The Political Economy of Education in the Arab World
  • 2021/297 pages
  • A Project of the Hicham Alaoui Foundation 

The Political Economy of Education in the Arab World

Hicham Alaoui and Robert Springborg, editors
Hardcover: $85.00
ISBN: 978-1-62637-935-0
Ebook: $85.00
ISBN: 978-1-62637-944-2
Despite substantial spending on education and robust support for reform both internally and by external donors, the quality of education in many, if not most, Arab countries remains low. Which raises the question: why?

The authors of The Political Economy of Education in the Arab World find answers in the authoritarian political economies that shape the architecture of national governance across the region. Presenting studies from North Africa and the Gulf region, as well as comparative perspectives from Asia and Latin America, they show clearly that efforts to improve education—and thereby enhance economic development and broaden the base of citizenship on which more stable and effective systems of governance can be built—will fail until ruling elites are no longer able to increase their political and economic power at the expense of the greater good.
Hicham Alaoui is research associate at the Weatherhead Center for International Affairs, Harvard University. Robert Springborg is a nonresident research fellow of the Italian Institute of International Affairs and adjunct professor in the School of International Studies at Simon Fraser University.