Narrow Results

Recent years have witnessed phenomenal growth in both the number and size of US based international equity mutual funds. While the benefits of international diversification are well documented in the literature, empirical research relating to the performance of international mutual funds has been limited and contradictory. The purpose of this study is to examine the impact of political risk on the risk-adjusted returns of international mutual funds using a modified event study methodology. More specifically, the dummy variable event study methodology using portfolios rather than individual funds is used. This methodology addresses the problems of multiple event days and calendar clustering. The macro political risk event of interest is the Iraqi invasion of Kuwait. Results of the study suggest that shareholders of international equity mutual funds earn significant abnormal returns in the face of political turmoil.

The main objective of the current study is to investigate personal and external factors that might influence women's decisions to become entrepreneurs in Kuwait. To achieve this objective, a questionnaire containing selected variables of women's personal and external factors was distributed to a sample of Kuwaiti women who are mainly studying or have completed their studies at the Public Authority for Applied Education and Training. The participants in the questionnaire survey were asked to express the level of agreement they assign to various variables that might affect their decisions to become entrepreneurs. Although the result of the analysis of the participants' answers revealed that they attach a certain level of agreement to the external factors effect on their decisions to become entrepreneurs, they attached higher level of agreement to personal factors. The Kuwaiti women who participated in the survey believe that getting involved in developing a self-business will enhance their social position and assist them in making independent decisions. Their interests and hobbies together with availability of business ideas would encourage Kuwaiti women to develop their own businesses. Their involvements in developing self-businesses are motivated by profit, given that they can secure the start-up capital. Finally, the participants revealed that religious bindings, together with family responsibilities, influence their decisions to become entrepreneurs.

The Middle East and North Africa (MENA) region is expected to benefit more than most other regions from continued rapid growth in China and India. This paper analyzes the trade-related implications of this growth for the MENA countries using a global general equilibrium model, modified to take into account the focus of China and, increasingly, India on exports of manufactures from global production chains. To obtain a better idea of the implications for key countries in the region, we developed a database with expanded coverage of Middle-Eastern countries. We find that most of the gains to the MENA region come from improvements in the terms of trade, particularly linked to increasing demand for energy. Exports from the Middle East as a whole are expected to decline although exports from the non-oil economies will likely expand. Fuelled by higher incomes and by increases in the competitiveness of China and India, imports into MENA are expected to increase. In the oil-exporting countries of the Middle East, Dutch-disease effects increase the importance of policies to promote adjustment to the changing world environment.

It is by now well established in the public health literature that health and nutrition in the first years of life are critical to health and wellbeing later in life. In this paper, we examine the patterns of inequality of opportunity in health and nutrition outcomes, such as height-for-age and weight-for-height, for children under 5 years of age in selected Arab Countries and Turkey, using Demographic and Health Survey (DHS) data. Our objective is to decompose inequality into a portion that is due to inequality of opportunity and a portion that is due to other factors, such as random variations in health and genetics. Inequality of opportunity is defined as the inequality that is due to differences in circumstances, such as parental characteristics, household wealth, place of birth and gender. We measure inequality using decomposable general entropy measures, such as the Theil-T index, and use parametric decomposition methods to determine the share of inequality of opportunity in total inequality.

Results show that different levels and trends are evident across countries in both the overall inequality of child health outcomes and in the share of inequality of opportunity in total inequality. Inequality of opportunity is shown to contribute substantially to the inequality of child health outcomes, but its share in total inequality varies significantly both across countries and within countries over time. To further highlight the relative contribution of circumstances to the inequality of child health outcomes in different countries, we simulate height and weight outcomes for a most and least advantaged child in each context. Since these simulations set observed circumstances at their best and worst levels, the larger the difference in predicted outcomes between the most and least advantaged child, the larger is the inequality of opportunity facing children in that country.

