The Economics of the Arab Countries The future of the Arab world

Moustafa Mohamad El Abdallah Alkafry
2022 / 6 / 14

The unification of the Arab world into one political entity is still a popular demand that the masses of the Arab nation aspire to face many internal and external challenges (political, economic and social). This demand was and still dominates the thinking of most of the masses and the educated and political elites since the late nineteenth century.
Some Arab countries had entered into partial unitary experiments and practices, especially in the second half of the twentieth century. Despite the faltering´-or-failure of these experiences, the unitary attempts are still continuing, which indicates the vitality and depth of this popular demand to confront the external and internal challenges that the Arab world has faced for more than a century.
The digression in mentioning the natural, human, cultural, historical, economic and social factors and their enumeration, which confirm that the Arabs from the ocean to the Gulf are one Arab nation, with one civilization, one common history, one hopes and tragedies with the diversity and specificity that may exist between them within the framework of the general system. And the exposure to it here is a boring repetition in providing the axioms and talking about the postulates. But these matters have been killed in research and study, and there has been a lot of talk about them during the past fifty years, by individuals, parties and governments.
What concerns us in this regard is to contribute to providing an answer to the question that has been going on for more than a century: If the Arabs are one nation, and if most of the Arab masses have this demand for unity throughout this period, then what are the factors and reasons that impeded and continue to impede the establishment of the Arab state the one? And if political unity that includes all Arabs is difficult at the present time, why did the Arab countries not integrate economically? What are the factors that impeded,´-or-continue to impede, the steps of Arab economic integration? Why were the Arab countries unable to achieve the Arab Common Market and its desired goals? What are the problems of the Arab common market? And build it in the future?
Many factors call the Arab person to think about the future of the Arab world while we are in the first decade of the twenty-first century, and the most important of these factors are: Thinking about the future and determining its features contribute to the process of creating this future, and motivating people to make it, and when a person thinks about this future and is discussed by thinkers And others will find those who agree to this, object, add´-or-delete, and this ultimately leads to comparison and comparison between alternatives, choosing the most appropriate´-or-thinking about the future. Each of us, according to his position in Arab society, looks at the distant tomorrow and is not satisfied with managing the immediate needs of tomorrow, and this means taking measures To secure the needs of the immediate tomorrow, and the distant tomorrow, which helps to secure them and facilitate access to them. Thinking about the future and planning to meet its requirements is what distinguishes the contemporary man, because the only being in this nature who thinks about the future, plans for it and contributes to making it is man and man only. For these reasons and other less important reasons, it is necessary to research the future of the Arab world.
The truth that must be acknowledged is that we cannot talk about the future of the Arab world without remembering that the Arab world belongs to the group of developing countries, and therefore it suffers from all the problems and difficulties that the countries of the South suffer from, in addition to another additional problem that the country suffers from. The Arab world only, which is the problem of fragmentation, and accordingly, the future of the Arab world is linked to:
• By eliminating underdevelopment through development.
• The elimination of dependency through collective self-reliance.
• The elimination of fragmentation by unity.
In the recent past, Arab societies prevailed in a behavior characterized by correctness’ concerned with solving immediate issues in the economy and society by focusing on a series of reform measures and policies that are primarily concerned with addressing the problems facing the economy and society without necessarily ruling them (a clear strategic horizon on the methods of economic advancement, Specifically, the transition from the stage of economic reform to the stage of economic development and comprehensive development, as it is not sufficient to address the issues of the current reality only by solving a series of immediate problems, such as controlling inflation rates, stabilizing the exchange rate, reducing the size of the budget deficit´-or-the balance of payments, As important and necessary as such measures are, they remain incomplete and deficient policies if they are not linked and employed within the framework of a clearly defined future strategy for economic advancement and development.
)The core issue here is that there are many future -dir-ections of a strategic nature that it is difficult for market mechanisms alone to undertake, for example:
• The pattern of basic transformations in the production structure.
• The distribution of urban blocks through a future vision of the balanced geographical distribution of the population.
• The strategy of accessing foreign markets in light of the increasing competitiveness of many developing countries.
These are examples of major strategic issues that require a guiding compass and a tremendous guiding planning effort. because they need future markets that do not exist in the first place, and because the present markets have-limit-ed efficiency in solving problems related to the welfare of future generations, the future vision is in essence a contract of solidarity between the different generations that successive On the land of the homeland, so that one generation´-or-two generations does not monopolize the affluence of life, and the future generations of children and grandchildren will pay the burdens of internal and external debt...from the livelihood of their children(.
In our world today, after the signing of the GATT agreements and the establishment of the World Trade Organization (WTO), which seeks to liberalize foreign trade, the overlap and interdependence between three levels of international economic relations is increasing:
• The national level (within the borders of one country).
• The regional level, and it is possible to multiply the sub-regional intermediate levels that eventually lead to the regional level (in the Arab countries we note that the model of the sub-regional intermediate levels is represented in the Gulf Cooperation Council, the Arab Maghreb -union-, the Damascus Declaration countries´-or-the crippled Arab Cooperation Council. As for the level the regional is represented by the Arab economic unity.
• The global level (at the level of the global economy), where the whole world seeks to globalize the economy.
• Any future of cooperation between Arab countries must consider this overlap between the three levels mentioned.
The world looks at us today as a single Arab nation with an ancient civilization and a desire to build the future of its generations. The Arab economic bloc must be formed to confront the American, African, Asian and Latin American global economic blocs instead of deepening the narrow Qatari policies. It is necessary to seize the opportunity to lay the foundations for Arab economic cooperation to enter into the new world order (globalization), and we are at the beginning of the third millennium AD, the most important of which are:
• Supporting economic reforms in the Arab countries and rehabilitating the Arab economy to enter the twenty-first century within the giant global economic blocs.
• The establishment of an Arab market for capital and its movement within the framework of the Arab world, the development of a legal framework and new legislation in line with the changes taking place in global markets.
• Free movement of production and production factors, labor force, people and capital among the Arab countries. As well as the freedom of ownership and inheritance.
• Unifying monetary, fiscal, customs, transport, transit and foreign trade policies.
• Creating an Arab socio-economic observatory whose mission is to suggest and evaluate Arab economic policies, and to identify differences and the factors to avoid them. This requires an advisory cell that includes Arab experts tasked with thinking about Arab economic policies in light of international changes. The Arab League can play an important role in accomplishing such a thing.
• It is necessary to anticipate future prospects and develop a future vision for the position of the Arab world in the regional and international environment, and to imagine a specific concept of Arab national security, and to anticipate the extent of the possibility of establishing the Arab common market and the related issues of protection, support, competition and economic freedom.
• Develop a strategy for building competitiveness, which is an integral part of a higher strategy for comprehensive development in the Arab world.
• Upgrading human capabilities at the level of the Arab world.
The lesson offered by the Chinese experience in dealing with globalization can be an important lesson for developing countries in general and Arab countries in particular. This country was able to launch the development process with its economic and social wings, so it succeeded, and relied on its own capabilities and energies in the first place. It also tried to reform the structures of its socialist economy without destroying them. So, it reformed and wanted to deal with globalization with an open mind and from the position of the strength of the Chinese economy, so its market became attractive to private foreign investments. and general.
The world of the future is the world of economic blocs, the world of large companies and investments, the world of technology and information, the world of capable management and effective decision making. Therefore, the Arab countries must take decisive steps in an irreversible continuity to achieve the goal of Arab economic integration and Arab economic unity, without which the Arabs will not be able to build an Arab economy capable of survival and competition in the contemporary economic world.




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