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This paper delves into the critical role of women in the domains of architecture, engineering, construction and urban planning, particularly within the context of the United Nations sustainable development goals (SDGs) and the imperative of achieving gender parity. Concentrating on the Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) countries, this paper explores the profound importance of women as essential contributors to urbanisation and sustainable development. It scrutinizes the existing gender disparities within the architecture, engineering and construction (AEC) industries; evaluates prevailing women empowerment indices in diverse sectors; and presents a strategic framework for harnessing women’s engagement to cultivate inclusive and sustainable urban cultures in the GCC. This conceptual paper introduces an actionable framework that can serve as a guiding agenda for empowering women in the AEC sectors by incorporating their socio-cultural, economic and ecological contributions towards creating sustainable cities.

Centring its focus on Gulf Cities, this paper employs a comprehensive approach to examine the current gender disparities within the architecture, engineering and construction sectors. It probes potential barriers and advocates for leveraging women’s participation to foster inclusive and sustainable urban development in the GCC. The study introduces the Women’s Empowerment Index (WEI) for the Gulf AEC industry elucidating how these measures are translated into a tailored framework.

The paper presents a practical framework that provides actionable guidance for engaging various stakeholders, including governments, academia and industry players, to empower women within the AEC industries. An “Agenda for equitable AEC industries for sustainable urban development: Our Common Gulf Cities” is culminated in a Women Empowerment Index for the AEC Industry (WEI-AEC) designed to serve as a guidance tool to monitor progress within industry, governments and academia.

Future research endeavours could advance the framework by conducting institutional support analyses, multi-stakeholder collaboration studies and practical testing of the framework within real-world scenarios.

The findings of this study can guide and influence a diverse range of initiatives, including policy development, educational strategies, corporate endeavours, awareness campaigns, capacity-building programs, skill enhancement initiatives and knowledge exchange among the Gulf Cooperation Council countries.

This conceptual paper introduces a practical framework that can serve as a roadmap for implementing the study’s potential to shape policies, educational programs and corporate initiatives aimed at advancing both gender equality and the development of sustainable cities.

This paper aims to test the influence of external information search (EIS) on knowledge elaboration and group cognitive complexity (GCC) under the moderating effect of absorptive capacity (AC is indicated by prior knowledge base and gender diversity).

The results of three studies (one field study and two experimental studies) are reported. The first study tests the interaction between EIS and the two dimensions of AC on group knowledge elaboration in a sample of 65 organizational groups. In the second study, EIS was directly manipulated and the interaction with AC in a sample of 65 groups was tested. In the last experimental study, the AC of the boundary spanner (highest level of expertise versus lowest level of expertise) was manipulated and the effects of EIS in a sample of 37 groups were tested.

The first study reveals a significant interaction between EIS and prior knowledge base on knowledge elaboration and points toward a compensatory interplay of EIS and AC on GCC. The results of the second study indicate that EIS increases the time spent on task, as well as the efficiency of knowledge integration (GCC per unit of time). Furthermore, EIS has the strongest positive effect on GCC in groups in which at least one of the AC dimensions is average or high. The results of the last study show that the AC of the boundary spanner compensates for the lack of absorptive capacity of the group and also show that the cognitive distance between the boundary spanner and the rest of the group has a negative influence on the efficiency of knowledge integration in groups.

The limitations of Study 1, common to non-experimental research (related to causality), are dealt with in the second and third studies that establish causality between EIS and GCC.

The paper has important implications for the management of information search effort in organizational groups, in particular the groups are advised to: engage in EIS to increase their cognitive repertoire and cognitive complexity, delegate, when possible, their most competent members to engage in boundary spanning activities as they will maximize the cognitive benefits of EIS and finally minimize the cognitive dissimilarity between the boundary spanner and the rest of the group to facilitate the effective integration of novel insights into the group cognition.

This study is among the first empirical attempts to uncover the causal effect of EIS on knowledge elaboration and GCC in groups and to uncover the role of the boundary spanner in the EIS efforts.

This study aims to analyze the impact of Arab Revolution on the Arabian Gulf security by applying on Yemeni Revolution. This can be achieved by analyzing the threat of Arab Spring Revolutions to the national security of the Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) countries after the breakout of demonstrations and protests in some of the member states. In addition to its analysis of threat of the Regional Security of the Gulf as a result of Yemeni Revolution and Civil War and Iranian intervention to support Houthis within light of regional anarchy and security competition according to the Neorealism and how the GCC Countries face such threats.

The study depended on the historical methodology to track the developments of some events related to the Gulf Security and crisis in Yemen. Moreover, it used the analytical approach to analyze the impact of Arab Revolutions and Yemeni Civil War on the Arab Gulf Security. In addition, it depended on the realistic approach to explain the security state at the national and regional level of the Arab Gulf countries within light of regional anarchy, security competition and Iranian support to Houthis “Non-State Actors” (Kenneth Waltz), as well as the offensive realism (John Mearsheimer).

The Arab Revolutions had an effect on the national security of GCC countries according to the Neorealism due to the breakout of demonstrations and protests in Saudi Arabia, Kuwait and Sultanate of Oman which reached to the degree of threatening the existence of the state as in Bahrain. The Gulf Regional Security is influenced by Revolution and Civil War in Yemen as a result of that Iranian support to Houthis within light of security competition between Iran and Saudi Arabia, leading to the threat of the Arabian Gulf Security as Yemen is the southern gate to the GCC Countries and having joint borders with Saudi Arabia and Sultanate of Oman. Moreover, the GCC countries dealt with that threat individually, such as, performing internal reforms, or collectively through using military force, such as Bahrain and Yemen (Offensive Realism).

