Doing Business and Imperfections in the Development of Knowledge Economy in the Arab Countries

1. What Can Be Learned From Doing Business By Arab Economies?

The way of doing business and mainly the starting of a business provides important indications about how enterprises are created. It seems that the context of Arab countries shows the prevalence of more public businesses and government related transactions in comparison with that of private businesses. As the growth of the number of enterprises indicates how market economy is promoted, it also indicates how private initiatives lead to enterprise creation.

This chapter uses the data from the World Bank databases with the objective of showing the major trends characterizing the initiation of businesses in Arab economies at the level of countries and globally with comparisons with Eastern European Economies (EEE). The major characteristics as well as the comparisons are important means to underline the existence of market incentives for the expansion of private initiatives in individual countries and for the overall economy of the Arab World.

The chapter is composed of a literature review and a section based on data analysis. This latter is used to discuss the trends taking place in Arab economies.