Introduction: Resistance to globalization in the Arab Middle East

ABSTRACT

The Arab region finds itself at a historical cross-road between resilience and resistance to globalization. Arab countries' short-term strategies to globalization are primarily determined by the diversification of their respective economies. Long-term adjustments to globalization are mitigated by existing social and political structures. While Arab states might seem exceptional in many ways, they display common features that have their origins in their history of state-formation. The key challenge for Arab states is to widen state revenues to include taxes, tariffs and other income and to increase the state's capacity to prepare effectively for times of fiscal crisis. International policies must take the interest of incumbent elites into account when proposing economic adjustment programmes and turn from a technical understanding of governance towards a political.

KEYWORDS:

• Globalization
• state-building
• economic reform
• governance
• World Trade Organization
• democratization

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

Many thanks to Mareike Kleine, Helder de Schutter and Thomas Richter for valuable comments and suggestions on this introduction.

Notes

1 Egypt's role in the G22 during the Cancun ministerial meeting is an illustration for this. A further example is Egypt's strong opposition to the Singapore issues in the area of trade and investment.