By Will Donovan | original source

THE HAGUE, Netherlands: The conference center at The Hague is buzzing with activity as six students from American University of Beirut (AUB) discussed with The Daily Star their future plans after they receive their Bachelor’s Degrees. They are the delegation representing AUB at this year’s World Model UN Conference, hosted in the shadow of the International Criminal Court.

It is an interesting question to pose to these ambitious AUB students who had traveled all the way to The Hague to represent their school, their country and their culture. The resounding answer from all six was largely to be expected:

“Graduate school in Europe.” “Graduate school in America.” After that? “Work in the Gulf…” “Europe…” “America…”

While each member of the AUB delegation confronted stereotypes, bureaucracy, and chilly North Sea weather in The Hague this past week, all reported the conference a “huge success.”

The six-person AUB delegation, “representing” the role of the GCC state Qatar, sat with The Daily Star Friday afternoon to discuss their experience at Dutch-organized event, featuring over 2,400 students representing 275 universities and 53 countries.

Sitting in a quiet lobby away from the thousands of foreign students engaging in endless simulated debate, the AUB delegation talked about their Model UN organization. Sally Meouche, the head of the delegation, told The Daily Star that, not only was Model UN a “growing movement in the Arab World,” noting that the 2006 World Model UN event was hosted at Sharm El-Sheikh in Egypt, she added that, “overall the average awareness of Arab political and cultural realities is growing as well.”

The consensus was that, “Misconceptions are variable.”

“This is all about cooperation, learning and social events – we meet a lot of people and when they hear we’re from Lebanon they want to know more, they want to help out. Students who are interested in the Middle East [and] who are in Model UN aren’t interested in being spies … they’re interested in making the region a better place.”said Maya Sabban.

“The delegation from the University of North Carolina represented Jordan at this conference – their understanding of the country, its challenges, its attitudes and its overall strategy was amazing. They told me they had met with the Jordanian ambassador to the US, and their portrayal of Jordan was very realistic,” Meouche said.

The AUB delegation also stressed how important it was that they were here representing Lebanon as students and as citizens, given that “obviously there are some misconceptions of who the Arabs are.”

“Yes, I do get asked whether we ride camel, but overall I was impressed at the degree of understanding and knowledge. The students who participate in Model UN are from all over the world, and they know a lot more about foreign peoples, cultures and politics than your average University student,” Ghassan Nassif told The Daily Star.

Other American and European teams were sometimes, “overly optimistic or idealistic in their portrayal of Arab nations,” but, “it’s good that we’re here to correct them.” As an example, the American team representing Syria acquiesced to UN monitors – said Ghassan, “I had to yell at them – obviously that wouldn’t happen in real life.”

The AUB delegation is planning a Model UN event in Beirut this July, and they stressed how important it was that foreign students who come to the event also get out to see the country. “We will be accommodating our guests in Hamra because of its proximity to student life at both AUB and LAU, and we will be sure to show them the many faces of Lebanon – the historical sites, the clubs and bars, the mountains and the sea – so that they get a full picture of Lebanon while they’re here,” Dina Kfouri told The Daily Star.

It is easy to see how important Model UN is to these students – equally obvious is the degree to which they believe that Model UN, which enjoys near universal participation at colleges and universities around the world, is a force for international understanding.

Asked what their impressions were of the event in The Hague, the AUB delegation all agreed that “it was a success,” their only complaint being that, “there were so many [participants that] it was hard to debate and to meet people.”

The also complained that the scope and size of the event made it difficult to get things done, and “committee sizes were so big that they were crippled.”

Evidently, the event was simply too realistic; endless bureaucracy, circular debate and a cacophony of too many voices and interests are recurring problems of the real UN.

The Daily Star also took some time to speak with some of the event organizers from the Dutch Model UN club. Based at Radboud University in Nymegen, these Dutch students were responsible for putting on one of Model UN’s biggest events.

Annalise Rietveld, Director of PR and Communications for “WorldMUN 2009,” told The Daily Star organizing this year’s World Model UN conference took a “full year” and the work of “14 dedicated students.”

