Saudi Arabia doesn’t enjoy a reputation as being a hub of intellectual achievement. On the contrary, the Kingdom is widely regarded as being backward, even by its Arab neighbors. King Abdullah want’s to change that by creating the Kingdom’s own M.I.T.

As the NYT reports (here) King Abdullah will be investing $12.5bn for the creation of a university, known as Kaust (King Abdullah University of Science & Technology) devoted to bridging the gap in technology and science in Saudi Arabia, and the Middle East.

Saudia Arabia has become famous for all the wrong reasons: women can’t drive here and are generally treated as second class citizens, there’s a religious policing body that has become infamous for its brutality, non-Muslims are generally not welcome, and perhaps the most well known reason for the Kingdom’s inhospitality is that limbs are amputated in accordance with the Saudi interpretation of Islamic law. That doesn’t excactly scream “Welcome to Saudi Arabia.” While King Abdullah can’t change the reasons for the Kingdom’s infamy, he’s hoping to stem the decline in Saudi Arabia when it comes to education in the sciences and technology by literally throwing money at it, an all too common strategy in the oil-rich gulf.

Qatar realized early on that it needs to invest its educational infrastructure and is now home to Georgetown, Cornell, Carnegie Mellon who maintain campuses there. Shaykh Mohammaed, the ruler of Dubai, recently established the eponymous Mohammed bin Rashid Al Maktoum Foundation which has a $10bn mandate to assist in the education development of Dubai. (In classic Middle Eastern fashion – the website for the Foundation is still not up. You’d imagine $10bn could get you a decent website). Saudi Arabia is certainly the wealthiest of Middle Eastern nations and the most populated. So it’s not surprising that it is investing in its educational infrastructure. Some may say its a bit late in the game, but better late than never.

Universities are built upon its academicians. If Kaust can get world-class faculty it has a shot at catching up; if not, they might as well give up. Many of the best American universities were founded by poaching start faculty from other universities, the most notable of which is probably the University of Chicago, which over a very short period of time established its reputation as an intellectual powerhouse. But moving to Chicago is a lot easier than moving to Saudi. As an advisor to Kaust has explained:

“Getting the faculty will be the biggest challenge,” said Ahmed F. Ghoniem, a professor at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology who is consulting for the new university. “That will make it or break it.” Professor Ghoniem has advised the new university to lure international academics with laboratory facilities and grants they cannot find at home, but he also believes that established professors will be reluctant to leave their universities for a small enclave in the desert.

“You have to create an environment where you can connect to the outside world,” said Professor Ghoniem, who is from Egypt. “You cannot work in isolation.”

He admitted that even though he admired the idea of the new university, he would be unlikely to abandon his post at M.I.T. to move to Saudi Arabia.

For all the freedoms being promised at the university, Kaust will not be allowing any Israeli academics to visit, which is a step in the wrong direction. If there’s any one nation that Middle Eastern nations would be wise to model themselves after, it’s Israel. It boasts some of the brightest minds the world over, in the humanities and the sciences, and has top-notch universities. Technion is widely recognized as the best technical university in the Middle East and is often thought of as being superior to M.I.T. There is a robust tech. industry and eco-system in Israel which is found nowhere else in the region. Kaust is in some ways shooting itself in the foot by ignoring what Israel has to offer.

Kaust is a step in the right direction, hopefully it can achieve some of its promise. But Saudi Arabia and the other Gulf states would be wise to realize that one can’t simply create education institutions just by throwing money at them, there needs to be greater incentives than simply money. Universities are places of the mind and unless that type of freedom is accompanied with the hefty endowments very few will come.