Local Governments in the Middle East and West Asia
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In 2004 the Saudi Council of Ministers called for the formation of semi-elected municipal councils in 178 cities and towns of Saudi Arabia. This command instigated public participation in local decision making. The election process finished in early 2005 and councils' formation is completed by the end of 2005 to augment their start. Given the relatively fresh beginning of citizen engagement in local decisions in Saudi Arabia, this paper aims at analyzing the context and organization of municipal councils in Saudi Arabia. The paper starts by reviewing theoretical background on public participation, highlighting its importance, methods and factors affecting it. The purpose is to establish an analytical framework to examine the work in Saudi. Two sets of interrelated factors are defined including contextual and local factors, which are then discussed in relation to municipal councils in Saudi Arabia. The discussion outlines existing shortcomings with the contextual and local factors and proposes necessary improvements based on the understanding that public participation is a learning process that will demand continuous improvement and enhancement.
Sustainability indicators play a key role in putting the ambiguity of the urban development concept in a way that
could be realized and accordingly measured. This paper develops a set of indicators for a local city based on the study of the experiences of a number of quintessential international institutions and organizations for measuring urban development. It analyzes the ethics and concepts of measuring sustainability in terms of the main system, subsystems, and the Orientation theory for the system’s classification. The paper develops a model based on studying these systems. This model investigates the three aspects of the environment in local cities; the Built environment, the Natural environment, and Human Well-being. The paper applies this model to the city of "Misrata", Libya. The findings were used to validate the proposed model measuring the achievements of urban development using local indicators.
The literature suggests a strong relationship between municipal awareness and citizen satisfaction. This study aims at examining the determinants of municipal awareness, and their impacts on citizen satisfaction. The model of this study was validated in the context of the kingdom of Saudi Arabia with 250 inhabitants in the region of northern borders. The study data is collected and processed using exploratory and confirmatory analysis, based on survey methods and structural equations. The results revealed a positive association between municipal awareness and citizen satisfaction. Overall, findings suggest that knowledge, discussion, participation and learning about municipal achievements, as indicators of municipal awareness, affect citizen satisfaction with the quality of the municipal services.
The objective of the paper is to draw a sketch of UAE’s population and migration dynamics, using the scarce data available from the federal and emirate-level statistical bureaus. In 2010, expatriates in the UAE were estimated to number 7,316,073 persons, twenty times the 1975’s figure of 356,343. Foreign nationals thus made up 88.5 per cent of the country’s total population; most were believed to come from Asia and especially from India. In the employed population, foreign nationals accounted for an even larger share (96 per cent of the Dubai’s employed population in 2011). Non-Emiratis comprised 40 per cent of the UAE’s public sector’s workforce in 2013, but as much as 99.5 per cent of those employed in the private sector. Unlike in other GCC states, a quarter of working expatriates were in managerial posts, employed across all activities’ spectrum. Expatriates’ demographic expansion mounted during the 2000s, a period of spectacular economic growth fuelled by soaring oil prices. Since 2008’s financial downturn, however, the economy recovered and the hiring of foreign workers has resumed, stimulated by large-scale projects such as Dubai’s Expo 2020. Nonetheless, reforms in immigration policies are now undertaken, fuelled by security concerns and pressures from human rights’ protection bodies. The reality of some expatriates’ settlement is also witnessed in numbers (expatriate children aged 0-14 outnumbered Emirati children already in 2005), while mixed marriages are acknowledged in policies: some naturalisations of children of Emirati mothers have been performed since 2011.
Own cars are the most common mode of transport in Tripoli, Libya. About 66% of Tripoli's residents prefer to use their own cars and only 34% resort to depend on public transports namely taxi, coaches and microbuses for their transportation activities in the city centre area. Rapid increase in own cars' usage, coupled with no public transport system have caused problems such as acute traffic congestion, an increase in road accidents, deterioration in environmental well being and unbalanced land use characteristics. A questionnaire survey was carried out in Tripoli to address the first two of these problems. About 900 respondents were analysed where their needs were observed and expectations explored. The study has found that the variables to support the use of public transport system are the reductions in travel time, distance travelled and reasonable fares. The study also identifies some factors that prevent the users of private cars, taxi, coaches and microbuses from using the public transportation system, in order to enable the researcher to suggest and formulate logical policies to support better use of public transportation system.
Since the early 1990s, Saudi Arabia has placed great emphasis on political and administrative reforms in order to strengthen local authorities and create more opportunities for citizen participation in decision-making. Therefore, it is important to inquire to what extent the intended goals and objectives of these reforms have been achieved and what their impacts on the efficiency and the effectiveness of municipal authorities in managing local development and service provision have been. This study seeks to examine the impact of recent political and institutional reforms on the responsiveness of local authorities and their effectiveness in managing local affairs and services, particularly in light of the 2005 municipal elections and the new structure of municipal councils. It is here argued that these political and administrative reforms have put into effect a more enabling institutional framework for measures and practices of good governance and decentralization but that their success is conditioned by the capacity of local authorities to adopt, practice, and maintain these measures. The focus of this study is on the practice of local elections and their implications for decentralized local governance and citizen participation; it is supported by investigative research into the interaction between local authorities and local citizens, as understood in light of responsiveness of local authorities and the newly established local councils. The findings indicate a large gap between large urban and small municipalities (amanats), in terms of financial capacity, citizen participation, cooperation with the private sector, and in terms of administrative capacity. This gap extends to amanats' institutional performance and outcome, particularly in terms of municipal business and construction, developed municipal areas, and municipal roads. In general, the findings of the study confirm that sub-national demographics and socioeconomic variations play a vital role in determining the capacities of local authorities to fulfill their responsibilities.
The proper planning of the general strategies for road marking is not dependent on the transport planning only, but it is directly related to health, social, physical and economic aspects and issues, and which have a negative impact on the development of communities. Cause random planning and incompatibility with the road specifications within Misurata city in the deterioration of social development and the lack of social and economic justice among the population, as well as the deterioration of the factors of traffic safety and increasing traffic congestion, and as the number of vehicles within the city continues to increase so the problem is getting worse and there is an urgent need for more effort to improve the performance of the road network and attempt to address the incompatible strategies in order to increase the efficiency of the traffic within the city. To achieve this end, there should be a close cooperation between all stakeholders in the city.
Solid waste management (SWM) is one of the major reasons of environmental degradation in
Pakistan. Inappropriate management of solid waste causes hazards to dwellers. Recent
literature on current SWM practices in five major cities of Pakistan has been reviewed, and an
effort has been made to provide a comprehensive review on the total amount of municipal solid
waste generated, storage, collection, physical composition, transfer, processing and disposal
of SW. There is an overall fragmented approach to the SWM in Pakistan. Inadequate waste
collection system exists as it is collected only 51-69% of the total waste generated in a few
major cities. Municipal collection of household waste is quite irregular and limited to highincome
areas. Generally, inadequate disposal service and no weighing facilities are installed
at most of the disposal sites. There is a poor management of hazardous waste and under the
current disposal practice no proper method is being employed. The review of the legal
framework indicates that there is a need for detailed and clear regulations dealing specifically
with solid waste. In addition, promotion of public awareness, legislation, financial and
economic calculations, strengthen institutional capacity and regulations enforcement and
establishment of a proper sanitary landfill are considered to be principal remedial measures to
ensure sound environmental maintenance.