When the institutional context thwarts public-private partnerships: The role of political factors in the failure of ppps

The PPP scholarly work has effectively explored the material values attached to PPPs such as efficiency of services, value for money and productivity, but little attention has been paid to procedural public values. This paper aims to address this gap by exploring how Enfidha Airport in Tunisia failed to achieve both financial and procedural values that were expected from delivering the airport via the PPP route, and what coping strategies the public and private sectors deployed to ameliorate any resultant value conflicts. Based on the analysis of Enfidha Airport, it is argued that PPP projects are likely to fail to deliver financial and procedural values when the broader institutional context is not supportive of PPP arrangements, and when political and security risks are not adequately counted for during the bidding process

The role of political leadership in driving citizens’ engagement through social media: The case of Dubai’s public sector

© Springer International Publishing Switzerland 2015. This chapter examines the use of social media in Dubai’s government from a public policy perspective. It traces its development and the intrinsic role of political leadership in encouraging and creating a virtual space for brainstorming important policy matters with a wider public audience. The chapter argues that the technological advancement Dubai and the United Arab Emirates (UAE) (Dubai is one of the seven Emirates that form the United Arab Emirates. Other Emirates in alphabetical order are Abu Dhabi (which serves as the capital), Ajman, Dubai, Fujairah, Ras al-Khaimah, Sharjah, and Umm al-Quwain.) achieved in the past few decades, has facilitated the exploitation of social media tools and allowed the engagement of the public in policy making. This is a result of the political leadership’s firm willingness to modernize its public administration and involve the public in shaping public policy. Dubai currently serves as a catalyst for other governments of the Gulf and the wider Middle East and North Africa (MENA) region to utilize social media to formulate public policies that are supported and co-formed by the public

Economic Policies, Structural Change and the Roots of the ‘Arab Spring’ in Egypt

This paper analyses the economic challenges facing Egypt in the post-Mubarak period, demonstrating the ways in which economic policy choices over the 2000s have contributed to the economic and social outcomes witnessed in the run up to the 2011 uprisings. The article investigates three specific policy areas and demonstrates their role in reducing employment opportunities, eroding wages and facilitating the creation of an increasingly unequal economic and social structure in Egypt. The three policy areas addressed by the article are (i) the general misplaced fiscal focus on expenditure-reduction rather than revenue-enhancement and the lack of progressive revenue growth; (ii) the manipulation and use of subsidies in Egypt to appease the populous instead of fostering employment generation; (iii) the failure to adequately promote employment-intensive investment

The state of HRM in the Middle East:Challenges and future research agenda

Based on a robust structured literature analysis, this paper highlights the key developments in the field of human resource management (HRM) in the Middle East. Utilizing the institutional perspective, the analysis contributes to the literature on HRM in the Middle East by focusing on four key themes. First, it highlights the topical need to analyze the context-specific nature of HRM in the region. Second, via the adoption of a systematic review, it highlights state of development in HRM in the research analysis set-up. Third, the analysis also helps to reveal the challenges facing the HRM function in the Middle East. Fourth, it presents an agenda for future research in the form of research directions. While doing the above, it revisits the notions of “universalistic” and “best practice” HRM (convergence) versus “best-fit” or context distinctive (divergence) and also alternate models/diffusion of HRM (crossvergence) in the Middle Eastern context. The analysis, based on the framework of cross-national HRM comparisons, helps to make both theoretical and practical implications

Public-private partnerships for school infrastructure development: International review and recommendations for Saudi Arabia

As Saudi Arabia embarks upon a transformative economic journey under the umbrella of its Vision 2030 and National Transformation Plan, the Saudi government plans to implement various initiatives to engage the private sector in meeting new national development goals, including the provision of 1600 schools through the public-private partnership (PPP) route. This article provides an international outlook and review of the use of PPPs to deliver school infrastructure and analyzes Saudi Arabia’s potential to implement this promising program. Effective use of the PPP model can guarantee the timely provision of schools and other infrastructure projects that could fulfill the vision of Saudi Arabia’s political leadership, potentially serving as a catalyst and blueprint for other Gulf states. The case study argues that, while Saudi Arabia’s schools’ program enjoys significant political support, its government needs simultaneously to pursue the parallel objective of developing the necessary institutional, legal, regulatory, and supervisory frameworks essential for successful PPP projects globally. The article concludes with recommendations to mitigate existing challenges and foster the involvement of the private sector in education sector development

Anti-normalization, nonviolent activism, and domestic interests: The Case of Morocco

Between August and December 2020, the United Arab Emirates (UAE), Bahrain, Sudan, and Morocco announced US-brokered agreements with Israel whereby they established full diplomatic relations and effectively withdrew from the Arab Boycott of Israel that tied official relations to the resolution of the so-called Palestine Question. These announcements came as a surprise to Arab-Muslim publics, despite their awareness of informal relations between these states and Israel. Using the case of Morocco and drawing on nonviolent resistance literature, this paper investigates civil resistance to the December 2020 Moroccan-Israeli agreement by three Moroccan activist groupings–opposition leftists, Islamists, and boycott-focused groups. Through document analysis, webinars, and interviews, this study asks two related questions: to what extent do these groups use nonviolent tactics and strategies to resist the Moroccan-Israeli agreement and to what extent is the agreement the focus of protest activities versus serving as a rallying point for advancing calls for socio-political reform

Understanding the historical processes of privatization policies in North Africa: Lessons from the cases of Algeria, Morocco and Tunisia

This paper provides a concise historical analysis of the political economy of privatization in Algeria, Morocco, and Tunisia from the 1980s to 2007, a period that witnessed the emergence of privatization as a primary policy tool to reform the public sector. The paper examines the influence of political history, macroeconomic considerations, and International Development Agencies (IDAs) on the early privatization processes in these North African countries. Despite shared developmental trajectories, internal and external factors had a significant impact on the outcomes of economic liberalization. The paper aims to answer the following key questions: What were the underlying political-economic factors driving privatization, and how successful was it in achieving the promised economic growth? Through a focused analysis of each country’s contextual factors, privatization processes, and outcomes, the paper contributes valuable insights into the nuanced dynamics shaping privatization in developing countries