Africa

126 Items

Book Chapter - VoxEU

How did Egypt soften the impact of Covid-19?

| Feb. 23, 2021

The Covid-19 pandemic has drastically disrupted people’s lives, livelihoods, and economic conditions around the world. The global shock has resulted in a tourism standstill (Djankov 2020), significant capital flight (Djankov and Panizza 2020), and a slowdown in remittances (Nonvide 2020), resulting in an urgent balance-of-payments need. Egypt responded to the crisis with a comprehensive package aimed at tackling the health emergency and supporting economic activity. The Ministry of Finance acted swiftly to allocate resources to the health sector, provide targeted support to the most severely impacted sectors, and expand social safety net programmes to protect the most vulnerable. Similarly, the Central Bank of Egypt adopted a broad set of measures, including lowering the policy rate and postponing repayments of existing credit facilities. The next section highlights the experience of firms in Egypt following these policies.

A Russian military medic inspects a patient near the village of Maarzaf, 15 kilometers northwest of Hama, in Syria, Wednesday, March 2, 2016.

AP Photo/Pavel Golovkin

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Podcast: Humanitarian Negotiations Series: Negotiation with Non-State Armed Groups at the Frontlines

Dec. 21, 2016

A podcast from the Advanced Training Program on Humanitarian Action produced from a Middle East Initiative event on humanitarian negotiations with non-state armed groups featuring Professor Claude Bruderlein; Ashley Jackson; Stig Jarle Hansen; and Abdi Ismail Isse.

View of an office building on the Suez Canal in Port Said, Egypt, between 1911 and 1913.

Deutsche Fotothek/AP Images

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Podcast Collection: Globalization and its Discontents in MENA - Fall 2016 MEI Study Group with Prof. Robert Springborg

    Author:
  • Robert Springborg
| November 18, 2016

During the Fall 2016 semester, visiting scholar Professor Robert Springborg invited a distinguished group of scholars to address the implications of slowing global integration for the Middle East, a region both harmed and helped by rapid globalization in the late 20th century. Over the course of nine seminars, the group explored issues including postcolonial countercurrents in the Middle East and North Africa, the Iranian nuclear agreement, Egypt's military economy, resource wealth, liberal arts education, economic strain and its impact on Islamism, and the future of the United States' Middle East alliances.

In this photo provided by the Syrian Civil Defense group known as the White Helmets, a destroyed ambulance is seen outside the Syrian Civil Defense main center after airstrikes in Ansari neighborhood in the rebel-held part of eastern Aleppo, Syria, Friday

Syrian Civil Defense White Helmets via AP

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Podcast: Humanitarian Negotiation Series: Protection of Medical Personnel and Operations at the Frontlines

October 26, 2016

A podcast from the Advanced Training Program on Humanitarian Action (ATHA) program produced from a Middle East Initiative event on humanitarian negotiations to protect medical personnel and infrastructure on the frontlines of conflict zones on Thursday, October 6, 2016, featuring Professor Claude Bruderlein; Michael VanRooyen, Director, Harvard Humanitarian Initiative; Chairman, Brigham and Women's Hospital Department of Emergency Medicine, Professor, Harvard Medical School and Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health; François Stamm, Head of Delegation for the International Committee of the Red Cross, Washington, D.C.; Adrienne Fricke, Senior Fellow, Harvard Humanitarian Initiative, Visiting Scientist, Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health.

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Harvard Kennedy School Welcomes Robert Springborg as the Fall 2016 Kuwait Foundation Visiting Scholar

| September 14, 2016

Robert Springborg, a preeminent senior scholar of the Middle East has joined the Harvard Kennedy School (HKS) community this semester as Kuwait Foundation Visiting Scholar at the Middle East Initiative at the Belfer Center for Science and International Affairs.

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Analysis & Opinions - Agence Global

Banning opposition groups is a failed Arab legacy

| July 21, 2016

"The recent and ongoing spate of decisions by several Arab governments to dissolve and ban certain political groups (mostly Sunni or Shiite Islamists) is a reflection of two dynamics that need to be reviewed together: rising sectarian, political, and ideological tensions across the region, alongside continuing structural inabilities in every Arab country, except Tunisia to date, to accommodate a range of differing political views in a legitimate governance system..."

Military and police security patrol Gare du Nord station in Paris, France.

Getty Images

Analysis & Opinions - Agence Global

When is the moment to ask for more effective anti-terrorism policies?

| July 16, 2016

"What happens when, after another dozen major attacks, the chain of their barbarism outpaces the chain of our human solidarity? When is the permissible moment to start asking if we can muster as much wisdom and realism to fight terror as we do to harness emotions of solidarity? The recent increasing pace and widening geographic scope of terror suggest we are dealing with a qualitatively new kinds of terrorists — but the policy responses of governments and the emotional responses of entire societies suggest we have no idea how to respond to quell this monster."

Egyptian President Abdel-Fattah el-Sissi (R) meets with U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry (C) and Egyptian Foreign Minister Sameh Shoukry at the Presidential palace in Cairo, Egypt.

Getty Images

Analysis & Opinions - Agence Global

Egypt's bold but marginal, mysterious diplomacy

| July 13, 2016

"Egyptian President Abdelfattah Sisi has suggested a regional diplomatic gathering to push ahead towards a permanent Arab-Israeli peace. But the proposed regional conference has not been formulated with widespread consultations among the key players or coordinated with other international initiatives on the table, and the positions of the principal Israeli and Palestinian parties remain too far apart to stir any hopes of success..."