This paper reviews the development experience of the Arab countries since World War II, arguing that the lack of inclusive economic and political institutions is the primary cause for the current state of underdevelopment in the region. While macroeconomic mismanagement and oil abundance are important determinants of performance, these factors are shaped primarily by the prevailing political institutions which predated the discovery of oil. In the oil-poor Arab countries, limited progress is attributed to an authoritarian bargain in which the rulers exchanged economic benefits to the poor and the middle class for political acquiesce. Finally, the paper concludes by speculating whether the recent Arab revolts will spread to the rest of the region and whether these revolts will be remembered in the future as a critical juncture towards more inclusive institutions and shared progress. It does not offer a conclusive answer, but suggests that early indications are positive.

There are two prevailing arguments among international observers about China’s role in the Middle East. One is that China has been a “security free-rider;” the other is that China is fundamentally a business-seeker. Yet neither of the two is well-grounded. If viewed comprehensively rather than in terms of military engagement alone, China’s contribution to stability and security of the region is enormous, and its role in the Middle East can be described as a combination of a major economic partner, a low-profile mediator and a modest but important provider of security public goods. As China has proposed various new concepts and initiatives as guidelines of its foreign policy, its future policy toward the Middle East can be best understood through its increasing efforts to promote the “Belt and Road” initiative, to develop a new-type major-power relationship, and to uphold justice and pursue shared interests with all related countries. With ever more Chinese engagement in the region, China’s Middle East policy is expected to be delivered in a more comprehensive way. However, China is not likely to seek dominant presence in the region in the foreseeable future.

China is in dire need of energy resources to sustain its economic growth. In recent years, China has been turning more to Saudi Arabia and Iran in the Middle East, as well as Sudan in North Africa, as trading partners to secure its energy supply. This article explores China’s energy strategy in the Middle East and North African (MENA) region through case studies of China’s energy diplomacy with Saudi Arabia and Iran. It argues that China’s energy strategy is very much driven by the “Beijing Consensus” that features respect for others’ sovereignty, emphasis on sustainability, equality, and quality-of-life, as well as incremental change to past institutions and practices. China has applied an equity ownership strategy to gain more control over oil flows as a shield against price fluctuations and to reduce the possibility of supply interruption; however, civil unrest and conflicts in the MENA region threaten to disrupt China’s energy supply channels, which implies that China should work harder for regional peace in order to achieve sustainable energy supply.

To safeguard its economic and security interests, China has adopted a whole-of-region diplomacy in the Middle East since the end of the Cold war. Through a multitude of regional and international organizations, China has been able to maintain constructive interactions with Middle Eastern countries while deepening its ties with other major powers like the United States, the European Union, Russia, Japan and India. China’s diplomatic efforts have paid off in the Middle East and increased the influence of developing countries as a whole in international politics. Meanwhile, China’s whole-of-region diplomacy is faced with a number of challenges given the complexity of ethnic, religious and security landscapes in the Middle East. China needs more holistic and well-coordinated ways of whole-of-region diplomacy to seek closer relationships with Middle Eastern countries. To this end, it is important for China to consolidate its network of strategic partnerships on the basis of bilateral collaboration and multilateral cooperation, further strengthen its discourse power and agenda-setting capacity, and consider adopting a common but differentiated strategy toward regional countries according to their different national conditions, political systems and paths of socioeconomic development.

Outside powers have diverse visions of international peace in the Middle East. The first is the “peace through strength” hypothesis, arguing that a “security deficit” is the root cause of conflict. Proponents of the hypothesis argue for building networks of military bases and strategic alliances, conducting, if necessary, regime changes and military strikes in an anti-terror campaign, a mode of security governance. The second features “peace through democracy,” emphasizing that a “democracy deficit” results in conflict. Leaders of democracies are more prudent in power usage so that they refrain themselves from launching aggression, a model of democratic governance. The third is the “peace through development” approach, arguing that a “development deficit” is the root cause of conflict. China favors “peace through development,” advocating a development-focused peace initiative to address the peace-development-security nexus in the Middle East. China offers developmental aid and human resources training to the target countries in order to improve their capacity with key infrastructure and livelihood projects as the centerpiece. Beijing places a high premium on infrastructure inter-connectivity between the Middle Eastern countries and attempts to builds these countries into a community of interest for regional peace by way of the Belt and Road Initiative.

