Abedtalas, Musallam

Abedtalas, Musallam

Job Title

Dr. Öğr. Üyesi

Main Affiliation

KONAKLAMA İŞLETMECİLİĞİ BÖLÜMÜ

Status

Former Staff

Full item page

Scholarly Output

16

Articles

12

Citation Count

0

Supervised Theses

0 Scholarly Output Search Results

Now showing 1 - 10 of 16

Syrian higher education and social capital in times of conflict
(University College London, 2020) Abedtalas, Musallam
This paper explores the role of higher education (HE) in fostering social capital as a means of building a sustainable peace in Syria. We draw on a qualitative study in Northeast Syria to argue that the HE sector is currently playing a negative to weak role in developing social capital as it is highly politicised and suffers from outdated curricula and unsuitable teaching approaches.
The Factors of Residents' Support for Sustainable Tourism Development
(AHM International, 2016) Abedtalas, Musallam; Toprak, Lokamn
In this paper we examined the factors of residents’ support for sustainable tourism development in Mardin city-Turkey, in the context of gender as social structure. We found that people are sensitive about positive and negative effects of tourism, in association with society attachment and involvement, with bigger role for the later. And the perceptions of positive effects reduce their evaluation of the negative effects. Also we found that women are less active in transforming their attitude toward the effects of tourism to behavior toward sustainable tourism. But they are ready, more than men, to support sustainable tourism and ignore its negative effects, in spite of their higher sensitivity for the negative effects. So we recommend raising the role of local community and giving women more chances in the different levels of tourism activities.
The Determinants of Tourism Demand in Turkey
(AHM International, 2015) Abedtalas, Musallam
Using data oftheinboundtourist arrivalsto Turkeyfrom France, Germany,UK, US,andNetherlands over the period 1986-2012, we appliedautoregressive distributed lag (ARDL) approach to test for cointegration, and we estimated long run model anderror correction model for tourism demand. The results referred that the most significant factor determines inboundtourist flows arethereal per capita income and realeffective exchange. We found weakeffects for price and financial crisis, but the political events playedastrong role differed from country to other.The added value of this article is the estimation of international tourism demandinTurkey using new approach and the newest data for Turkey
The State of Higher Education in Syria Pre-2011
(Cara, 2019) Abedtalas, Musallam
Higher education will play a key role in rebuilding Syria – a country torn apart by more than seven years of war and destruction – and will be crucial to rebuilding both the lives of those who have remained in Syria and of those who will return. It is our hope, as members of the joint Cambridge and Syrian team who undertook this project, that the report will contribute to that reconstruction by informing the debate on future reform. The purpose of this project is threefold: • To assist displaced Syrian academics living in Turkey (henceforward known as the Syrian research team, or co-researchers) by conducting a collaborative enquiry with colleagues from the University of Cambridge Faculty of Education, in order to build the co-researchers’ capacity by introducing them to, and engaging them in, a qualitative study of higher education in Syria. • To facilitate the continued contribution of Syrian academics in exile to addressing the challenges facing Syria • To inform strategic planning on the future of Syria’s higher education sector, by providing a background study on higher education in Syria in the lead-up to the 2011 crisis
Testimonies of Syrian Academic Displacement Post-2011: Time, place and the agentic self
(Elsevier, 2020) Abedtalas, Musallam; Alokla, Wissam Aldin
This article explores the experiences of protracted displacement in a group of 19 displaced Syrian academics now living in Turkey who are often referred to as the ‘precariat’ – that is, a group or collective of people who are living in conditions of high unpredictability, insecurity and uncertainty. As part of a small-scale collaborative professional enquiry semi-structured interviews with these academics were conducted to understand the social, affective and professional experiences, needs and concerns of the academics during and after their forced displacement. The key concepts of ‘precarity’ and ‘crises of selfhood’ alongside memory and testimony, inform the analysis. This article seeks to provide an account of this collective experience and its complex character and concludes with observations on how one might understand the constraints on professional agency and how might one support displaced academics in such contexts. Solidarity in exile and the development of political friendships are argued for as a principle to inform all work.
