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Theses and Dissertations

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Browsing Theses and Dissertations by Subject "Arab Spring"

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    From revolutions to realities: an empirical investigation of the Arab Spring's consequences
    (Colorado State University. Libraries, 2023) Muktad, Abdalla, author; Miller, Ray, advisor; Tavani, Daniele, committee member; Zahran, Sammy, committee member; Çavdar, Gamze, committee member
    With the irrevocable change in the Arab world over the last decade, fully understanding the economic and political impact of the Arab Spring is paramount for policymakers. This dissertation consists of three empirical essays on the Arab Spring which attempt to capture causal relationships between Arab Spring and some political and economic factors. Exogenous shocks such as the experiences of revolution are treated as natural experiments which minimize problems of endogeneity and selection. Therefore, these essays are analyzed based on the synthetic control method and synthetic difference-in-differences. The first essay concerns the impact of the Arab Spring on economic growth, corruption and democracy. I focused on Tunisia and Libya as a case study of Arab Spring countries using the synthetic control method (SCM). I found that there was a negative impact of the Arab Spring on economic growth after 2010 for both Tunisia and Libya. On the other hand, the results suggested that although there was a substantial increase in democracy after the Arab Spring for both Tunisia and Libya, democracy sharply decreased in 2015 in Libya due to armed conflict. Surprisingly, the results showed that there was a substantial increase in corruption in both Libya and Tunisia after the Arab Spring. In the second essay, I estimated the Arab Spring's impact on foreign aid by using the synthetic difference-in-difference method. I examine whether the Arab Spring affects the distribution of foreign aid. I argue that the conflict may respond differently to different types of aid because of the objectives and aid-giving motives. The results indicate that, following the Arab Spring, there was a general increase in total foreign aid to affected countries, with exceptions for certain donors and a stronger increase for "non-traditional Western allies," with the United States being the largest contributor. Also, the findings suggest that, following the Arab Spring, various donors increased foreign aid to affected nations, particularly in government and civil society support, as well as humanitarian aid, with the United States focusing on government and civil society aid in Tunisia, Libya, and Syria, European countries emphasizing government and civil society aid in Libya and Tunisia, and Multilateral aid generally increasing, except for government and civil society aid in Yemen. In the third essay, I studied the spillover effect of the Arab Spring by investigating its influence on nearby countries concerning economic growth, bilateral trade, and foreign direct investment. I aimed to address how proximity to Arab Spring countries impacts the economic growth, bilateral trade, and foreign direct investment of neighboring economies. The results found that countries located within 2000 kilometers of Arab Spring nations experienced a significant negative impact on both real GDP and net inflow of foreign direct investment (FDI). However, the negative effects on bilateral trade were not statistically significant, suggesting that engaging in trade with Arab Spring countries did not necessarily harm the economic growth of neighboring countries.
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    Three essays on corruption in the Middle East and North Africa
    (Colorado State University. Libraries, 2022) Kirsanli, Fatih, author; Vasudevan, Ramaa, advisor; Tavani, Daniele, committee member; Zahran, Sammy, committee member; Dossani, Asad, committee member
    This dissertation focuses on the corruption phenomenon at the macro level in the Middle East and North Africa (MENA) after the Arab uprisings regarding its impacts on economic growth and income inequality. The first chapter investigates the relationship between corruption and economic growth. The results show that after the Arab Spring, corruption lowers economic growth. After clustering the MENA countries into three categories -- severe, moderate, and light -- according to the magnitude of the Arab protests and their outcomes, the results are obscure due to the low number of observations. Although the results are not significant in sub-sample regressions, they are robust for the entire data set with alternative corruption indexes. Furthermore, the findings verify that the natural resource curse is a valid argument. Lastly, the Chow test confirms that 2011, the year when the Arab protests started, constitutes a structural break. The second chapter examines the impact of corruption on income inequality. The findings concludes that there is no significant relationship between corruption and inequality for the entire data set. Then, the MENA region is categorized into three sub-regions as in the first chapter to test whether results constitute intra-regional heterogeneity. The robust results reveal a negative and significant relationship between the Arab Spring and inequality in severely affected countries. Nevertheless, the results are insignificant for moderately and lightly affected countries. The third chapter analyzes the heterogeneous findings of the previous chapters. In the first part, crony capitalism, democratization of corruption and rentier state models are discussed to explain the political-institutional characterization of severely, moderately and lightly affected countries. In the second part, severely affected countries are further examined on how corruption income inequality nexus rotates in terms of magnitude and sign and still significant after the Arab Spring. The political economy analysis helps to provide country and group-specific policy recommendations.