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ESSAYS ON THE NEW ECONOMIC HISTORY OF THE MIDDLE EAST
by
Mohamed Saleh
A Dissertation Presented to the
FACULTY OF THE USC GRADUATE SCHOOL
UNIVERSITY OF SOUTHERN CALIFORNIA
In Partial Fulfillment of the
Requirements for the Degree
DOCTOR OF PHILOSOPHY
(ECONOMICS)
May 2012
Copyright 2012 Mohamed Saleh
Object Description
| Title | Essays on the new economic history of the Middle East |
| Author | Saleh, Mohamed |
| Author email | msaleh@usc.edu;msaleh1982@yahoo.com |
| Degree | Doctor of Philosophy |
| Document type | Dissertation |
| Degree program | Economics |
| School | College of Letters, Arts And Sciences |
| Date defended/completed | 2012-03-20 |
| Date submitted | 2012-04-10 |
| Date approved | 2012-04-11 |
| Restricted until | 2012-04-11 |
| Date published | 2012-04-11 |
| Advisor (committee chair) |
Costa, Dora Nugent, Jeffrey |
| Advisor (committee member) |
Boustan, Leah Easterlin, Richard Miller, Donald |
| Abstract | This dissertation introduces economic theory, modern microeconometric methods, and new microdata sources to the study of the economic history of the Middle East. In particular, it examines an intriguing phenomenon in this field: the stylized fact that non-Muslim minorities are better off, on average, than the Muslim majority in many countries of the Middle East. ❧ The Introductory Chapter provides an overview of the research questions and the findings of the dissertation. It also describes the contribution of the dissertation to the general economics literature as well as to the field of economic history. ❧ Chapter 1 describes the digitization project of two nationally representative samples of the 1848 and 1868 Egyptian censuses from the original manuscripts at the National Archives of Egypt, and introduces an application of the data in the field of Middle Eastern economic history. These censuses are perhaps the earliest in the Middle East and among the earliest in any non-Western country to include information on all segments of society on a wide range of demographic and socioeconomic variables. ❧ Chapter 2 employs this new data source to examine the impact of state-led modernization on the socioeconomic differentials between religious groups. Over the nineteenth century, Egypt embarked on one of the world’s earliest state-led modernization programs in production, education, and the army. I examine the impact of this ambitious program on the long-standing occupational differentials and occupational and educational segregation between Muslims, Christians, and Jews. The major finding is that the modernization program did not attenuate the occupational gap or the occupational and educational segregation structure between religious groups, because it did not focus on providing access to skills to the unprivileged Muslim majority. ❧ Chapter 3 examines the impact of the transformation of elementary religious schools (kuttabs) into public modern primary schools in 1953 on the educational differentials between religious groups in Egypt. Using several new data sources, the individual-level census records from 1986, the village/urban quarter-level census records from 1897 to 1986, and the official schooling reports from 1907 to 1969, I find that the educational reform reduced the literacy gap between religious groups by the end of the twentieth century. ❧ Chapter 4 attempts to answer the question: Why are local non-Muslims minorities of the Middle East better off, on average, than the Muslim majority? It traces the origins of the phenomenon in Egypt to the imposition of the poll tax on non-Muslims upon the Islamic Conquest of the then-Coptic Christian Egypt in 640. The tax, which remained until 1855, led to the conversion of poor Copts to Islam to avoid paying the tax, and to the shrinking of Copts to a better off minority. Using new data sources that I digitized, including the 1848 and 1868 census records, I provide both econometric and qualitative evidence to support the hypothesis. |
| Keyword | poll-tax; conversion; religious minorities; Copts; modernization; occupational segregation; Middle East |
| Language | English |
| Part of collection | University of Southern California dissertations and theses |
| Publisher (of the original version) | University of Southern California |
| Place of publication (of the original version) | Los Angeles, California |
| Publisher (of the digital version) | University of Southern California. Libraries |
| Provenance | Electronically uploaded by the author |
| Type | texts |
| Legacy record ID | usctheses-m |
| Rights | Saleh, Mohamed |
| Access conditions | The author retains rights to his/her dissertation, thesis or other graduate work according to U.S. copyright law. Electronic access is being provided by the USC Libraries in agreement with the author, as the original true and official version of the work, but does not grant the reader permission to use the work if the desired use is covered by copyright. It is the author, as rights holder, who must provide use permission if such use is covered by copyright. The original signature page accompanying the original submission of the work to the USC Libraries is retained by the USC Libraries and a copy of it may be obtained by authorized requesters contacting the repository e-mail address given. |
| Repository name | University of Southern California Digital Library |
| Repository address | USC Digital Library, University of Southern California, University Park Campus MC 7002, 106 University Village, Los Angeles, California 90089-7002, USA |
| Repository email | cisadmin@usc.edu |
| Archival file | uscthesesreloadpub_Volume3/etd-SalehMoham-590.pdf |
Description
| Title | Page 1 |
| Full text | ESSAYS ON THE NEW ECONOMIC HISTORY OF THE MIDDLE EAST by Mohamed Saleh A Dissertation Presented to the FACULTY OF THE USC GRADUATE SCHOOL UNIVERSITY OF SOUTHERN CALIFORNIA In Partial Fulfillment of the Requirements for the Degree DOCTOR OF PHILOSOPHY (ECONOMICS) May 2012 Copyright 2012 Mohamed Saleh |
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