Research Library

The authors examine the investments, trade-offs and broad policy changes necessary to reimagine the U.S. health care delivery system.

Fellow Kelsey Norman examines the U.S. refugee resettlement system, which the Trump administration is steadily dismantling.

In the near term, a ban on shale development in Mexico will have little impact since factors like limited infrastructure and access to water would likely stall progress in any case, the authors conclude. In the long-run, a ban may adversely affect efforts to diversify Mexico’s gas supply.

In this brief, the authors analyze transcripts from public hearrings at the Texas legislature to identify key arguments against school-mandated vaccinations. To ensure public health, policymakers and other stakeholders should be well informed about vaccines, the impact of vaccine-preventable disease, and the risks associated with putting absolute individual rights above public health concerns, they conclude.

Lebanon faces significant developmental challenges, including insufficient electricity supply, environmental degradation and staggering inequality, yet the government has not invested in these areas despite substantial economic growth in recent decades. This student brief uses agenda-setting theory to argue that Lebanon’s disappointing record of development is reflected in the narrow political agenda of the government. This brief is part of a two-year project on pluralism and inclusion in the Middle East post-Arab Spring. The project is generously supported by a grant from the Carnegie Corporation of New York.

The toll of Lebanon's dual governance system weighs heavily on the state and its governance structure. The author examines the current need to formalize the country's informal senate.

The author explores consociational democracy as it has played out in Lebanon, and its possible use as a heuristic tool to rethink the relationship between communal groups, political organizations, and the state in the contemporary Middle East.

This brief sets out some of the major structural reforms to taxes, subsidies, and debt issuance in the GCC that are shifting financial burdens from the state to its citizens and residents.

Nonresident fellow Valentine M. Moghadam analyzes Tunisian women’s employment patterns and challenges and offers some policy recommendations.

By Alanoud Al Sharekh, Ph.D., University of London Kuwait’s economy has been stagnant over the past decade due to political instability, fluctuating oil prices, and endemic corruption. To combat this situation, Kuwait has attempted to develop a robust business sector through fundamental policy shifts away from monopolies and toward the creation of small- and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs). Alanoud Al Sharekh explores Kuwaiti SME development in an issue brief and a longer research paper, which are part of a series on pluralism and inclusion in the Middle East after the Arab Spring. The project is generously supported by a grant from the Carnegie Corporation of New York.