Arab Mega-Projects

Mega-projects are at the core of contemporary Arab town planning, and the papers in this issue of Built Environment illustrate the primacy of the urban project in the planning of large cities in the Arab World over the last twenty years. That said, is there an ‘Arab’ way of creating big projects? Can we highlight Arab specificities in the manner of implementation of such urban actions, or indeed within the eight countries – Mauritania, Morocco, Algeria, Tunisia, Egypt, Sudan, Lebanon and Syria – discussed by the contributors to this issue?

 

• Arab Mega-Projects: Between the Dubai Effect, Global Crisis, Social Mobilization and a Sustainable Shift
  Pierre-Arnaud Barthel
• Urban Highways as an Embodiment of Mega and Elite Projects: A New Realm of Conflicts and Claims in Three Middle Eastern Capital Cities
  Agnès Deboulet
• Property Investments and Master Projects in Damascus: Urban and Town-Planning Metamorphosis
  Valérie Clerc and Armand Hurault 
• Tanger-Med and Casa-Marina, Prestige Projects in Morocco: New Capitalist Frameworks and Local Context
  Pierre-Arnaud Barthel and Sabine Planel
• A Glimpse of Dubai in Khartoum and Nouakchott : Prestige Urban Projects on the Margins of the Arab World
  Armelle Choplin and Alice Franck
• The Development of the Bay of Algiers: Rethinking the City through Contemporary Paradigms
  Madani Safar Zitoun
• Major Urban Projects and the People Affected: The Case of Casablanca’s Avenue Royale
  Isabelle Berry-Chikhaoui
• Reactions ‘From Below’ to Big Urban Projects: the Case of Rabat
  Hicham Mouloudi
• Exception as the Rule: High-End Developments in Neoliberal Beirut
  Marieke Krij nen and Mona Fawaz