PRO POOR TOURISM IN MARDIN
(2018) Abedtalas, Musallam; Toprak, Lokman; Abedtalas, Musallam
We did our best to meet the benefits of pro poor tourism based on a series of aspects. On the one hand, the theoretical studies which try to explore pro poor tourism as a concept, to define it, find its theoretical roots in the specialized literature referring to growth and development, and to evaluate the ability of tourism to be pro poor by using its own characteristics. On the other hand, the empirical studies, which are very scarce, tried to measure the role of tourism in poverty alleviation both at a macro and micro level. At the micro level, they studied the activities which had the formal task of being pro poor. However, no one tried to measure the extent to which tourism activities are pro poor by themselves, without any formal task or plan.
Tourism and Economic Growth in Turkey: Disaggregated Approach
(2017) Abedtalas, Musallam
To enhance our understand of the relationship between tourism and economic growth, we used quarterly data ofTurkey between 2003q1-2014q4, disaggregated tourism variable into many segments according to tourismmotivation and tested the hypothesis that different segments of tourism have different effects on economic growth.We used Johansen co-integration test, estimated Error Correction Model ECM, and found a long rung causationfrom tourism segments to economic growth, but we did not find short term causation. By estimating the long runmodel, we found that different segments of tourism have different effects on economic growth. The most importantsegment was leisure tourism followed by business tourism. Visiting relatives has insignificant effect, while shoppingtourism has negative and insignificant effect. The results affirmed our hypothesis. The added value of our article ismixing microeconomic and macroeconomic approach in studying TLG.
'We are still here': The stories of Syrian academics in exile
(2018) Abedtalas, Musallam
Purpose – The purpose of this paper is twofold: first, to generate insight into the experiences of Syrian academics in exile in Turkey; and second, to explore approaches to collaboration and community building among academics in exile and with counterparts in the international academic community. Design/methodology/approach – The study employs a hybrid visual-autobiographical narrative methodology, embedded within a large group process (LGP) design. Findings – Findings are presented in two phases: the first phase presents a thematic analysis of narrative data, revealing the common and divergent experiences of 12 exiled academics. The second phase presents a reflective evaluation of undertaking the LGP and its implications for community building and sustaining Syrian academia in exile. Research limitations/implications – While this is a qualitative study with a small participant group, and therefore does not provide a basis for statistical generalisation, it offers rich insight into Syrian academics’ lived experiences of exile, and into strategies implemented to support the Syrian academic community in exile. Practical implications – The study has practical implications for academic development in the contexts of conflict and exile; community building among dispersed academic communities; educational interventions by international NGOs and the international academic community; and group process design. Originality/value – The study makes an original contribution to the limited literature on post-2011 Syrian higher education by giving voice to a community of exiled academics, and by critically evaluating a strategic initiative for supporting and sustaining Syrian academia. This represents significant, transferable insight for comparable contexts
Conflict, insecurity and the political economies of higher education: The case of Syria post-2011
(Emerald Group Holdings Ltd., 2018) Abedtalas, Musallam; Dillabough, Jo-Anne; Fimyar, Olena; McLaughlin, Colleen; Al-Azmeh, Zeina; Abdullateef, Shaher
This paper stems from a 12-month collaborative enquiry between a group of Syrian academics in exile in Turkey and academics from the University of Cambridge into the state of Syrian Higher Education after the onset of the conflict in 2011. The purpose of this paper is to draw on 19 open-ended interviews with exiled Syrian academics; two focus groups; mapping and timeline exercises; and 117 interviews collected remotely by collaborating Syrian academics with former colleagues and students who were still living inside Syria at the time of data collection. The findings of the research suggest that Syrian HE after 2011 was fragmented across regions; in some cases non-existent, and in others deemed to be in a state of reform in order to meet student needs. Key issues that emerged from this work are human rights’ abuses directed against academics and students including the detainment, purging and kidnapping of academics, an increased