It has been a subject of considerable scholarly interest ever since the United Arab Emirates, Bahrain, and Israel signed the Abraham Accords brokered President of the United States in September 2020. However, little has been written about the impact of the Accords on China’s belt and road initiative (BRI) in the Middle East. Both scholars and politicians, including the Chinese leadership, have welcomed the move, but U.S. involvement in the implementation of the deal has raised some doubts. Since the United States openly opposes the BRI and overcoming China is one of the goals of its foreign policy. Under U.S. pressure, Israel has scrapped several agreements with China. The study examines how the Abraham Accords can escape the U.S. control trap against China’s BRI in the Middle East. It concludes that it is difficult for these countries to avoid U.S. influence, but that any country that has previously held bilateral talks with China will have to persuade the United States to abide by their previous agreements.

The purpose of this paper is to analyze China’s geopolitical strategy in the Strait of Hormuz using secondary data of the topic and the concept of Natural Resources War. The Strait is very important to all the importing oil countries from Middle East including China as the only way in and out. At the same time, the Strait is also vulnerable with any kind of attacks that become challenge and threat to all the countries. It is the United States (US) as the one and only superpower which guarantee the security of the Strait and all the ships from importing oil countries. Recently with a lot of issues occurred in the region, the US seemed to be overwhelmed and asked every country to protect their own ships. With the status of one of the superpower countries and the power of its economy, China should be able to have the same role as the US. This paper contends that the lack of power of China’s military, dependence on the US security and Iran conflict with the US are the reasons why China is not showing some significant roles in Middle East related to its geopolitical strategy specifically in the Strait of Hormuz.

China’s foreign health cooperation has evolved from health aid to health partnership with the advent of global health diplomacy. Particularly since the start of the new era, China has planned forward in the area of health cooperation, strengthening the connections with its entire diplomatic approach and taking a more active part in the world health community. This paper examines the distinctions between conventional aid and health partnerships using the cooperation between China and the Middle East as an illustration. It also traces the development of the health partnership network between China and the Middle East through sectorial collaboration, humanistic exchanges, institutional building, and mutual policy appreciation. Using the two sides’ cooperation in the face of the COVID-19 outbreak as an example, it evaluates the effects of cooperation on regional health governance and diplomatic relations. It is considered that there has been a favorable contact between China and Middle Eastern nations in terms of health cooperation.

Providing an empirical and conceptual context for the volume, this chapter discusses patterns and trends in women's social and economic participation in the region, draws together the themes explored in individual chapters, and offers policy recommendations and suggestions for future research. Middle East and North Africa (MENA) countries have made good progress in educating women, whose schooling attainments often outstrip those of men, and in reducing fertility rates, but most of MENA women remain out of the labor force, and those who do work outside the home face a wide range of difficulties associated with their gender. Having so few women working is costly for the countries in the region, limiting their economic size and growth prospects. From a policy perspective, it is important to understand why so few women work. Reasons include discriminatory practices in the workplace and difficulty in obtaining access to credit and productive assets; women's reservation wages and internalized gender roles in traditionally patriarchal societies; and discrimination by government policies against female market-based activities. The chapter seeks to understand the links between these causual factors within a coherent analytical framework that can handle both diversity and difference.

