Creative Insecurity - Institutional Inertia and Youth Potential in the GCC

The Middle East is experiencing the world''s most prominent youth bulge. Yet many MENA economies'' institutional designs, both formal and informal, favour the power of business elites, systematically discriminating against young people joining the workforce or opening businesses, and thus limiting their ability to contribute to innovation. Large youth populations can be a boon or a curse: nurtured and integrated, they can jumpstart stratospheric growth; but if alienated and confined, they can drain a society politically and economically. The Gulf Cooperation Council countries are no exception to this perilous dilemma. This book explores the problem through a new concept, ''creative insecurity'': a state''s subjection to an institutional ecosystem that is suppressing opportunities for innovation--to the extent that it is causing economic and political vulnerabilities, which in turn threaten national security. Creative insecurity threatens the longevity of many states today. In this orig