Institutional Roots of Muslims’ Educational Choices in 19th Century Lebanon by Hania Abou...

Institutional Roots of Muslims’ Educational Choices in 19th Century

Lebanon

byHania Abou al-Shamat

Arab Region late-19th century

• Background: 19th C. Educational reform and Expansion/ Modern Education Introduced

• Puzzle: While Christians attended the new schools to receive modern education, Muslims continued to enroll in traditional Islamic schools

Distribution of Population and Pupils by religious communities

Year City % Population % Pupils

Muslims Non-Muslims

Muslims Non-Muslims

1882 Jerusalem 67 33 10 90

1882 Aleppo 78* 22* 21 79

1882 Beirut 31 57 21 79

1907 Egypt** 92 8 48 52

*Population percentages for Aleppo are for 1840s.** Egypt here includesSources: Bowring, John (1973). Report on the Commercial Statistics of Syria. New York: Arno Press, p. 3; Courbage, Youssef and Philippe Fargues (1997). Christians and Jews under Islam. (Translated by Judy Mabro). London: I.B.Tauris, p. 88; Diab, Henry and Lars Waehlin (1983). “The Geography of Education in Syria in 1882, with a Translation of ‘Education in Syria’ by Shahin Makarius, 1883.” Geografiska Annaler, 65 B, 2: P. 117, 120 & 121; Landau, Jacob (1969). Jews in 19 th Century Egypt. New York: New York University Press, p. 6 & 72.

Conventional Explanations I

1. Access to Missionaries: Genesis of Modern Education

2. Early Indigenous Christian Schools: Early attempts to spread new schools

Counterarguments for 1 & 2:- Mainly Religious, basic education

- Timing: why not pre-19th century?

**Missing: Structural Changes in the Job-market

Conventional Explanations II

3. ‘Ulema’s Resistance to Change: Vested Interests prevented change*Counterargument: - ‘Ulema divided front- Christian clergy resisted reform

4. State Neglect: curb Arab nationalism* Counterargument - Long history of private provision of education

- Arab nationalism: cross religious trend

According to 3 & 4: Islamic schools relied upon for elementary education

** Missing: Islamic schools were in demand

Conventional Explanations III

5. Christians more prone to westernize (shared same religion); Muslims were defensive

• Counterarguments:- Historical evidence: Christians equally put at defensive- Urgency to reform among Muslims

** Missing: Difference in institutions

The Missing Element

• Common Elements in conventional explanations

- Top-down reform (lack of agency for individuals)

- Supply side (necessary, not sufficient)

• Missing: Demand for Education

- Evidence of active demand

- Quantitative & Qualitative impact on education

• Focus on Demand (motives and incentives)• Challenges in capturing demand • Approach: reconstruct the job-market to derive skills

needed

Why 19th century Lebanon?

• Geographic Area: Vilayet Beirut & Mount Lebanon

• Leader in Educational Reform• Religious Diversity – compare and contrast

educational choices• Job-market analysis extends to Egypt

(migration effect)

Table 1.2. Av erage Percentage Distribution of Population by Religion

Region Muslims Christians Druze

Beirut 37 57

Mount Lebanon 7 81 12

Tripoli 83 17 ---

Saida 87 12 ---

Source: Leila Tarazi Fawaz, Merchants and Migrants in Nineteenth Century Beirut (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1983), ch.5; John Spagnolo, France and Ottoman Lebanon (London: Ithaca Press, 1977) p. 24; Rafiq, Muhammad and Muhammad Bahjat, Wilayat Bayrut, vol. 2 (districts of Tripoli and Latakia), 3rd edition. (Bayrut: Dar Lahd Khatir, 1987), 212; Rafiq and Bahjat, Wilayat Beirut, vol.1, 302-303.

Table 4.1: Percentage distribution of Syrian Protestant College graduates (1870-1900) by

country of migration

Region Lebanon Egypt Rest of the

Arab World

United States

Turkey Others

Percentage 35 28 45 7 8 5

Source: AUB Directory of Alumni 1870 -1952. (AUB archive). Out of 468 studen ts who graduated b etween 1870 and 1900, inform ation was available on 347. Percentages are taken from known population.

