The Decline of Syrian Industry: An Assessment of Performance and Capabilities During the 1990s

Syrian manufacturing industry has several advantages: it has a long history and a strong entrepreneurial base, relatively low wages and a good location to serve large markets in oil-rich neighbours and Europe. It has not, however, performed well. This paper focuses on its record in the 1990s, benchmarking indicators of performance and competitive capabilities against selected comparators. Manufacturing growth has been erratic and probably low; manufactured exports have declined dramatically and its composition has shifted towards primary products. The demise of the Soviet block, which provided a soft market for Syrian exporters, has exposed their competitive weaknesses. The competitive base of Syrian industry has been eroding. With greater openness, Syria faces enormous challenges in terms of building new technological capabilities to strengthen existing activities and diversifying into more dynamic non-oil manufactured exports

The e-government implementation directions in Oman: A preliminay investigation

Electronic government has established itself as the primary enabler for transforming the way government services are offered to citizens. In the gulf countries, public sector transformation efforts are focused towards increasing accessibility, availability, competitive advances and enhancing services in civil administration. The Sultanate of Oman is one such example of the Gulf countries where large investments have been made since 2003 to implement electronic services in the public sector. Using a qualitative research approach, this research investigates the improvements that have been made to facilitate these electronic services in three public organisations, and their resulting impact within the organisations. The empirical results reveal that among others, top management support, integration and IT staff skills and capabilities are the most important factors that facilitate e-government initiatives in the Omani public sector

Science diplomacy and trans-boundary water management. The Orontes River case

The Mediterranean Basin in general, and more specifically its southeastern part, is encountering rapid changes leading to huge water stress and the tiniest percentage of available drinking water per inhabitant in the world. Changes leading to water scarcity include growing population, with rates annually exceeding 2.8%, and excessive water demand for irrigation. Climate change exacerbates water droughts and risks. Overall national sovereignty, political, social and economic factors seem to be equally important to the scarcity of water resources, which may influence conflicts and violent clashes (\u201cwater riots\u201d).This is the reason why water and hydro-diplomacy occupy a central space on the diplomatic agenda of the governments in the region, including Lebanon, Syria, Jordan, Palestine, Israel, Egypt and Turkey. To guarantee the equitable use of water resources for the population of the countries involved, a major task of hydro-diplomacy is to overcome a number of challenges and critical thresholds by exploring all possible options for consensus building and by using reliable scientific evidence.Hydro-diplomacy, as applied in the case of the Orontes, builds partly on traditional bilateral approaches, taking account of power relations, partly on observing International Law and partly on pursuing new methods and tendencies based on the analyses of the actual water needs at national and local level, considering in particular the most vulnerable communities and enhancing prospects for social and economic development.The present publication is based, on one hand, on the results of the ICT project funded by the Italian Development Cooperation (Ministry of Foreign Affairs and International Cooperation) through the University of Insubria, and on the other hand, on the data and accumulated experience of hydro-diplomacy efforts. It thus brings together two approaches: first a crisp analysis of the evolution in addressing the water challenges applying technological tools on basin management, and secondly, a pragmatic one, based on a case study dealing with water resources in the Middle East

Implementing Agenda 2030 in the Arab world: Contextualization, action areas and policy planning

This article is a critical assessment of the implementation frameworks of Agenda 2030 in the Arab region through a study of the deficiencies pertaining to the contextualization of the Agenda in the region. Seeking to identify the scope of implementation that would allow for the eventual streamlining of action towards the achievement of all of the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs), the authors argue that the region’s political and institutional context is one of peacebuilding and resilience-building, imposing several overarching considerations pertaining to the priority intervention areas. Drawing on the findings of Ianovichina (2018), the article identifies the key levers of peacebuilding as being the reduction of real inequalities, the resumption of public and social services, and the promotion of equity and the rule of law. It then explores the policy deficiencies underlying the mobilization of these key levers. While domestic resources mobilization remains crippled by political exclusiveness and institutional inefficiency, the implementation of foreign financing frameworks intrinsically depends on that said mobilization. The authors conclude with a “roadmap” for improvements in the contextualization of Agenda 2030 by focusing on fiscal and financial reform and on the curbing of illicit financial flows on one hand, and de-escalation and institutional peacebuilding on the other

Regional Integration: Whither Arab Free Trade Area?

