About the Project

The German-Arab university project "Dialogue with the Muslim World: Economic Rationality and Socio-Economic Behavior in the Arab Region: Is there an Arab Rationality?" Is a German-Arab cooperation project between the Faculty of Law at the University of Hamburg and the Faculty of Economics at the American University Beirut (AUB), the Faculty of Business Administration, Economics, and Political Science at the British University in Egypt (BUE), the Faculty of Economics and Political Science (FEPS) at Cairo University, University of Tunis, École Supérieure des Sciences Économiques et Commerciales de Tunis (ESSECT), and University of Sousse, Faculté de Droit et des Sciences Politiques de Sousse (FDSP).

The aim of the cooperation is to convey modern interdisciplinary research methods (behavioral economics) at the partner universities and thus to promote university dialogue between the German and Arab partners. This German-Arab cooperation project aims to close the existing gaps in the areas of behavioral economics and experimental research at the partner universities. The question is whether and to what extent the usual economic behavioral assumptions “rationality of the individual, homo-economicus” can be appropriately applied to the actions of people in the Arab region.

The cooperation project consists of four pillars:

1. Introductory/fundamental courses at the partner universities,
2. Annual supplementary workshop at one of the partner universities,
3. Annual summer school in Hamburg (more information can be found here),
4. German-Arabic supervision of bachelor and master theses as part of the project.

In addition, an interdisciplinary group of German and Arab students and scientists (from the fields of law, economics, ethnology, sociology and Islamic studies) will be founded, which will carry out joint empirical studies in the Arab region (Egypt, Tunisia, Jordan, Lebanon) and in Germany.