Lebanon Early 19th Century

• Socio-economic structure: feudal• Social stratification: kinship and landownership• Limited Social mobility• Beirut: small city• Economy: mainly agricultural• Job-market

- Administration: judges, scribers, bookkeepers, accountants

- Education: religious

- Judiciary: religious codes

- Trade: internal

- Education needed: basic and religious

Factors Altering the Old job market

• Socio-economic effects of the silk industry - Economy: silk cash crop, external trade- Socio-economic system: emergence of middle class- Social stratification: property, social mobility- Beirut: major port city- Job-market: External trade & New financial & Commercial services

- Muslims’ absence from (Christian dominance over) external trade & new financial services

Muslims’ share in external trade and related businesses

Profession Year Muslims Total Percentage

Merchants with Europe

1826 6 34 17

Merchants with

England 1848 3 29 10

Merchants 1889 12 89 13

Silk Exports

1911 5 67 7

Wool exporters

1914 29 80 36

Bankers 1889 2 13 15

Insurers 1914 7 18 38

Shipping agents

1914 3 12 25

Source: Boutros Labaki. “The Christian Communities and the Economic and Social Situation in Lebanon,” in Christian Communities in the Arab Middle East: The Challenge of t he Future, ed. Andrea Pacini. (Oxford: Calendon Press, 1998), p . 238; Thomas Philipp, The Syrians in Egypt 1725-1975 (Stuttgart: Franz Steiner Ve rlag Weisbaden GMBH, 1985), 99; Leila Fawaz, Merchants and Migrants in Nineteenth-Century Beirut (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1983), p. 97-8.

Table 4.4. Percentage of Christian Translators at Foreign consulates in Beirut and Egypt

Year Region Christians Total Christians’

% Share

1878 Beirut 54* 64 84

1889 Beirut 17 18 94

1902-1908 Beirut 10 13 77

1905 Egypt 12 16 75

Sources: Issawi, “The Transformation of the Economic Position of the Millets in the Nineteenth Century,” in Christians and Jew in the Ottoman Empire: The Functioning of a Plural Society, vol. I, ed. Benjamin Braude and Bernard Lewis (New York: Holmes & Meier Publishers, 1982), 278; Al-Jami’ aw Dalil Bayrut for 1889, 22; Al -Aswad, Ibrahim Bek, Dalil Lubnan (Be’abda: Al-Matba’a al-‘Uthmaniyya, 1906), 88 -89; Dalil Suriyya wa Misr al-Tijari, (1908), 19 -20; Thomas Phillip, The Syrians in Egypt, 1725-1975 (Stuttgart, 1985), 121.

Islamic Legal Institutions: Muslims’ Absence from (Christians’ dominance

over) external Trade I

Conventional explanations: Co-religion, and Europeans’ bias against Muslims

Factors overlooked: 1. Islamic law: higher transaction cost- Individualistic (lack of collective entities, corporations)- Dominance of oral testimony (limited transactions’ longevity)- Europeans’ avoidance of Islamic law and courts

Islamic Legal Institutions: Muslims’ Absence from (Christians’ dominance

over) external Trade II

2. Legal Pluralism: Choice of law- Christians’ benefits from being Protégés - Supremacy of Islamic jurisdiction lack of motives for the job

Long Term (unintended) consequences1. Statistical discrimination against Muslims2. Lost opportunities to gain new skills

Military Conscription

• Measures of service: Muslims’ opposition• Exemption:

- Fee payment- Attendance of Islamic Schools- Special occupations: civil servants, judges, muftis.

• Consequence: 1. Increased demand for Islamic schools 2. Limited access to higher education

Table 4.2: Distribution of major professions in 1908 Beirut

Muslims Christians Total Occupation

# % # %

Physicians 7 23 24 77 31

Pharmacists 5 20 12 70 17

Dentists 1 12 8 88 9

Lawyers 3 17 15 83 18

Bankers 2 11 16 89 18

Commissioners 4 21 15 79 19

Source: Dalil Suriyya wa Misr al-Tijari,(1908), 28-31.

Administration Expansion

• Attractiveness: stability, social mobility, social status and power.

