Tarek Heggy
| Tarek Heggy | |
|---|---|
 |
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| Born | Port Said, Egypt |
| Nationality | Egyptian |
| Education | Ain Shams University, University of Geneva |
| Occupation | Writer, Intellectual, International Petroleum Strategist |
| Website | |
| http://www.tarek-heggy.com http://www.tarek-heggy-interviews.com/ | |
Tarek Heggy (Arabic: طارق حجى, IPA: [ˈtˤɑːɾˤeʔ ˈħeɡɡi]; born October 12, 1950, Port Said, Egypt) is a liberal Egyptian author, political thinker and international petroleum strategist. His extensive writings advocate the values of modernity, democracy, tolerance, and women's rights in the Middle East – advancing them as universal values essential to the region's progress. As one of the contemporary leading Egyptian liberal theoreticians, he has lectured at universities throughout the world, including Oxford University, the University of Tokyo, the University of Melbourne, Sydney University, Princeton University, Columbia University, King's College London, Colorado University, Colorado School of Mines, The Hayek Institute (Vienna), Erasmus University (The Netherlands), the American University in Cairo, and the University of California Berkeley.[1] Additionally, he has lectured at the European University (Rome), John Cabot University (Rome), and the University of Calabria (Italy) as well as Marrakesh (Morocco), Fes (Morocco), Zaytouna (Tunis) and Manouba (Tunis) universities. Due to his knowledge of the Middle East, he has been called upon to speak at various international institutions and think tanks, such as the Heritage Foundation, the Hudson Institute, the Washington Institute for Near East Policy, the National Endowment for Democracy, the American Enterprise Institute, the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, and the Council on Foreign Relations. Because of his intellectual project advocating universal human values, he also participates in international organizations addressing the holocaust and genocide, such as Project Aladdin[2] and the Stockholm International Forum.[3]
Tarek Heggy's main themes are the need for economic, political, cultural and educational reforms in Egypt and the Middle East. His liberal voice is part of the small but growing minority that calls for self criticism and massive reforms and that frankly admits the failures of the political ideologies/dogmas dominating Egypt and the Arab world. Moreover, this voice calls the conspiracy theories and overblown rhetoric that pervade the region signs of a cultural crisis that needs resolution. Finally, Tarek Heggy advocates the imperative need to develop a fair political ending to the Arab-Israeli conflict to enable all societies in the Middle East to move towards a pro-active phase of economic and social development. [4]
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[edit] Biography
Tarek Heggy was born in 1950, into the Egyptian upper-middle class and hometown of his parents, Port Said. Both his father and mother were fortunate enough to be highly educated, intellectual people who had been widely exposed to Western culture and civilization. They inculcated within him a love of reading and an appreciation of languages at a young age. As citizens of Port Said, Heggy’s parents were the offspring of the Suez Canal community and of an otherwise unique openness to the outside world.[5]
Tarek Heggy studied law (LL.B & LL.M) at Ain Shams University in Cairo, followed by higher degrees in Modern Management Techniques from the International Management Institute of Geneva University. From 1971 until 1979, he taught at the law schools of a number of North African Universities (Algeria and Morocco).[6]
In July 1979, Tarek Heggy joined a major multinational petroleum and gas corporation as a Gas and Oil attorney (1979–1985) and went on to become deputy to the Chairman of its Egypt branch (1985–1988). In 1988 he became the Chairman and CEO of a top oil and gas multinational corporation in the Middle East. He resigned on July 1, 1996 to devote his efforts to a wide range of intellectual and cultural activities.[6]
[edit] Affiliations
- Advisory Board of the Institute for the Study of Terrorism and Political Violence, Washington D.C.(US).
- Advisory Board of the RAND Organization "Centre for Middle East Public Policy" of the initiative for Middle Eastern Youth (IMEY)
- Advisory Board of Just Journalism (UK).
- Egypt Supreme Culture Council (Management Sciences Committee).
- The Egyptian Society for Historic Studies.
- MSA University ( Cairo , Egypt ).
- The Faculty of Economics and Political Sciences of Cairo University.
- The Middle East Research Centre of Ain Shams University (Cairo)
- The Arab Management Society.
- Egypt Bar Association.
- Egypt Writers Association.
- Heliopolis Library Chairman.
