Following global trends, philanthropic foundations have increasingly become a feature of the Middle East and North Africa (MENA) education landscape. Despite some existing literature on general philanthropic activities around the region, research on philanthropic work in the education sector is lacking. This study begins to address this gap through an examination of education activities of 65 entities across the region. Thirty-eight of these are located in the Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) states of Bahrain, Kuwait, Oman, Qatar, Saudi Arabia, and the United Arab Emirates (UAE). The other 27 foundations are in five non-GCC states: Egypt, Jordan, Israel, Lebanon, and Palestine. These two sub-regions of MENA serve as the basis of comparison for this study.
Recommended citation: Ridge, N., Kippels, S., & Bruce, E. R. (2019). Education and philanthropy in the Middle East and North Africa. In N. Ridge & A. Terway (Eds.), Philanthropy in education: Diverse perspectives and global trends (pp. 70-89). Edward Elgar Publishing. https://doi.org/10.4337/9781789904123.00013