• Pre-Tanzimat: - Administrative service restricted- Requirements: basic education, apprenticeship• Post-Tanzimat:- Specialization: Muslims (both ranks)

Christians higher ranks- Requirements: lower ranks basic education higher ranks new education• Muslims ‘Mixed’ education

Parallel Institutions

Courts

Three types of courts:

1. Shari’a:

Islamic education

2. Nizamiyyeh (later national):

old and new education

3. Mixed:

new education

Schools

• Old Education: Islamic schools, public schools, private tutoring, private Islamic new schools

• New Education: Foreign, missionary, Christian private schools, private tutoring

Summary

• A network of institutions rewarded Islamic education and maintained its demand by:

- Directly increasing demand for old education

- Preserving the old job market, the arena for graduates of the Islamic schools

- Creating new jobs whose required skills were met by Islamic education

- Preventing new job opportunities that feedback on new education

Women’s Education• Marriage institution

- Emigration & civil strive 18601. Tightened marriage market for Christians

2. Increased competition- Christians undergoing westernization- Education as social investment and positional good

• Job Market- female workers in silk factories: altering patriarchal authority - mechanization: challenging traditional female jobs- Migration and civil strife: women left behind bread winners- Education as economic investment (mainly captured by missionaries)

Rhetoric in Muslims’ Newspapers

• Thamara>t al-Funu>n (1870s) criticizing quality of kuttabs and madrasas, praising quality of Christians’ schools, calling for modern education for the Muslims

• al-Fajr al-S}a>diq (1879): declining conditions of Muslim schools (Compared to Christians’)

• al-Mana>r, Rashi>d Rid}a> (1890s): called upon Muslims to learn from the Syrian Protestant College example of modern education

Two Potential Routes to Provide new education among Muslims

1. Reform of Islamic schools: Study effect of waqf institution on Islamic education

2. Establish new schools: Compare to Christian schools to detect problems faced

Reform of Islamic schools

A. Effects of waqf: Static perpetuity, evidence of change

B. Approach: Analyze system’s structure, agents’ incentives to change. Agents of change: qadis (judges), muftis (jurisconsults), and teachers

C. Findings: Large scale reform hindered by: (1) Individualistic structure of Islamic institutions confined frequency & scale of change

(2) legitimacy within Islamic Institutions held reform to what existed/discouraged innovation

Founding new schools in the 19th century

Approach: Compare Muslim & Christian schools

Findings:(1) Limited incentives to found new charitable waqfs (2) Lack of Collective Legal entity Limited

resource pooling

(3) lack of central management lack of flexibility

Contributions I1. New approach to revisit an old puzzle

- Shifting focus to the individual by analyzing demand- Linking demand and supply to a network of institutions

2. Comprehensive two-sided explanation:

- At the demand side, a set of institutions kept Islamic education (Journal of Islamic Studies 20, 3 (2009): 317-351)

- At the supply side, institutions hindered Muslims’ ability for resource pooling (Journal of Middle Eastern Studies, under submission)

Contributions II

3. Transplanted institution does not guarantee internal demand. Institutional networks shape the dynamics of institutional transplant (Policy implication: reform comes in packages)

4. Framework of analysis useful in addressing current issues in the Arab world

Reframe Institutional Transplant

• Determinants of successful transplant

- Competitiveness of transplanted institution

- Compatibility with indigenous culture

- Origin of transplanted institution

- Process of the transplant

- lock-in effect cause of institutional stagnation• Implications

- Efficacious institutions will take over (not necessary)

• Missing:

- Indigenous Demand for the transplanted institution

- Role complementary institutions play

Effects of Legal Transplant

• “The Effects of Legal Reform on Muslims’ Commercial and Financial Performance in Egypt, 1883-1949,” Islamic Law and Society, forthcoming

• Conclusion: legal change necessary, not sufficient- Complementary changes needed- Socio-economic and political context

Islamic Schools in Arab and Islamic World

• Recommendations: invest in modern schools in the area

• Overlooked is internal demand and he complementary institutions that support it

• Example: Islamic schools in Lebanon/Egypt

Old job market

New job market

New education

Old education

Dndn Do

do

Do: Old Job market skills demandDn: New job market skills demanddo: individual’s demand for old educationdn: individual’s demand for new education

Schools and Students in various parts of Lebanon in 1882

Locality Schools Students population

Beirut 101 12 452

Mount Lebanon 190 5 850

Tripoli 15 1 152

Sayda 15 887

Sur 10 520

Baalbek 5 433

Source: Henry Diab and Lars Waehlin, “The Geography of Education in Syria in 1882, with a Translation of ‘Education in Syria’ by Shahin Makarius, 1883” Geografiska Annaler 65 B, 2 (1983): 126.