[edit] Honors
2008 Grinzane Cavour Award for cultural and literary achievement [7]
In 2008, Tarek Heggy (along with Professor Naim Mahlab) established the Tarek Heggy scholarship at the University of Toronto for post graduate studies in Comparative Jewish/Muslim relations.[8]
Tenth Anniversary Award Recipients/Arab World Books' Writers.[9]
Tarek Heggy participated in establishing (in 2000) the "Chair of Coptic Studies" at the American University in Cairo.[10]
[edit] Published works
Since April 1978, Tarek Heggy has written 17 books In Arabic and 28 overall in four languages. In addition, nearly 500 hundred published articles are posted as essays on his website. Examples of Tarek Heggy's writings may be found in French [1], English [2], Italian [3], Arabic [4], Hebrew [5], and Russian. [6]
Books in English:
- On Management and Petroleum Industry. 1991
- Egypt's Contemporary Problems. 1992
- Critique of Marxism. 1992
- Egyptian Political Essays. 2000
- Culture, Civilization & Humanity. (Published in the UK and US by Frank Cass) 2003 [7]
- The Fall of Socialism. 2009
- The Arab Cocoon. (Published by Vallentine Mitchell in the UK, US) 2010 [8]
- The Arab Mind Bound. (Valentine Mitchell Publishers, UK and US) 2011 [9]
Books in Arabic:
- Marxist Ideas In Balance. 1978
- Communism And Religion. 1980
- My Experience With Marxism. 1983
- What is to be done? 1986
- The Four Idols. 1988
- The Trinity of Destruction. 1990
- Egypt between two Earthquakes. 1991
- The Fateful Transformation. 1993
- Reflections on Egypt 's Realities. 1995
- Critique of the Arab Mind. 1998
- Culture First and Foremost. 2000
- The Values of Progress. 2001
- On the Egyptian Mind. 2003
- Margins on The Egyptian Mind. 2004
- Modern Management in the contemporary Arab Societies. 2006
- The Imprisonment of the Arab Mind. (Merit Publishers, Cairo) 2009
- Our Culture Between Illusion and Reality. 2009
Books in French:
- L'inéluctable Transformation. 1991
- Le Djinn Radical. (Published by L'Harmattan, Paris) 2010 [10]
Books in Italian:
- Le Prigioni Della Mente Araba (translated by Valentina Columbo). (Published by Marietti 1820 - Casa Editrice Marietti, Milan Italy) 2010 [11]
[edit] Interviews and videos
La Stampa interview with Tarek Heggy. "The revolution is not over." [12]
BBC HARDTalk interview with Tarek Heggy (04/07/11) Part One [13]
BBC HARDTalk interview with Tarek Heggy (04/07/11) Part Two [14]
Liberal Egyptian author Tarek Heggy on the phenomenon of Islamism [15]
On the Muslim Brotherhood [16]
Tarek Heggy on Separation of Mosque and State—Part One [17]
Tarek Heggy on Separation of mosque and State—Part Two [18]
Multiple video interviews in Arabic, English, and French [19]
Elaph interview with Tarek Heggy conducted by Sabry Khalil. [20]
The Brain of Tarek Heggy [21]
Rhapsody Face to Face: Tarek Heggy Interview [22]
[edit] Debates
Tareq (Heggy) vs. Tariq (Ramadan) [23]
The BBC/Doha Debate on the Separation of Mosque and State [24]
[edit] Selected articles
The Egyptian Revolution
Compromise Needed on All Sides [25]
Egypt's Revolution: What Happened? [26]
Placing the Arab Revolutions in a Philosophical Context [27]
A Comment on What Happened [28]
Political Islam
The Reality of the Muslim Brotherhood [29]
Militant Islam: Questions for the West [30]
The Proliferation of the Radical Jinni [31]
The Erosion of the Middle Class...and its Consequence [32]
Islam Today: Interpretations of Islam [33]
On the U.S./Islamists Dialogue [34]
Brotherhood With Ambitions [35]
The worst-case scenario [36]
The Arab Mindset and Reform
Religious Reform: Cornerstone of Reform in the Arab Societies [37]
Ten Random Observations [38]
The Prisons of the Arab Mind [39]
Islam Between Copying and Thinking [40]
The Seven Pillars of Terrorism [41]
Believing in Conspiracy [42]
No More Than A "Refuge" [43]
Religious Education in the Balance [44]
The Arab-Israeli Conflict: Between Reason and Hysteria [45]
Our Need For a Culture of Compromise [46]
Opinion
Three Intractable Dilemmas [47]
Democracy
Beyond the Ballot Box [48]
On Lebanon
Once Again: On Hizbu'Allah [49]
Hamas and Hizbu'Allah: Sub-Contractors [50]
Filled With Grief [51]
Saudi Arabia
The King and the Sword [52]
Let The Sane of Saudi Arabia Unite [53]
If I Were A Shi'ite From Saudi Arabia [54]
Egyptian Christians
If I Were A Copt [55]
The Suffering of the Copts in Egypt [56]
Reflections on the Coptic Question [57]
[edit] What others say
- "A courageous and distinctive voice from Egypt." Tarek Heggy provides "a candid and provocative inside view of the current problems of the Arab world". Bernard Lewis, Cleveland E. Dodge Professor Emeritus of Near Eastern Studies, Princeton University.
