Credit Rating Agencies (CRAs) play a key role in financial markets by helping to reduce informative asymmetry between lenders and investors, on one side, and issuers on the other side, with regard to the creditworthiness of banks or countries. This crucial role has expanded alongside financial globalisation and received an additional boost from Basel II which integrates the ratings of CRAs into the rules for setting weights for credit risk. Ratings adjustment tends to be sticky, lagging behind markets, and often overreact when they do change. This overreaction may have aggravated the recent financial crises, contributing to financial instability and cross-country contagion. Criticism has been especially directed towards the high degree of concentration of the ratings industry. Promotion of competition may require policy action at the international level to encourage the establishment of new agencies and to discover alternative rules or regulatory requirements in order to achieve promising results. The recent growth of Middle Eastern and North African countries (MENA) and their commercial banking system has increased the need of paying widespread attention to this region of the world. This thesis crucially identifies, and estimates, the robust determinants of credit ratings for MENA countries and their commercial banks, incorporating a set of bank level accounting and financial risk factors, as well as country-specific characteristics, including indicators for regulatory, supervision, legal and economic environments. The research contributes, firstly, to the theoretical literature on credit ratings industry by reviewing extant methodologies specifically as they apply to banks and sovereign countries. Secondly, it conducts a systematic, cross-country empirical investigation using panel data econometric methodology for the purpose of estimating MENA countries sovereign and bank credit rating models. Thirdly, it provides tangible and statistically significant evidence on the different factors that determines the estimation of credit ratings and influencing bank's risk. The extant literature reviewed serves as a basis to achieve and develop the research aim, objectives and hypotheses of the thesis. The research then constructs an appropriate panel dataset from different sources, containing bank-level and country-level information for a sample of 108 commercial banks covering 13 MENA countries over the period 2000 - 2012. The methodological framework for estimating credit rating models (linear regression, logit and probit) is also reviewed and the procedures for panel data estimation are implemented using the econometric package STATA (version 13). All relevant data are drawn from public sources including Reuters, Bankscope, IMF and the World Bank. Using the random effects ordered probit and logit methodologies to estimate both sovereign (country) and bank level credit ratings models for the MENA countries, the evidence shows that real GDP growth, capital requirements, restrictions on banking activities and control of corruption all contribute negatively to the sovereign ratings. Furthermore, internal management and organisational requirements is considered as an additional regulatory factor not studied in previous research. The statistically significant and inverse relationship of the latter is considered an important and interesting outcome of MENA countries’ sovereign ratings. On the other hand, GDP per capita, investment (as a percentage of GDP), political stability, government effectiveness and the rule of law all reveal significant and positive impact on the sovereign credit ratings. In general, this research finds that improved macroeconomic conditions are correlated with higher ratings, while greater reserve regulations are correlated with lower ratings. The study also does find the significance of governance and regulatory variables plays a key role into the final credit rating. With regard to the impact on banks’ ratings, the results show that higher return on average assets and equity, larger bank size, more restrictions on bank activities, as well as higher official disciplinary power and higher standards of internal management, will yield higher credit ratings. Apart from having direct and positive impact on banks credit ratings, these variables are important for examining the risk-sharing incentives in MENA countries’ banks. In contrast, the estimation results indicate that net interest margin, net loans to deposits, liquid assets to deposits, capital requirements, deposit insurance scheme, liquidity requirements, unemployment rate and government effectiveness have an inverse and negative impact on banks ratings. In general, this study also finds various financial, macroeconomic, and regulatory effects on banks’ credit ratings. To a much lesser extent than government ratings, various macroeconomic variables also helped predict banks’ ratings, including real GDP growth and the unemployment rate. The thesis concludes by arguing that the combined use of financial and non-financial factors for estimating credit ratings models supports the relevant hypotheses examined and adds value to all stakeholders in improving and obtaining a better quality of credit ratings. This study also demonstrates that a diversity of bank-level and country-level factors influence the MENA sovereign and bank ratings differently, implying that policy makers, regulators alongside rating agencies should distinguish the different environmental factors between nations before any judgment and issuance can be model of the ratings. To conclude, there is no study which exclusively investigates credit rating models for the MENA region exploiting the richness of the data and methodology employed, and the current research aims to fill this gap.