Christians’ and Muslims’ Reactions

Christians- external trade- New financial services- Administration: top ranks- Teachers: indigenous

Christian and missionary schools

- Liberal professions- Need for new education

Muslims- internal trade- Old financial services- Administration: all ranks- Teachers: Public and

Religious Schools- Old education suffices

Table 2.2: Number of Kuttabs and students by city and year

Year Area Number of Schools Number of Students

1870s Beirut 8 225

1893 Vilayet Beirut 205 ---

1917 Tripoli 37 ---

1930s Lebanese Republic 34 961

Source: Abdul Latif Tibawi. American Interests in Syria, 1800-1901: A Study of Educa tional, Literary and Religious Work (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1966),181; Martin Strohmeier, “Muslim Education in the Vilayet of Beirut, 1880-1918” in Decision Making and Change in the Ottoman Empire ed. Caesar E. Farrah (Kirksville: Thomas Jefferson University Press, 1993), 222; Muhammad Rafiq and Muhammad Bahjat. Wilayat Bayrut. vol. 2 (districts of Tripoli and Latakia), 3rd edition (Bayrut: Dar Lahd Khatir, 1987), 192-3; and J.A. Babikian, Civilization and Education in Syria and Lebanon (Beirut: s.n., 1936), 174. For the curriculum in these schools check Margaret Doolittle, “Moslem Religious Education in Syria,” The Moslem World XVIII, 4 (1928): 374-380.

Table 2.5: Muslim Girls’ schools and Students, numbers and Percentages

Year City Schools Students

# % # %

1882 Beirut 3 8 452 8

1882 Saida 1 20 60 25

1908 Tripoli 7 41 --- ---

1910 Beirut 5 14 --- ---

Source: Shahin Makarious, “al-Ma’aref fi Suriyya” Al-Muqtataf 7 (February 7, 1883), 291; Muhammad Rafiq and Muhammad Bahjat, Wilayat Bayrut. vol. 2 (districts of Tripoli and Latakia), 3rd edition (Bayrut: Dar Lahd Khatir, 1987), 193; and Muhammad Kurd ‘Ali, Memoirs of Muhammad Kurd ‘ Ali: A Selection, Translated by Khalil Tatah (Washington D.C.: American Council of Learned Societies, 1954), 51-52.

Education Providers

• Old Religious Schools: Madrasas, Kuttabs, Dayrs

• New Indigenous Schools (by sects)• Missionary Schools• Public Schools• Private Tutors

Islamic Schools

Madrasa: Higher education

• Origin: Formal 11th century due to: expansion of Islamic state (need to systematize Islamic law). Number of students increased ---> Khans. To ensure full time students ---> waqfs to provide for their living and accommodation

• Form and shape affected by:- Traditionalist-rationalist/ Shiite-Sunni struggle

- Job market needs: expanding administration + judicial needs ---> Law and its sciences

- 19th century: private, waqf supported, small, founder-teacher

Elementary Schools

• Muslims: Kuttabs: Elementary education

- mainly informal

- Expansion due to job market demand

- Waqf-founded kuttabs for poor and orphans

- 19th-20th century kuttabs

• Christians: Dayrs

- informal, basic education

- more formal at higher education, after church’s reform

Education Providers

• Religious schools:

- Madrasas:

• ajhflahf

Thesis

• While supply of new schools was necessary for educational modernization, it was not sufficient. A matching demand had to coexist for educational modernization to take place.

The relative efficiency of the new schools was not enough to create internal demand. A network of institutions shaped Muslims’ demand for old education and kept it from changing.

Table 1.1. Average Percentage Distribution of Population in Beirut by Religion and Sect, 1850-1920

Religion Sect Percentage Total Percentage

Muslim Sunni 37 37

Orthodox 28

Maronite 21 Christian

Catholics 8

57

Jews 1-3 Others

Foreigners 1-3 2-6

Source: Leila Tarazi Fawaz. Merchants and Migrants in Nineteenth Century Beirut (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1983), ch.5