The internet has spread its network to the remotest parts of the world. The availability of digital technologies, infrastructure, and devices like laptops, tablets, smartphones, and wearables has enabled a lot of commercial transactions online. Banking could not remain untouched by these transformations as customer preferences in both their personal and professional lives have changed as there is a great demand for digital banking services like mobile apps, internet banking, digital wallets, and electronic payment systems (Sardana & Singhania, 2018). The consumers in the Gulf are not far behind. A McKinsey Report indicates that in the UAE, with an internet penetration of 92%, at least 80% of these customers prefer to utilize banking facilities online and are willing to shift some part of their financial assets to banks that offer an extensive digital solution (Shirish et al., 2016; Sharma, 2022). The research aim was to comprehend the consumer’s acceptance of digital banking in the Middle East, focusing largely on the current challenges (infrastructural, cultural, and behavioral) and the vast opportunities, considering that only a fraction of the Middle East’s digital potential has been captured (Elmasry et al., 2016). The research methodology includes an extensive literature review on digitization in banking, available fintech solutions, consumer behavior toward e-commerce, and the region’s rapid transformation into a digital economy. A remarkable insight gained from this research is that, in the Middle East, there is a robust consumer adoption of digital solutions, but consumers would like multichannel options available to meet their complex financial needs. Other pertinent requirements from a digital banking experience are trust, security, and ease of usage. A major drawback is the lack of qualified digital talent and a strong IT sector that can complement the bank’s journey toward digitization.

The MEASA region forms a crescent of countries beginning with Bangladesh and India in the East, continuing through the Middle East and West Africa, and terminating with the South African nations. This grouping of countries has a long history of cultural, economic, and political advantages and achievements. One need only consider the energy riches of the Middle East, the mineral, agricultural, and fishery resources of Africa, or the large and educated population of India to understand the potential for the region. The MEASA region covers 45% of the worlds population and is expected to be one of the most rapidly growing regions. Moreover, the MEASA region is approximately 18% of global GDP and is likely to grow at much faster than developed countries in the coming decade. Our study reports that the MEASA region stocks have produced exceptional returns and returns relative to risk compared to MSCI Emerging Markets stocks, Frontier Market stocks, and World Index stocks during the January 2003 to September 2017 time period. The situation today in the MEASA region countries seems like the situation in the BRICs countries in the early 2000s. As happened with the BRICs countries, the barriers to investing in the MEASA region are being removed as we write. Innovative investment advisors are set to offer mechanisms to access these markets. The rewards will go to those visionary investors who are able to first see the possibilities.

The notion of the ecosystem was coined by Roy Clapham in 1930 to denote physical and biological components in an environment and their relationship to each other. Today, entrepreneurial ecosystems are defined as the agglomeration of interrelated individuals, institutions, organizations, and regulatory entities in a particular geographic area that acts upon and promotes entrepreneurial initiatives and actions. Governments influence activities within these ecosystems.

Women’s entrepreneurship in Syria is highly affected by its historical facts and the wars that affected the business environment. This chapter tries to shed light on the history of entrepreneurship, especially women’s entrepreneurship, in the country. Then, the authors add more details about the entrepreneurship ecosystem and relevant issues. Afterwards, the chapter explains the evolution of women’s entrepreneurship and the challenges that can affect its trend. Finally, the authors mention some critical issues to improve women’s entrepreneurship in Syria.

The aim of this study is to examine the institutional organization of the water sector. The Mediterranean area provides diverse examples of water sector organization. This chapter focuses more particularly on two aspects of the water sector organization: the recent introduction of private sector participation and the institutional framework. Five countries have been reviewed in detail: Tunisia, Algeria, Egypt, Morocco and Jordan. The chapter analyzes institutional arrangements of the water sector for each of these countries, It not only presents the theoretical legal framework but also the practice. It shows that "independent" regulatory agencies have been set up only in a few countries. However, a closer look confirms that these regulatory agencies are rarely independent. The study also reveals that in most of the countries, the management of water supply suffers from political interference and is overly centralized. Experience with corporatization has also been limited. While the corpo-ratization of local operators has been legalized in most countries, only few have implemented it. Experience with private sector participation in water supply has been relatively positive and therefore expected to expand in the future.