This thesis examines the determinants of capital structure in the MENA coun- tries. The main interest is to investigate both financial firms specially banks and non-financial firms. This study test the main theories of capital structure, namely: trade off theory and pecking order theory. The countries included in this thesis are Saudi Arabia, United Arab Emirates (Include both Abo-Dhabi and Dubai stock indexes), Bahrain, Qatar, Kuwait, Oman, Egypt, Morocco, Tunisia, Palestine and Jor- dan. The characteristics it covers as suggested by previous literature are tangibility, profitability, risk, debt tax shield, growth, dividends,size, cash flow and liquidity. It will also investigate the effect of the industry, credit rating and ownership structure on the capital structure This study also investigates the determinants of capital structure in Islamic and conventional banks. This is one of the first attempts to empirically examine the determinants of capital structure in Islamic and conventional banks in general and in MENA countries in particular. This study fills the gap in this important area of research and can provide a base for future research on capital structure in Islamic banks. This thesis use different models to test the capital structure and these are Panel data models (OLS, Fixed, and Random); Tobit and Dynamical model (Arellano-Bover Blundell-Bond), Structural Equation Modeling (SEM) and Generalised Regression Neural Networks (GRNN). The results suggest that the three methods used in this study lead to similar re- sults with a few exceptions in some countries. This thesis finds that the relation between leverage and the determinants of capital structure is different when using the market or the book leverage. It also finds that the determinants of capital struc- ture between the MENA countries are different. For example, profitability attribute relation with leverage follow the trade-off theory in some countries and follow the picking order theory in other countries. Also, liquidity is significant in all the countries in the sample and have a negative relation to leverage. In addition, tangibility is found to have a mixed results with some countries following the trade-off theory and other countries which follow the trade-off theory but overall it is a key determinant of capital structure. Additionally, the findings show that although that the majority of firms in the MENA countries don’t pay dividends the relation between the long term debt and leverage is negative in all the countries in the sample. The growth opportunities have a negative relation in Bahrain, Egypt, Jordan, Kuwait, Morocco, Palestine, Qatar and Tunisia but positive in rest of the countries. The cash flow attribute have a negative relation with leverage in all the countries in the sample except Saudi Arabia and Qatar when using the short and long term debt. Furthermore, the ownership variable is expected to have a negative relation when the ultimate owner is an institution. The results show that overall when there is an ultimate owner the leverage will have a negative relation. Suggesting that ultimate owners will force managers to keep a low debt in firms capital structure. This PhD also attempt to investigate the capital structure in banks within the MENA countries. A special focus is on the differences between the Islamic banks and conventional banks capital structure. First, the findings show that the banks follow the same determinants of capital structure as non-financial firms and that regulations are not the main determinant of capital structure in banks. Then, This study show that there is a difference in capital structure of Islamic banks in com- parison with conventional banks. The findings for the dividends variable show that Islamic banks do not follow the pecking order theory but conventional banks don’t. The results of the size variable show that when Islamic banks are large they use less debt in their capital structure. Growth variable show mixed results depending on the use of book or market leverage. Ownership structure show that when there is an ultimate owner leverage increase which is the reverse of the relation in the non-financial firms. The age variable is negative in relation to the book leverage and positive with the market leverage. Also, credit rating relation is different between the two banks, as it is positive with the conventional banks and negative with Islamic banks. Therefore, this study conclude that the main capital structure theories are applicable to MENA countries. Also indicate that Islamic banks have a different capital structure to conventional banks.

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The flow of political aid into civil society organizations has sparked extensive debates and controversies surrounding the impact of foreign aid on the efficacy of said organizations in recipient countries. These discussions explore foreign aid through theoretical and empirical lenses, investigating its implications on global, regional, and national levels of analysis. Consequently, fundamental notions of geopolitics, development, and normative considerations within the realm of International Relations (IR) have been called into question. By employing the theory of hegemony and the concept of agency, this paper aims to enhance our understanding of the interplay between the agency of civil society organizations and foreign aid. It addresses the question of What analyzing the agency of civil society organizations in Lebanon reveals about the possibilities for transforming the hegemonic relationships within foreign aid? The examination of Robert Cox’s contextualization of Gramsci's theory of hegemony in IR, combined with James C. Scott’s observation of peasant resistance in rural Malaysia, lays the foundation for this study. This study calls attention to the often-overlooked ability of civil society organizations to not only challenge but reshape the prevailing hegemonic dynamics of foreign aid. More importantly, this study instigates a nuanced exploration of agency, resistance, and the transformative capacity of CSOs derived from local perspectives and the subculture and values of the civil society in Lebanon

