It is kind of nonsensical the way you're choosing what is an absolute monarchy. The situation where the head of government is completely unopposed and is without the need for the input of those below them is at its base quite rare. One could point to Stalin's Russia or Hitler's Germany as absolute (which they were) but another could say due to the competing factions underneath especially in the various intelligence operatus forcing leaders to at least take on input from their underlings to maintain there position on top.It's a misconception if you think Saudi Arabia is an absolute state. The rule in the Kingdom is more of a collaborative process (even in the context of recent events), between the Al Saud family, the Council of Seniors (the clerical elite drawn exclusively from the extreme Wahhabism movement), and a small number of staggeringly wealthy merchant families. While distinctly non-democratic, it bears little relationship to an absolute state on the lines of say, the Sun King, or Stalin.
I still hold that that Acton's famous line about "Power corrupts, absolute power corrupts absolutely" is basically true. Anyone care to debate that, over the long term, historically?
From Wikipedia, an "Absolute monarchy, or despotic monarchy,[1][2] is a form of monarchy in which one ruler has supreme authority and where that authority is not restricted by any written laws, legislature, or customs." Whether or not the exercise of power needs to be made through a conferred ruling (which it does not in Saudi Arabia) or not what matters is whether there are any laws or bodies legally capable of stopping that execution of power once the executing branch of government has decided to do so.
The line "Power corrupts, absolute power corrupts absolutely" is often treated as an axiom when frankly it isn't. It's simply a saying.
From this site, "This idiom means that those in power often do not have the people’s best interests in mind. They are primarily focused on their own benefits, and they may abuse their position of power to help themselves. If you follow the thread that absolute power corrupts absolutely, you can believe that monarchs—those with the most authority—have the least amount of morals. Kinder souls would be found among poorer, less influential people.
Naturally, this is not always the case, as there are many examples of kind and good leaders. Of those who are corrupted, it is it is hard to distinguish whether the power corrupted the man or the men who were drawn to power were already corrupted."
I'm not saying it is even close to an ideal form of government but one should not immediately dismiss things that seem foreign to them as a lot of what's normal is based on what has been normal our entire lives. The most likely examples of what you would paint as an absolute state would include very few examples of actual absolute monarchies but mostly dictatorships of which most if not all were installed through military intercession in someway.
- Fun fact: There is a considerable variety of opinion by historians on the extent of absolutism among European monarchs. Some, such as Perry Anderson, argue that quite a few monarchs achieved levels of absolutist control over their states, while historians such as Roger Mettam dispute the very concept of absolutism. In general, historians who disagree with the appellation of absolutism argue that most monarchs labelled as absolutist exerted no greater power over their subjects than any other non-absolutist rulers, and these historians tend to emphasize the differences between the absolutist rhetoric of monarchs and the realities of the effective use of power by these absolute monarchs.
- Another fun fact: Qatar and the UAE are also absolute monarchies by above definition with the UAE having a few 'elected positions' that are essentially hereditary. I didn't know that.
- To cover my ass - I know my state apparatus comparison is not the most solid but it stands.