militarisation of university life and a substantive loss of academic and human capital. Design/methodology/approach – The overall design involved two workshops held in Turkey (in June and July, 2017) at which the Cambridge team explained the stages of undertaking qualitative research and planned the collaborative enquiry with Syrian co-researchers. The first workshop addressed the nature of qualitative research and explored the proposed methods of interviewing, using timelines and mapping. The instruments for interviewing were constructed in groups together and mapping was undertaken with the 21 Syrian academics in exile who attended the workshop. Syrian academics also built their own research plans as a way of expanding the consultation dimension of this project inside Syria, engaged in survey and interview protocol planning and discussed ways to access needed documentation which could be drawn upon to enrich the project. The Syrian coresearchers interviewed remotely HE staff and students who had remained in, or recently left, Syria; the key criterion for group or participant selection was that they had recent and relevant experience of Syrian HE. The second workshop focused on data analysis and writing up. There was also wide consultation with participants inside and outside Syria. As part of the research, the Cambridge team conducted open-ended interviews with 19 Syrian academics and students living in exile in Turkey. This involved interviewing Syrian scholars about their experiences of HE, policy changes over time and their experiences of displacement. The researchers developed this protocol prior to the capacity-building workshops based on previous research experience on academic and student displacement, alongside extensive preparation on the conditions of Syrian HE, conflict and displacement. In addition to interviewing, a pivotal element of methodological rigour was that the authors sought to member check what participants were learning through mapping and timeline exercises and extensive note-taking throughout both workshops. The major issues that the authors confronted were ethical concerns around confidentiality, the need to ensure rigourously the protection of all participants’ anonymity and to be extremely mindful of the political sensitivity of issues when interviewing participants who may not feel able to fully trust “outsider” researchers. Issues of social trust have been reported in the literature as one of the most significant drawbacks in conducting research in “conflict environments” (see Cohen and Arieli, 2011) where academics and students have been working and/or studying in autocratic regimes or were operating within political contexts where being open or critical of any form of institutional life such as university work or the nation could cost them their jobs or their lives. Findings – The accounts of Syrian academics and students emerging from this work point to some of the state-building expressions of HE manifested in the shaping of professional and personal experiences, the condition and status of HE, its spatial arrangements and their associated power formations, and resulting infeelings of intense personal and professional insecurity among Syrian scholars and students since 2011. While acknowledging that the Syrian situation is deemed one of the worst humanitarian crises in the region in recent decades, these accounts resonate, if in different ways, with other studies of academics and students who have experienced highly centralised and autocratic states and tightly regulated HE governance regimes (Barakat and Milton, 2015; Mazawi, 2011). Originality/value – Currently, there is virtually no research on the status and conditions of higher education in Syria as a consequence of the war, which commenced in 2011. This work presents a first-person perspective from Syrian academics and students on the state of HE since the onset of the conflict. The major contribution of this work is the identification of key factors shaping conflict and division in HE, alongside the political economies of HE destruction which are unique to the Syrian war and longstanding forms of authoritarian state governance
Turizm Ekonomisi
(DETAY YAYINCILIK, 2017) Toprak, Lokman; Abedtalas, Musallam; Toprak, Lokman; Abedtalas, Musallam
Tourism as a subject of interdisciplinary scientific thinking is based on the application of relevant theories from different mother theories in order to contribute to a better understanding and mastering of problems of the real world of tourism. The mother discipline of the course is economics which is applied to tourism, more precisely tourism economics based on theories of international economics, new economic geography, industrial economics, environmental economics, and new political economics. The theoretical objective is to contribute to a body of knowledge which can sooner or later establish tourism economics as a sub-discipline of its self.