La phosphoinositide phosphatase SHIP2 est une protéine capable de moduler le PI(3,4,5)P3, le PI(4,5)P2 et le PI(3,4)P2 qui sont des phosphoinositides importants lors des remaniements membranaires de la cellule. La régulation de la composition en phosphoinositides des membranes permettant l’assemblage de complexes protéiques est primordiale pour la génération de protrusions essentielles pour la migration et l’invasion cellulaire. D’autre part, SHIP2 possède des propriétés d’échafaudage permettant sa participation à plusieurs complexes multi-protéiques et à son ancrage à des localisations subcellulaires spécifiques. Plusieurs études ont montré que SHIP2 pouvait jouer un rôle dans le développement de certains cancers dont le cancer du sein. Au cours de ce travail, nous avons mis en évidence deux nouveaux partenaires de SHIP2 :IRSp53 et CIN85. Ces deux protéines participent respectivement à la formation d’invadopode et à l’endocytose. IRSp53 et CIN85 lient la même région C-terminale riche en prolines (PRR-II) de SHIP2, mais toutefois pas par les mêmes séquences. Cette région contient plusieurs motifs consensus permettant l’interaction de SHIP2 avec plusieurs autres partenaires connus comme l’intersectine, une protéine impliquée dans l’endocytose et Mena, un partenaire commun de SHIP2 et d’IRSp53 impliqué dans l’invasion cellulaire. Nous avons également montré que la mutation de la F1053 située dans la PRR-II de SHIP2 est, essentielle pour la liaison à l’intersectine, impliquée dans la stabilité de la liaison avec Mena et IRSp53 mais pas impliquée dans la liaison de CIN85. De plus, nous montrons qu’à la différence d’IRSp53 qui n’en possède qu’un, CIN85 possède trois domaines SH3 mais ne doit lier que deux motifs dans la PRR-II de SHIP2 afin d’assurer sa complète interaction.Dans les cellules dérivées du cancer du sein MDA-MB-231, nous avons montré que Mena n’est pas nécessaire pour l’interaction entre SHIP2 et IRSp53. Cependant, nous avons observé que l’absence de Mena dans les MDA-MB-231 diminue l’organisation du cytosquelette d’actine-filamenteuse et modifie la localisation subcellulaire de SHIP2 et IRSp53 en augmentant leur concentration à la membrane. Ces données renforcent l’hypothèse que SHIP2 participent à la formation de complexes multi-protéiques qui pourraient favoriser (1) la capacité d’élongation de l’actine de Mena, (2) la courbure de la membrane induite par IRSp53, (3) la production de PI(3,4)P2 par SHIP2 lui-même et (4) le recrutement d’autres protéines participant aux remaniements de la membrane. L’ubiquitination de SHIP2 que nous avons également étudiée pourrait aussi être un élément de régulation de ces complexes. La poursuite de l’étude de la spécificité d’interaction de SHIP2 pour ses divers partenaires dans un contexte pathologique pourrait donc aider à la compréhension de la dynamique des interactions protéiques essentielles au développement de tumeurs et de leurs métastases. / Doctorat en Sciences biomédicales et pharmaceutiques (Médecine) / info:eu-repo/semantics/nonPublished