- "Tarek Heggy is perhaps the Arab world's leading intellectual light and certainly one of its most prolific thinkers and writers. (H)is latest work reminds us all once more of his originality of thought, the breadth and depth of his learning and his intellectual courage". Efraim Karsh, Middle East and Mediterranean Studies, King's College London.
- "Tarek Heggy is one of the most creative and prolific writers in the Arab world. His writings probe the political and social limits and present a refreshing message of self-reliance that challenges the prevailing sense that regional ills are largely made abroad". Shibley Telhami, Anwar Sadat Professor for Peace and development at the University of Maryland and Senior Fellow at the Brookings Institution.
- "Tarek Heggy can rightly be considered the liberal conscience, in the nineteenth-century British sense, of modern Arab society. He challenges the notion of an Arab civilization as desirable paradigm with its unique traditions. Instead, he maintains that universal values like humanism, progress, responsibility and choice produce democracy, civil society as well as cultural and economic integration. He argues that modern Arab society's inability or unwillingness to integrate those universal values has led to its failure in achieving results evident in the West as well as in certain successfully developing economies. Heggy's courageous indictment of religious obscurantism, political authoritarianism, bureaucratic sycophancy, and collective cynicism paves the way toward his vision of a shared global heritage informed by relevant education systems, the work ethic, efficient time management, and meritocracies." Jean-Marc Ran Oppenheim, Teachers College, Columbia University.
- “Having discovered that there is no equivalent in the Arabic language, classical or colloquial, for the word “compromise”, Tarek Heggy invented his own “cultural compromise”. This led him to advocate cultural tolerance and acceptance of the “Other”, and to argue for progress as a human product, modernity, the universality of science and knowledge, democracy and civil society. An academic, intellectual, economist and one of the world's top petroleum strategists, he is also a managerial wizard. Many consider his books on management a recipe for curing the ills of Egypt." Adel Darwish
- "Tarek Heggy's book is one of the most interesting and important works to come out of the Arab world in a long time. At the very moment when the debate over change or continuity, democracy or dictatorship is at its height, Heggy brilliantly analyses the causes and solutions of Arab problems and paradoxes." Professor Barry Rubin, Director, Global Research in International Affairs Center and Editor, Middle East Review of International Affairs.
[edit] See also
[edit] References
- ^ Tarek Heggy - An Egyptian Creative liberal intellectual, One of the most quoted Arab thinkers on the web
- ^ http://www.projetaladin.org/en/why-this-web-site/committee-on-conscience.html?searched=tarek+heggy&advsearch=oneword&highlight=ajaxSearch_highlight+ajaxSearch_highlight1+ajaxSearch_highlight2
- ^ http://www.preventgenocide.org/prevent/conferences/StockholmDeclaration28Jan2004.htm
- ^ Hoover Institution - Policy Review - A Reformer in Egypt
- ^ Tarek Heggy - An Egyptian Creative liberal intellectual, One of the most quoted Arab thinkers on the web
- ^ a b Tarek Heggy
- ^ http://www.adnkronos.com/AKI/English/Religion/?id=3.0.2693433883
- ^ http://cjs.utoronto.ca/node/75
- ^ http://www.arabworldbooks.com/events/TenthAnniversary/awards2.html
- ^ Cairo.http://www.aucegypt.edu/giving/supportstudy/Pages/Professorships.aspx