Table 2.4: Percentage share of Muslim students and schools in Beirut city

Students Schools Source Year

# % # %

Hassan Za’rour 1870 900 38 16 38

Makarious 1882 2170 32 21 32

Al-Jami’ aw Dalil Bayrut 1889 2000 23 21 32

Vital Cuinet 1896 2160 32 23 35

Heny Jessup 1909 4462 34 36 28

Moh’d Kurd ‘Ali 1910 ---- --- 25 38

Sources: Hasan Za’rur. Bayrut: al-Tarikh al-ijtima’I, 1864-1914, (Bayrut : al-Markaz al-Islami lil-I`lam wa-al-Inma, 1991), 42; Shahin Makarious, “Al-Ma’aref fi Suriyya” Al-Muqtataf 7 (February 7, 1883), 291 ; Vital Cuinet, Syrie, Liban et Palestine, Géographie Administrative, Statistique, Descriptive et Raisonnée (Paris: E. Leroux, 1896), 60; Al-Jami’ aw D alil Bayrut Li ‘am 1889. Collected by Amin al-Khouri (Bayrut: al-Matba’ah al-Adabiyyah, 1889), 31; Henry Jessup, Fifty-Three years in Syria, II, (New York : Fleming H. Revell Company, 1910), 815; and Muhammad Kurd ‘Ali, Memoirs of Muhammad Kurd ‘Ali: A Selection, Translated by Khalil Tatah (Washington D.C.: American Council of Learned Societies, 1954), 51-52.

Job Market: Structure and Changes

Pre-19th century

• Administration: judges, scribers, bookkeepers, accountants

• Education: religious• Judiciary: religious

codes• Trade: internal• Educational needs:

basic and religious

Since 19th century

• Enlarged administration• Education: foreign,

missionary, public• Judiciary: new ‘secular’

courts• Trade: external trade

expanding• Educational needs:

basic, higher, ‘secular’

Christians’ and Muslims’ Responses

Christians

- External trade- New financial services- Administration: top ranks- Teachers: indigenous

Christian and missionary schools

- Liberal professions- Need for new education

Muslims

- Internal trade- Old financial services- Administration: all

ranks- Teachers: Public and

Religious Schools- Old education suffices

Table 4.3. Distribution of Top Civil Servants in Beirut in 1908

Muslims Christians Total

Civil servants 22 41 86

Port 5 5

Investment 3 14 18

Ottoman Bank 4 4

Source: Dalil Suriyya wa Misr al-Tijari lisanat 1324 H, Al-Muwafiqa 1908 M., 15-17

Number of students in Maronite schools by year

School Year Number of students

‘Ain Waraqa 1736 8

‘Ain Waraqa 1858 100

Mar Maroun ~1810 10

Rayfoun ~1810 10

Each of top 4 schools 1844 25

All top 5 schools 1884 177

Source: Iliya Harik, Politics and Change in a Traditional Society Lebanon, 1711-1845. Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1968. P. 164-165; Salamah, Bashir. Al-Ta’adud

al-Madrasi wa Takawwun al-Mujtama’ al-Ta’ifi” ??

Graduates from two Maronite schools

School Years Number ofGraduates

Number ofYears

Graduates peryear

‘Ain Waraqa 1789-1818 50 29 1.7

Kfayfan 1808-1874 260 66 3.9

Source: Iliya Harik, Politics and Change in a Traditional Society Lebanon, 1711-1845. Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1968. P. 164-165

Table 2.1: Distribution of schools and pupils by sect in Beirut in 1883

Sect Boys’

schools Girls’

schools Students

boys Students

girls Students

Total % students by

religion

Muslim 21 3 2,170 452 2,622 21%

Greek Orthodox

5 3 900 500 1,400

Maronite

10 1 1,280 55 1,335

Greek Catholic

3 --- 400 400

Jesuites

4 1 690 200 890

Sisters of Charity

--- 4 --- 1,324 1,324

Nuns of Nazareth

--- 1 500 500

Mar Mansur

2 --- 250 --- 250

Capuchins

1 --- 50 --- 50

Assyrians

1 --- 70 --- 70

Italian

1 --- 50 --- 50

Protestants

12 22 671 2450 3,121

75%

Jews

5 1 350 90 440 3.5%

Total

65 36 6,881 5,571 12,450

Source: Shahin Makarious, “al-Ma’aref fi Suriyya” Al-Muqtataf 7 (February 7, 1883), 391.

Distribution of female pupils and their schools across religious communities in Beirut 1889.

Community Number of students Number of schools Muslims 500 3

Greek Orthodox 310 3 Maronite 55 1

Greek Catholics - - Jesuits 200 1

Nuns of Charity 2000 4 Nuns of Nazareth 500 20 (?)

Italian 120 1 Jewish 90 1

Evangelican 2390 20 Source: Boutros Labaki, Education et Mobilite Sociate Dans la Societe Multicommunataire du Liban. Deutsches Institut Fuer Internationale Paedagogische Furschung, 1988. Table 80, P. 187.