Tidigare forskning har visat att medias rapportering om olika länder, kulturer och etniciteter skiljer sig åt beroende på vad och vilka som porträtteras, vilket i synnerhet förtydligas kring framställningen av avvikande kulturer. Kunskap kring dessa förhållanden problematiseras även i sportsliga sammanhang, där forskning bland annat tittat närmare på medierepresentation utifrån ett ”vi” och ”dem”-tänkande. Information kring hur media valt att konstruera landslag utifrån ett regionalt perspektiv, är dock inte lika utbrett. Denna studies syfte är därför att undersöka hur landslag under fotbolls-VM i Qatar 2022 porträtteras inom svensk sportjournalistik. Vidare behandlar studiens frågeställningar mer specifikt hur landslag från MENA-regionen (en engelskspråkig förkortning av länder från ”Mellanöstern och Nordafrika”), respektive Europa konstrueras i Expressen och Aftonbladets rapporteringar, och hur dessa skildringar kan förstås utifrån ett postkolonialt perspektiv. För att på ett djupare plan analysera dessa mediers rapporteringar, har diskursteorin tillämpats i undersökningen. Samtidigt har den postkoloniala teorin använts för att utröna historiska och kulturella förklaringar till mediernas skildringar. En kritisk diskursanalys har vidare tillämpats som metod för denna studie, med utgångspunkt i ett analysschema.  Resultatet visar att svensk sportjournalistik avviker i sin rapportering under mästerskapet, där yttre faktorer såsom politiska aspekter i stor utsträckning syns i texterna som behandlar landslagen från MENA-regionen. Medan sportsliga företeelser i synnerhet kommer till bruk i texterna som redogör för europeiska landslag. Studien visar även att de sportsliga resultaten redogörs på olika sätt beroende på vilka landslag som det rapporteras om. Anledningarna till dessa olikartade skildringar kan möjligen förklaras i den kulturella närhet respektive avstånd, som svensk sportjournalistik har till Europa (västerlandet), samt MENA-regionen (orienten).

This study’s purpose is testing the rentier state theory’s relationship to the degree of democracy and political stability in the MENA-region. In order to fulfill the aim of this study three research questions are formulated: what kind of relationship exists between oil export per capita and political stability in the MENA region? To what extent does the rentier state theory explain the variation in the degree of democracy in the MENA region? What kind of relationship exists between the rentier state theory and the degree of democracy in the MENA region? To which four hypotheses are formulated. Furthermore, to test these hypotheses and thereby meet the purpose of this study, its methodological approach consists of two regression models: one multiple regression analysis and one bivariate regression analysis. The former is set out to test the relationship between the dependent variable degree of democracy and the independent variables oil rent, tax revenue and political stability, using the control variable HDI. The latter regression analysis is employed to test the relationship between oil export per capita as the independent variable and political stability as the dependent variable. The multiple regression model finds insufficient support for the rentier state theory as an explanatory model for the variation in democracy in the MENA region, only observing a significant relationship with tax revenue. Whereas the bivariate regression model finds a significant positive relationship between oil export per capita and political stability. These findings do not exclude the possibility that the rentier state theory can explain variations in the degree of democracy in other oil rich regions outside of the Middle East and North Africa region. Nor do the results exclude the possibility of the rentier state theory explaining the variations in degree of democracy in certain MENA region countries. Additionally, there is reason to believe that a higher oil export per capita contributes to a higher degree of political stability in the MENA region. The observations of this study are problematized using earlier research that propose further studies including explanatory factors beyond the rentier state theory in the MENA region. These factors include armed conflicts, post colonialism and religious radicalization.

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yes / This paper sets out to provide a deeper understanding of the regulatory framework to drive energy transformation processes in the MENA region and the barriers for change. The recent developments in a global scale have encouraged States to look towards alternative sources of energy to power their nation, with nuclear energy and renewable technologies. Technologies such as wind power and solar energy appear to be attracting interest in many countries and regions, and in the MENA region this is primarily solar energy. However, all States are at different stages of development and therefore, it poses a challenge for taking into consideration definitively the costs and efficiency of renewable energy technologies. This paper investigates the state of preparedness of the legal framework in the region in order to deploy renewable sources of energy to power these countries in years to come.

Yes / This article provides an overview of the current stage of development as well as the outlook for future cooperation in the field of renewable energy between the European Union and the countries of Middle East and North Africa (MENA). To continue with the progress achieved in the context of the Mediterranean Solar Plan the MENA region should adopt a regionally coordinated approach due to the absence of an established institutional and regulatory framework for trans-regional cooperation. While several studies have highlighted the competitiveness of electricity produced from renewable energy sources in MENA, governments and policy makers in the region should carefully assess their ability to ensure a sustainable policy framework for the renewables sector and opportunities for trans-regional exchanges of electricity. This article proposes that in order to address governance issues and facilitate the creation of a regional energy market, MENA countries may need to adopt an intergovernmental instrument such as the Energy Charter Treaty or the International Energy Charter.