The future king has plans to keep Saudi Arabia powerful

The Saudi king has bucked tradition by naming his successor without consulting the extended royal family. Bernard Haykel looks at the heir apparent who has a plan for when the oil runs out.

Saudi Arabia’s King Salman has just replaced the 57-year-old Muhammad bin Nayif with his 31-year-old son, Mohammed bin Salman, as crown prince, completing a process of power centralisation that began with Salman’s accession to the throne in January 2015.

Prince Mohammed, commonly known as MBS in Western circles, is the king’s favourite son. By appointing him as crown prince, King Salman, who is now 81, has signalled a clear break from a decades-old tradition of building consensus among the leading sons of the Saudi state’s founder, the late King Abdulaziz Ibn Saud.