My inquiry will assess why, many decades after first attempts of economic integration, Arab countries have not been more successful in emulating the success of the European Union, a paradigm of successful economic integration. Specifically, I will explore obstacles to Arab economic integration and address the political and economic factors that play a role to achieve this goal. The central hypothesis of this paper is that there must be fundamental structural changes in Arab economic integration agreements

Trafficking in Women, Forced Labour and Domestic Work: in the context of the Middle East and Gulf Region

This document is part of a digital collection provided by the Martin P. Catherwood Library, ILR School, Cornell University, pertaining to the effects of globalization on the workplace worldwide. Special emphasis is placed on labor rights, working conditions, labor market changes, and union organizing.ASI_2006_DWS_Egypt_Trafficking_in_Women.pdf: 43 downloads, before Oct. 1, 2020

Talking across borders : information and communication technology use among Iraqi refugees in Amman, Jordan, and Louisville, Kentucky.

A series of interviews conducted in Amman, Jordan and Louisville, Kentucky posed the following questions: “How is information and communication technology (ICT) use affecting interpersonal communication patterns within the displaced Iraqi community in the US and Jordan?” and “What are the factors that limit the proliferation of the internet as a communication tool in that community?” Participants were individuals with legal refugee status and Iraqi nationality who left Iraq after the beginning of the 2003 Iraq War. Eight interviews were conducted in Louisville during the summer of 2012 and twelve were conducted in Amman during November 2012. Participants were asked demographic questions, as well as questions about their use of mobile phones and the internet. Based on these interviews and a survey of information collected on mobile phone and internet access in Jordan and Iraq, the researcher concluded that Iraqi refugees primarily utilize ICTs to communicate with relatives abroad. Younger participants in both Jordan and the US use ICTs to communicate with friends more often than older individuals. Participants in Jordan were more likely to call relatives in Iraq instead of using the internet than participants in the US. Interviewees in the US used smart phones, while few in Jordan did. Access issues for Iraqis in Jordan included cost and security concerns. Iraqis in the US had few access concerns. Differences between the two groups can be attributed to resource differences, as most of the participants in the US came directly from Iraq and came from well-off families and those in Jordan had exhausted their savings while waiting for resettlement. This study expands the information available on the subject of refugees\u27 transnational communication patterns and could be helpful to aid and resettlement organizations in the future

Energy Subsidies in the Arab World

The policy of maintaining tight control of domestic energy prices has characterized the political and economic environment in most Arab countries, together with many other parts of the world, for decades. The objectives behind such a policy range from overall welfare objectives such as expanding energy access and protecting poor households’ incomes; to economic development objectives such as fostering industrial growth and smoothing domestic consumption; and to politi- cal considerations, including the distribution of oil and natural gas rents in resource-rich countries. While energy subsidies may be seen as achieving some of a country’s objectives, this paper argues they are a costly and inefficient way of doing so. Energy subsidies distort price signals, with serious implications on efficiency and the optimal allocation of resources. Energy subsidies also tend to be regressive, with high-income households and industries benefiting proportionately most from low energy prices. However, despite such adverse effects, energy subsidies constitute an important social safety net for the poor in many parts of the Arab world, and any attempts to reduce or eliminate them in the absence of compensatory programmes would lead to a decline in households’ welfare and erode the competitiveness of certain industries. Therefore, a critical factor for successful reforms will be the ability of governments to compensate their populations for the reduction or removal of subsidies through carefully designed mitigation measures that protect the poorest and assist the economy in its long-term adaptation. We argue that a reform of energy pric- ing mechanisms in the Arab world may be seen as beneficial from more than one perspective, and as offering potential paths for reform. Nevertheless, this paper recognizes that the current political climate in the region will render the reform of domestic energy prices difficult in practice, such that reform may indeed be a medium- to long-term endeavour

Turkey’s foreign policy orientation in the water context and the Orontes basin

This chapter will basically aim at understanding, explaining and analyzing the foreign policy orientation of Turkey in the transboundary waters context. Turkey’s state practices include a rich history of treaty practices, as well as political statements and actions which culminated in regional water governance trends displaying consensus, but in most cases disagreements. The chapter will analyze how harmonizationwiththeEuropeanUnion(EU)hashadimpactsonthetransboundary water policy discourses and practices in Turkey, and how these changes have been reflected in the country’s relations with its neighbors in the Middle East. The Orontes River Basin is presented as a case-study with its geographical features and hydro-political history. In this context, transboundary water politics in the Orontes will be examined with its entrenched complexities. The chapter will focus on the divergent views of Syria and Turkey over the Orontes, the cooperation initiatives taken in the last decade, specifically the proposed “Friendship Dam” project which came to a standstill after the civil war in Syria and consequent deterioration of relations between Turkey and Syria. The chapter will also briefly present the need for a reappraisal of the transboundary water management practices in the basin so that they would favor greater participation of stakeholders which have traditionally been excluded in the region, such as women