Rahbord
Rahbord 52 - economic

Fall 2009





Discourse

The Future of the Middle East: Any Shift in Western Views?
Dr. Hassan Rohani

The Middle East is a region with a turbulent history. This region is considered the symbol of human civilization. At the same time, it has been caught in colonialization, war and occupation. Also, it has been a fertile ground for the emergence of modernist and emancipatory movements. The Middle East's rich oil and gas resources and its special geopolitical and geo - strategic situation have made it important in the international scene.
Having reviewed the current situation of this region, the article studies the goals, actions and orientation of the West towards the Middle East and their consequences, particularly, the U.S. strategy towards the Zionist regime and its making use of double standards are examined. The author believes that if the West's behavior towards the region continues and its previous mistakes are committed repeatedly; creating a peaceful atmosphere conducive to the promotion of democracy will be very difficult. Therefore, adopting new strategies by the West and the U.S. seems necessary.
Keywords: Middle East, Iran, United States, Terrorism, Zionism.



Research

Oil; A Pioneer Sector in Iran's Unbalanced Development
Mohammad Bagher Nobakht

The basic question in this article is: “What role has oil played in the economic development of Iran?” The article, therefore, delves into the relation between oil revenues and economic development in Iran.
In order to clarify this relation, it first reviews the trends of fluctuations of oil revenues as well as economic transitions in Iran, before and after the revolution, in accordance with the published reports. This whole was packed into a compilation of library research to respond to our basic question. Secondly, VAR model was employed to analyze the correlation between economic growth – as the main indicator of economic development- and oil revenues.
It is concluded that oil has been a pioneer sector in Iranian economy. It was first the reason for Unbalanced growth and, later, influenced other sectors and led to relative development of the country. Thus, it is reasonable to analyze Iranian model of development using the Unbalanced growth model adapted from Hirsh man theory.
Since Iran’s development in 2025 will aim at establishing an optimal society envisaged in the Constitution and 20- year perspective and will include a comprehensive human development, this article recommends “Simultaneous utilisation of oil revenues with provision of the grounds for social, political, and environmental development” as the optimal strategy.
Keywords: Oil, Pioneer Sector, Development, Unbalanced Development, Iran

Futurist Approach to Futurology of Energy in Iran
Firoozeh Khalatbari

Futurology of energy in one of the topics deeply linked to sustainable development and global links between the countries. Given this, it is essential to see energy prospects in Iran on the basis of the above two links. Sustainable development requires a clean energy and reduction of pollution. This means a responsible approach to energy utilization should be adopted on both production and consumption sides. Moreover, attempts should be made to discover all sources of energy, design the strategy of creation of incentives to increase availability of renewable as well as substitutes for fossil fules, provide adequate capital for development of energy sector, adopt a fair approach to vulnerable consumers and small businesses and efficient management of energy production and consumption. The research shows that energy sector is large enough to attract venture capital and that the backstop technology has already become available. Hence, substitution of fossil fuels is an unavoidable prospect.
Keywords: Energy Section, Future Study, Sustainable Development, Strategy Design

Justice, Islamic Justice and Justice Stock
Sadegh Bakhtiari

Justice is an ideal concept which human beings have always sought since the beginning of civilization. From the viewpoint of most scholars, justice is a virtue and a source to other virtues. Some have even gone so far that they give the same weight to justice as they do to all other virtues.
This article reviews justice from the viewpoint of ancient Greek philosophers and recent western ones. It considers economic justice from an Islamic perspective and summarizes it in optimum allocation of resources and facilities, elimination of poverty and financial needs, as well as socio-economic development. Our constitution considers justice as a major goal and the general policies of Article 44 are aimed to realize this goal.
This article also investigates the issue of Justice Stock and provides reasons to prove this programme violates the sacred value of Islamic economic justice. So it is unfair to use the word “justice” for such stocks.
Keywords: Justice, Economic Justice, Commutative Justice, Distributive Justice, Justice Stock

The Composite Indicator of Economic Ranking of Important South West Asian Countries and Its Forecast
Roya Tabatabaee Yzadi
Behzad Mahmoodi
Farzad Zand

Bounded to the level of success that different economies obtain in pursuing their goals and objectives, they prepare plans which through implementing them, achieving their goals would became easier and quicker.
In Iran’s 20 year vision document, Iran should become a developed country and should obtain first rank in economy, technology and science among region countries.
In this report, with the use of data envelopment method and the benefit of doubt approach, through using linear programming method we have composed up different macroeconomic variables of the countries of the region. Once the result was obtained we have provided the ranking of the countries in each year between the year 2002 and 2007. This method was first used by Emanatan Emakrishna.
On the other hand the other method that we have used in this report is the widely used equal weigh approach of simple averaging method.
In the end we found out that among the eight countries of south west Asia considered for this research work Iran’s ranking was at most five in the years from 2002 to 2007. This finding was supported by both of the methods. The forecast of these rankings also did not indicate any change in Iran’s regional ranking.
Keywords: Composite Indicator, Forecasting, Economic Position, Data Envelopment Analysis, Time Series

Analysis of the Measure and Manner of Support Policies in Iran’s Agriculture Sector (2001-2006)
Omid Gilanpour
Mina Hejazi

