muslim causes around the world, Saudi Arabia also matters deeply to the future of a turbulent Muslim world.

As a result, what the world needs is a Saudi king who can beat back the terror threat at home and abroad and maintain stability by integrating the country's growing and restive middle class into the decision-making process.

King Abdullah II, in his first six months in office, has shown a strong inclination to do all three. After years of drifting under the late King Fahd, the Saudi ship is quietly but firmly shifting course and the captain, King Abdullah, is fully in control. This is good news for Saudi Arabia, world oil markets, the war on terror, U.S.-Saudi relations and the Muslim world. And it might also make life easier for Prince Turki al-Faisal, Saudi Arabia's new ambassador to the United States, who was in Dallas last week to talk about strengthening relations between the two countries.

Already, King Abdullah has released several liberal dissidents from jail, reached out to the restive Shiite minority, opened the kingdom wide to foreign investment and promised greater rights for women. He has shined an internal light on princely corruption, tolerated a degree of press freedom unknown in Saudi history and created a new strategic framework for strained U.S.-Saudi relations.

He has also called for a Muslim world renaissance to jolt the world's more than 1 billion Muslims away from what he described as an environment of "political, economic and social underdevelopment that has evolved into a major crisis" and lashed out at al-Qaeda, describing its followers in Islamically loaded terminology as "corrupters of the earth" -- -- a charge tantamount to blasphemy.

Though opinion polls are not common in Saudi Arabia, anecdotal evidence suggests King Abdullah is popular. In my travels to four cities and one village across the kingdom in December, I was struck by the diverse range of people who praised Abdullah, from marginalized Shiite young men in the Eastern Province to cosmopolitan Jeddah intellectuals wary of al-Saud family rule.

Many spoke approvingly of his integrative vision; others praised his personal piety, his Bedouin distaste for pomp or his vigorous support for Palestinian self-determination. But mostly, ordinary Saudis expressed satisfaction at his "clean hands." Tired of princely corruption and worried by high un- and underemployment despite record oil prices, many ordinary Saudis have grown to resent the perks and privileges of the some 7,000 princes in the kingdom.

"King Abdullah and his sons are clean," one young man told me, "and that is worth more than you can imagine."

The king's domestic popularity will allow him to tackle some tough problems, including the reform of an entrenched Wahhabi religious establishment that continues to purvey a largely intolerant brand of Islam. Unlike Fahd, whose religious credentials were shaky because of his playboy past, Abdullah has the gravitas to face down the religious establishment as an equal: a pious man of faith interested in reform.

In one of the great "what might have been" questions of history, Saudi Arabia squandered an extraordinary opportunity to help build a modern Muslim world. Instead, it significantly contributed to what Abdullah himself calls a major crisis. From this crisis environment emerged 15 young Saudis willing to commit mass murder on American soil, seduced by the alluring call of another Saudi -- -- Osama bin Laden.

A new oil boom and a cautiously reform-minded king now have the opportunity to erase some of those wrongs. King Abdullah's success will largely be defined by quiet acts of diplomacy that prevent conflict, the creation of new institutions that bolster Muslim world economies (the modernization and resurgence of the stagnant Islamic Development Bank should be a top priority) and the spreading of an Islam that tolerates diversity and welcomes change.

Though the path remains long and the obstacles large, early signs are that King Abdullah and Saudi Arabia are headed in the right direction.