With protests called for today in Saudi Arabia, the authorities have been eager to play down any fears. A headline in this morning's Arab News – "No threat seen to stability of kingdom" – sets the tone. While this may be true in relation to today's demonstrations, in the longer term the kingdom – or rather, its archaic social/political/religious system – faces a huge threat.

The authorities have drawn a clear red line by declaring that demonstrations are not only illegal but "un-Islamic", and yesterday the police showed their strength by opening fire on Shia protesters in the Eastern Province.

This, obviously, is intended to scare away as many people as possible but it also invites others to test the authorities' resolve. Regardless of how many people turn out today, in the long run a ban on demonstrations will be difficult to sustain and it could make matters worse.

"It seems to me that the government is in a lose-lose situation," Saudi blogger Ahmed al-Omran writes in the Guardian. "If they do not stop people from protesting, the people will feel empowered to repeat it and continue protesting, defying the government's ban in a way that makes it difficult for authorities to restore it again. But if the government uses violence to crack down on protesters, this will fuel their anger and push them to protest even more and in larger numbers in the future."

In the Crossroads Arabia blog, John Burgess points out that the Shia agitation in the Eastern Province is nothing new and should not be confused with today's "Day of Rage". He writes: "In none of the 'Day of Rage' propaganda do I see a word about raising the Saudi Shi'a population to equality with the Sunnis".

This may be overstating the point, however. Recent documentscalling for change do highlight discrimination as an issue and the demands of the Shia cleric, Tawfiq al-Aamer, who was releasedearlier this week after being briefly jailed, stretch wider than merely defending Shia interests. Like many of the Sunnis, he is calling for a constitutional monarchy and separation of powers.

I doubt that today's protests will set the kingdom alight; if perceived as a damp squib they may even lull the regime into a false sense of security. But that will not be the end of it. There are no indications that the ruling family have grasped the enormity of the problem they face. They still think that handouts of money and minor tinkering with the system can keep trouble at bay.

There are two main reasons why that can't work. One is that in an age of globalisation the kingdom can no longer be insulated against influences from the world outside (a point I discussed in more detail in a recent talk).

The other reason is minority rule – government of a very predominantly youthful population by a gerontocracy. King Abdullah is well into his eighties. People aged 64 and over account for only 3% of the Saudi population and yet they are the ones in charge. Meanwhile, almost 30% of the population is aged under 15 (a typical figure in western Europe would be half that). The problem here is not so much the age gap itself as all the differences that go with it – attitudes, expectations and so on.

"I have become very pessimistic about the prospects of reform for my country," Omran writes. "The huge age gap between the young population and the ruling elite makes it nearly impossible for the ruled and the rulers to communicate and understand each other. We practically speak two different languages, and I don't see how the government can keep up with our aspirations."

In the Tunisian and Egyptian revolutions we saw a largely united population rebelling against an unpopular regime, but it's not the same in Saudi Arabia. The problem is not just the absolute monarchy but the large sections of society that seek to impose ultra-conservative values on others who reject them.

So the coming struggle will be more about tradition versus modernity, about the character of Saudi society and the role of religion, than about political leadership. It will be about the system as a whole, rather than the regime. That makes it much more difficult to predict what form the struggle will take or how it might ultimately be resolved.

Posted by Brian Whitaker, 11 March 2011.