Massoud Karshenas

• SOAS University of London

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...

We examine prospects for the shift from an authoritarian corporatist social policy regime to a democratic and developmental one, in light of popular socio-economic and political grievances and demands. Social policy can bring about a sense of inclusion, belonging, and rights on the part of beneficiaries, and is necessary for a well-functioning and...

In this article we discuss the compatibility of different global poverty estimates under a unified framework. We examine the updating of the rules of the international poverty lines under different Purchasing Power Parity exchange rate estimates and discuss the way this process has affected the latest World Bank poverty-line updates. The issue of t...

This article examines the evolution of social policy in the Middle East and North Africa (MENA) during three periods: the post-colonial and oil-boom period, the post-oil period of structural adjustment, and the more recent oil-boom period. Drawing attention to key factors that shaped both social policy and the region's lack of competitiveness durin...

Since 1979, Iran has witnessed important socio-economic and institutional changes and has been affected by significant economic and political upheavals. These years have witnessed a succession of oil booms and busts, external war, trade sanctions and of course, more recently, heightened internal strife within the state. After 25 years, however, Ira...

It is argued that agrarian relations play a critical role in the pattern of intersectoral resource flows and the way in which the agricultural sector shapes the macroeconomy in developing countries. The notion of ‘urban bias’ used by GKI is defective in its abstracting from the pre-existing agrarian system and from the prevailing institutions and i...

Incl. abstract, graphs, tables, bibl. This article examines the dollar-a-day poverty estimates produced by the World Bank. It highlights the lack of consistency between average consumption and income in household surveys and national accounts data. After examining the likely sources of divergence between the two series, the author proposes a new me...

This paper provides new national accounts consistent poverty estimates for low-income countries. The paper compares the properties of the new estimates that are based on household survey means to existing World Bank estimates. The new estimates are used to reflect on recent controversies regarding the relationship between economic growth and povert...

This paper investigates the relationship between female labor force participation rates and structural adjustment in the Middle East and North Africa (MENA). We put forward a new hypothesis to explain MENA's low female labor force participation rates, and argue that during the oil boom era MENA countries locked themselves into family structures and...

This paper is a comparative study of the role of agriculture in economic development in sub-Saharan Africa and Asia. Popular notions of economic duality and agricultural squeeze in sub-Saharan Africa are re-examined, and new explanations in terms of agrarian structures and resource availabilities are put forward to account for the apparent economic...

This paper explores th� mie of business services in knowledge accumulation and growth and the determinants of knowledge diffusion including the role of distance. A continuous time model is estimated on several European countries, Japan, and the US. The results of the estimation and the policy simulations support the basic insights of the Lisbon Age...

The Middle East and North Africa (MENA) region has lagged behind other regions in liberalization and economic reform during the past two decades. In this paper I argue that while socio-political and institutional factors may help explain the differences in the pace of economic reform between the different countries in the MENA region, the main expl...

Over the past twenty years Iran’s relative ranking in the world economy has declined considerably. Comprehensive institutional reform is essential if this process of economic retrogression is to be reversed and sustainable growth achieved. This chapter identifies the needed reforms by studying the ill-fated reforms of the First Five-Year Plan. Cont...

This paper investigates the relation between female labor force participation rates and wage competitiveness in the MENA region. We offer a new explanation for MENA?s low female labor force participation rates based on the variation in average non-agricultural wages in different countries in the process of transition from agrarian to modern industr...

A new accounting framework for the measurement of intersectoral resource flows is presented. Different definitions of agricultural surplus are discussed and the conceptual and measurement problems involved in empirical estimation are examined. The framework is used to obtain new estimates of net agricultural surplus from the financial side for Iran...

Since the 1980s, the majority of countries in the MENA region facing severe exchange shortages have had to adopt policies directed towards stabilization and structural adjustment of their economies. Employment expansion and the structure and function of labor markets in these economies has been closely tied to the nature of the adjustment programs...

The widely held view that Iranian industrialisation policies during the 1962–77 period led to a squeeze of resources out of the agricultural sector is re‐examined. Measurements of internal terms of trade and net agricultural resource flows are presented for the first time, which show a sizeable resource inflow into the agricultural sector. It is ar...

Disclaimer: The views expressed in this report are those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the views of the United Nations. The designations employed and the presentation of the material in this report do not imply the expression of any option whatsoever on the part of the Secretariat of the United Nations concerning the legal status of...

In this paper we undertake a comparative study of the development paths of Asia and sub- Saharan Africa since the 1960s applying the classical framework of Arthur Lewis's 1954 paper on economic development with unlimited supplies of labour. We will try to show that the classical framework used by Lewis can provide powerful insights into the compara...