Iran as a developing country with low medium per capita income which is a grate oil exporter confronts by a dual status about support ability to agriculture sector. Oil income can be a good external source to pay subsidy to agriculture producer which many of other developing countries dose not have it but this source is not sufficient for making high per capita income for our country. In this situation government has no choice except to make more effective support policy.
This article analyses of the measure and manner of support policies in Iran’s agriculture sector in the first half of eighty decade. Results show that input subsidies are grater than output subsidies which paid by guaranteed prices. A large part of agriculture subsidies are implicit unintended effect of consumers support policies.
KeyWords: Agriculture Support, AMS, Amber Box, Iran

Vulnerability and Development of Land Utilization System in Iran
Gholamhossein Hosseini

Vulnerability and development of land utilization system in Iran usually have been affected by internal and external factors. Non-scientific and political planning of internal decisions on the one hand and external defined interferences on the other hand such as land reforms and distribution of subsidy to agricultural economics not only retard development of land utilization system from its ordinary progress but some time will be led to recession. Therefore non- identification of economic opportunities and constraints of social and political conditions of country for example may be lead to choice of another method instead of capitalist farming and resulted as its backwardness from world economy.
Keywords: Agricultural Systems, Political Economy, Feudal

An Analysis of Challenges Facing Territorial Management in Iran
Esmaeil Salehi
Farzam Poorasghar Sangachin

Iran has six decades of formal national developmental planning background. During this period, land use planning at national level has been altered, modified, and not well being recognized by the governmental decision makers. Therefore, understanding these transformations is vital to put land use planning in practice to policies and enacting the land use planning in national level. Unstable trends in land use planning indicate regional disequilibrium loss of territorial prospective profits that leads to undeveloped areas with high potentials of developments. Thus, in this article with emphasis on national land use planning through an analytical review of country planning transformations, We try to investigate regional disequilibrium and most important specifications that during disequilibrium recent years.
Keywords: Planning, National land Use Planning, Regional Disequilibrium

Urban Planing and Design by City Development Strategy Plan (CDS)
Saeed Kardar
Mohammad Rahmani
Sareh Molla Aghajanzadeh

Strategy plan of city development is an important issue that is welcome in many countries specially developed countries. While complete and comprehensive plans that are document of city development in our country have more obstacle role and conductive role of them is less. But strategic plans can make municipality and public fundations active and give them purposive role for city development. Now, people not only don't know what role they have on development of their own city , but also even don't know how their city will be in future, and to what way it advances. City responsibles don't have clear and good imagination of the future of city. Now strategy plan of city development provides a bed that people and city responsibles to reach to this agreement what they want from their cities and then determine role of each one for gaining the aim.
Keywords: Strategy,Developmen, City, Plan


Ex-Post Evaluation Urban Community Initiative in European Community (1994-1999)
Faranak Seifoldini
Sirous Moussavi

This article aims to establish the processes and factors that have had an impact on the effectiveness of the URBAN programmes, based on an assessment of 56 URBAN programmes and 2 UPPs. In addition, this section also presents the types of networking activities undertaken by the various URBAN programmes and the factors that have impacted on their effectiveness. The criteria for the assessment of the effectiveness of each of the URBAN programmes derived from both the original objectives of the CI established at the European level and member-state specific success criteria. The latter reflected the differing issues faced and various levels of expectation. Of the sampled programmes, 72% were judged to have been very successful or mostly successful. The majorities of each of the three main types of strategy were judged to have been successful. Around a third of URBAN I areas that adopted ‘flagship’ strategies were considered successful. As a result of the variety across member states, the factors that either supported or hindered the success of the programmes were many.
Keywords: URBAN Programmes, Urban Community Initiative, Networking Activities, Ex-Post Evaluation , Urban Development.

The Study of Rural Management Changes in Iran: From Constitutional Revolution until Present Time
Hossein Imani Jajarmi
Majid Abdollahi

The study of Iran's rural management changes is the goal of the article. Some urban problems such as informal settlement, unemployment, and environment pollution make the live in rural areas as a favorite option. However sustainable rural development needs to an institutionalized and efficient rural management with specifications such as sustain financial resources and social participation.
The studies show after the land reform in early years of 1960s until the last years of 1990s there was not institutionalization and sustainability in rural management in Iran. The establishment of rural municipalities (Dehyaree) in the first years of 2000s and their rapid development is the last reform for organization of rural management. Anyway structural problems such as the weakness of human capital, centralized administration system and the lack of financial resources can play as obstacles for new rural management.
Keywords: General Management, Rural management, Dehyraee, Rural Islamic Council, Training, Development.

An Investigation on the Population Growth Rate of Iran
Hamed Shakouri Ganjavi
Shakib Taheri

In order to design an effective plan for the future path of a country, it is essential to have a clear image of its direction and route. Doubtless, census taking is a vital necessity to select the right way for developing economical and social plans. According to the census taken in 1385, the 10-year growth rate is equal to 1.61 percents. An uncomplicated mathematical calculation can prove that against a general opinion that is popular even among a faction of experts, the population growth won’t be descending or stay in the aforementioned rate. Moreover, it is shown by Cubic Spline inter/extrapolation that a new wave of population growth increment will appear within the next decade between 2 and 2.5 percents. This fact can affect many aspects in development and strategic planning and must be considered by planners and policy makers of the country.
Keywords: Population Growth, Iran’s Population, Forecasting Growth Rate, Cubic Spline Inter/Extrapolation.




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