This study is an introduction to explain the Arab Spring Revolutions, conflict in Yemen and its threat to the Arab Gulf Security according to the Neorealism based on that the GCC countries sought to keep its existence and sovereignty in confrontation to the demonstrations and internal protests and to keep the regional security in confrontation to the threats of neighboring countries such as the Civil War in Yemen and the Iranian Support to Houthis in light of the regional anarchy.

This paper aims to explore and analyse stakeholders’ perceptions of the development priorities and suggests more effective strategies to assist sustainable economic growth in the United Arab Emirates (UAE).

The authors use the World Bank data set, which collects various stakeholders’ opinions on the UAE development. First, the exploratory factor analysis has been applied to detect the main groups of development priorities. Second, the fuzzy cluster analysis has been conducted to detect the groups of stakeholders with different attitudes towards the importance of extracted groups of priorities. Third, clusters have been compared according to demographics, media usage and shared prosperity goals.

The two main groups of development priorities have been extracted by the exploratory factor analysis: economic priorities and sustainability priorities. Four clusters have been detected according to the level of motivation when it comes to the economic and sustainability priorities: Cluster 1 (High economic – High sustainability), Cluster 2 (High economic – Medium sustainability), Cluster 3 (High economic – Low sustainability) and Cluster 4 (Low economic – Low sustainability). Members of the cluster that prefer a high level of economic and sustainability priorities (Cluster 1) also prefer more diversified economic growth providing better employment opportunities and better education and training for young people in the UAE.

Limitations stem from the survey being conducted on a relatively small sample using the data collected by the World Bank; however, this data set allowed a comparison of various stakeholders. Future research should consider a broader sample approach, e.g. exploring and comparing all of the Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) countries; investigating the opinions of the expatriate managers living in the UAE that are not from GCC countries; and/or including other various groups that are lagging, such as female entrepreneurs.

Several practical implications were identified regarding education and media coverage. Since respondents prioritize the economic development factors over sustainability factors, a media campaign could be developed and executed to increase sustainability awareness. A campaign could target especially male citizens since the analysis indicates that males are more likely to affirm high economic and low sustainability priorities than females. There is no need for further diversification of media campaigns according to age since the analysis did not reveal relevant differences in age groups, implying there is no inter-generational gap between respondents.

This paper contributes to the literature by comparing the perceived importance of various development goals in the UAE, such as development priorities and shared prosperity indicators. The fuzzy cluster analysis has been used as a novel approach to detect the relevant groups of stakeholders in the UAE and their developmental priorities. The issue of media usage and demographic characteristics in this context has also been discussed.

Despite various governmental efforts, female entrepreneurship in the UAE is still not a popular option among women. The purpose of this study is to identify the enablers to female entrepreneurship and to establish relationships among them.

This research uses a two-phased approach. In the first-phase, an empirical study on female entrepreneurs was conducted to find out the most important enablers from among a set of variables identified through a comprehensive literature review. In the second-phase, using interpretive structural modeling, a hierarchy-based model is developed among the most important enablers. Further, these enablers are also classified depending on their driving power and dependence.

Survey results indicate that female entrepreneurs consider enablers as the driving force in creating an entrepreneurial culture. Further, the hierarchy-based model developed in this research helps to identify variables that are of strategic importance and require utmost attention.

The framework presented in this study can be used effectively by the policymakers to develop suitable strategies for improving entrepreneurial behavior among women in the United Arab Emirates.

The novelty of this approach is the integration of questionnaire and interpretive structural modeling methodology and classifying enablers in four clusters. The research provides useful insights about the perception of female entrepreneurs about the entrepreneurial culture in the United Arab Emirates, and a relationship model that may serve as a decision tool for improving female entrepreneurship.

This paper aims to systematically review the existing studies on the relationship of Sharī'ah governance (SG), as represented by the Sharī'ah supervisory board (SSB), with firm performance of Islamic banks (IBs), to suggest opportunities for future research in this field.

By adopting a systematic literature review, 21 empirical and theoretical papers published in Scopus concerning the relationship between SSB and performance of IBs were selected for review and analysis.

In light of the existing research studies' limitations, this paper suggests that the effect of SSB on IBs' performance still requires more empirical analyses using alternative analytical methods, alternative measures, and different periods (during crisis and non-crisis). Besides that, these studies should take into account the differences across jurisdictions in their SG models, the degree of agencies' intervention in SG practices, the control over cross-memberships of scholars, and the differences across IBs in the position of SSB in the organization structure.

The analysis undertaken in this paper would address the literature gaps on the effect of SSB on IBs' performance as this study serves as a guide for the researchers, academicians, and interested researchers from Islamic international autonomous non-for-profit organizations, e.g. AAOIFI and IFSB in research related to this important area. Importantly, the findings of this study would support regulators and related authorities across jurisdictions with suggestions on improving the current SG practices.

This paper presents a critical review of the existing research on SSB and IB performance and suggests new variables, measurements, analytical methods, and new issues for researchers in this area. Thus, it identifies the literature gap that still needs further empirical investigation and a suitable way to close it.