Hania Abou Al-Shamat, USCHania Abou Al-Shamat, USC

The Nature of the Educational Divide

• Revisiting the existing data: InconclusiveMore Christians attended ‘modern’ schools than

Muslims did. Qualitative not necessarily quantitative difference

• Old typology: traditional vs. modern schools (criteria: religion)- Missionary schools: ‘genesis’ of modern education, yet religious- Private ‘modern’ schools: Religion and modern sciences

• New typology: old vs. new (new skills, mainly foreign languages)

Limited change and adaptability

• Evidence: opportunities not fully pursued (flexibility and innovations limited and dispersed)

• The process of change not built into the system, exceptionally practiced by judges and teachers to overcome inefficiencies

• Question: why small change did not accumulate into large-scale transformations?

• Approach: Analyze the system’s organization/structure and examine agents’ motives/incentives to change. Agents of change: qadis (judges), muftis (jurisconsults) and teachers

Effects of Waqf• Centrality of Waqf for social services: (mosques,

zawiyas, madrasas)• Static Perpetuity: Inflexibility & Stagnation

- Founder’s stipulation power of law

- Inflexibility & Stagnation

• Consequences

1. procedural stagnation ruined madrasas

2. Contextual stagnation (curriculum)

• Potential Flexibility:

- Procedural: Two legal devices to overcome inalienability: istibdal (exchange of property) & long-term leases (cases in Beirut and Sidon court records)

- Potential Contextual flexibility

Two Factors Limited Scale of Change within waqf

• individualistic structure of Islamic institutions

- limited impact and transmission

- Potential for dismissing innovation

• criteria of legitimacy being linked to the past

- Importance of chain of knowledge

- Reputation based on mastery of classical religious works, conformity to traditions

- Fitting changes into religious doctrine, rather than changing the doctrine

Founding Schools in late 19th Century

• Large-scale waqf founder’s motives altered (centralization policies)

(1) wealth shelter motive altered consequence (madrasas left with old waqfs)

- Beirut, 12 mosques and zawiyas supported by pre-19th century waqfs.

- Madrasas at the al-Mansouri mosque in Tripoli dated back to the 17th century.

(2) Political patronage decreased

• Alternative approach: resource pooling/small waqfs

• Maqased (1878) vs. Zahrat al-Ih}sa>n (1882)

Institutional Roots for differenceMuslims

• Lack of collective legal entity: waqfs small and atomistic- Madrasas at the Grand Mosque in Beirut (1843) supported by 203 waqfs, Fractions of apartments and revenues from small shops. - Maqa>s}id Schools (1878) small waqfs, revenue 100 qurush, fractions of apartments

• Lack of central manager

- Mosque (dependant)- lack collective flexibility

• Judicial limitations for innovative fund raising

Christians• Judicial Autonomy:

different waqf law: larger and collective waqfs- ‘Ain Waraqa school (1789) family-founded waqf- Zahrat al-Ihsan (1882) co-founders of waqf

• Central manager for community’s waqfs- Church (corporate body)- ‘Ain Waraqa (1789)- al-H}ikmih (1874)

• Innovative tools of funding

(life insurances)

Institutional Roots for Limited Provision of Modern Education

• Waqf Increased the cost of change, without blocking it

• Individualistic organization of Islamic Institutions confined frequency & scale of change

• Structure of legitimacy within Islamic Institutions Holding reform to what existed

• Lack of Collective Legal entity blocked resource pooling

• Central Management Lack of flexibility

Comprehensive two-sided explanation for an Educational discrepancy puzzle

1. At the demand side, a set of institutions rewarded Islamic education, kept it in demand (Journal of Islamic Studies 20, 3 (2009): 317-351)

1. At the supply side, Islamic institutions hindered Muslims’ ability for resource pooling, and institutional reform (Journal of Middle Eastern Studies, under submission)

Christians’ and Muslims’ Responses

Christians

- External trade- New financial services- Administration: top ranks- Teachers: indigenous

Christian and missionary schools

- Liberal professions- Need for new education

Muslims

- Internal trade- Old financial services- Administration: all

ranks- Teachers: Public and

Religious Schools- Old education suffices

Factors Affecting Muslims’ Choices

• Islamic Legal Institutions:

1. Muslims’ limited external trade

• State’s Reform policies:

2. Military conscription

3. Administration

4. Coexistence of Parallel Institutions

Why Study Educational Institutions & Reform in the Arab World?

• Central for economic & human development• Political indoctrination• Suggested scenarios for educational reform in the

Islamic/Arab world:

- increase funds to found new modern schools

Assumption

- transplant ‘American’ college institution

Question: Would these work?