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Middle East and North Africa Economic Monitor, October 2015: Inequality, Uprisings, and Conflict in the Arab World
(Washington, DC: World Bank, 2015-10-21) Ianchovichina, Elena; Mottaghi, Lili; Devarajan, Shantayanan
The short-term prospects for a growth recovery in the Middle East and North Africa (MENA) are slim in the context of low oil prices and conflict escalation. Regional GDP growth, estimated at around 2.8 percent in 2015, will remain weak if current circumstances persist. In fact, since the Arab Spring, the region has seen a growth slowdown and a rise in the incidence of civil wars. This report explores how the region got to this state. It examines whether inequality or other factors contributed to the Arab Spring uprisings as well as to the ensuing conflicts. The report concludes that expenditure inequality, which was relatively low and declining, could not been a major factor in triggering the Arab Spring events, although wealth disparities, which are typically higher, could have been. Instead, we find that ordinary people, especially the middle class, were frustrated by the decline in their standards of living, related to the shortage of quality jobs, the poor quality of public services and lack of government accountability. The report also explores whether inequality played a role in the increase in the incidence of violence after the Arab Spring and finds suggestive evidence that intergroup inequality, rather than monetary inequality, contributed to the escalation of conflict.
Economic Monitoring Report to the Ad Hoc Liaison Committee
(Washington, DC, 2015-09-30) World Bank
Palestinians are getting poorer on average for the third year in a row. As evidenced in previous World Bank reports, the competitiveness of the Palestinian economy has been progressively eroding since the signing of the Oslo accords, in particular its industry and agriculture. Even though donor aid had increased government-funded services and fueled consumption-driven growth during 2007 to 2011, this growth model has proved unsustainable. Donor support has significantly declined in recent years and, in any case, aid cannot sustainably make up for inadequate private investment. Thus, growth has started to slow since 2012 and the Palestinian economy contracted in 2014 following the Gaza war. In early 2015, GDP was still lower than it was a year ago. Due to population growth, real GDP per capita has been shrinking since 2013. Unemployment remains high, particularly amongst Gaza’s youth where it exceeds 60 percent, and 25 percent of Palestinians currently live in poverty. Against the backdrop of weak economic growth, reduced donor aid, and temporary suspension of revenue payments by the Government of Israel (GoI), the Palestinian Authority’s reform efforts have not been able to prevent another year with a financing gap. The persistence of this situation could potentially lead to political and social unrest. In short, the status quo is not sustainable and downside risks of further conflict and social unrest are high.
MENA Quarterly Economic Brief, July 2015: Economic Implications of Lifting Sanctions on Iran
(World Bank, Washington, DC, 2015-07) Devarajan, Shanta; Mottaghi, Lili
Iran and the Permanent Members of the UN Security Council and Germany (P5+1) reached a deal on July 14, 2015 that limits Iranian nuclear activity in return for lifting all international sanctions that were placed on Iran (Box 1). This issue of the MENA Quarterly Economic Brief (QEB) traces the economic effects of this development—removing sanctions on Iran—on the world oil market, on Iran’s trading partners, and on the Iranian economy.