“We’re really happy, it was a huge success. We haven’t slept in weeks but we’re just happy that it went so well. We’ve had lots of compliments,” she added.

Many say they skip demonstrations out of opposition to organizers

BEIRUT: Protests continued in Lebanon and around the world this week, calling for an end to Israeli hostilities and global action to stop what the UN Human Rights Council on Monday called “grave” abuses committed over the past 18 days of violence in the Gaza Strip.

As Israeli tanks moved closer toward the center of Gaza City Monday, and the death toll rose beyond 900 lives, many of them women and children, The Daily Star went to the Beirut neighborhoods of Achrafieh and Mazraa for a local perspective on whether protesting against the Israeli war in Gaza would be effective in ending hostilities.

Respondents generally expressed pessimism, believing that protesting against the current war, both locally and abroad, would have little effect on international action to halt the violence that has cost so many Palestinian lives over the past few weeks.

Many said that their political apathy, and their lack of faith in the political parties that are often demonstrating, namely Hizbullah, kept them from participating in protests. This attitude was manifested on the streets of both Achrafieh and Mazraa.

In Achrafieh, Mariet said: “I don’t think that protesting will accomplish anything. I’m not political, so no I would not protest.”

Nearby, George echoed her sentiments: “No, it’s not going to change anything. I’m not political, so I won’t protest myself, but even if I was, protesting is not going to change the situation in Gaza.”

Colette, 40, said: “I reject Israel’s policy and I blame the Lebanese government for its lack of action regarding Gaza. I regret that only Hizbullah and Palestinians are protesting in Lebanon. I don’t support Hizbullah so I cannot protest with them.”

Two younger women nearby, Samia and Nour, echoed her sentiments, that they wished to protest, but did not wish to protest or stand with Hizbullah. But they said they were, “shocked by the deaths of children and women.”

Down the street, Amir, an Armenian living in Beirut, expressed a similar lack of faith in any progressive action stemming from protesting, but went further in his analysis: “Look, it’s a genocide, and I’m Armenian. I know all about that. But it doesn’t matter what [protesters] say … How many times have there been protests? Protests of 1.5 million people even! Is there any change? There has been 25 years of war, at least. The problem is political and when we’re talking about politicians, what will protests accomplish?”

Still, Amir believed that “if someone has a view to resist, and he’s defending his home, let him resist, and let him protest.” Regarding global protests, he said: “Maybe it will have an effect. I don’t know.”

Claude, 55, said: “I regret that Christian parties are not organizing protests in Achrafieh. For some it might seem like Gaza’s situation is a Muslim problem, but all Lebanese people should be concerned. I recognize Israel’s right to defend itself as well as the Palestinians.’ I think Lebanon’s government is the best among Arab governments … It gave $1 million to the Gazans and I am expecting good results from it. Giving money is [better] than protesting in the streets.”

Nadine took a more radical tone. “I’m very shocked by this systematic targeting of innocents such as children and women in Gaza, but I can’t help thinking that it is not Lebanon’s problem. Lebanon should try to focus on its own problems. Our best solution is isolation. We welcomed Palestinians in our country 60 years ago and it created a lot of problems. Media are always defending the weakest, but I don’t think that the weakest are always innocent. All these protests are useless. We should focus on the next legislative elections. Besides, in a democracy, the only legitimate way of protesting is to vote.”

In Mazraa, Osama told The Daily Star that “protesting isn’t going to change anything, and ultimately it won’t bring anything good for the Palestinians.”

However, further down the street, Mohammad was more vocal: “Israel is doing something terrible. They’re using phosphorous bombs, committing war crimes, and they should stop it. There is no reason for this war, and if there is a reason, they should give us one. There are poor people in Gaza, women and children. How can they say this war is with Hamas? However, I don’t believe that the Palestinians who are here and in [the Occupied West Bank] are doing enough.” Asked about protesting specifically, he replied, “I don’t know. It gives an opinion, and that’s important. I will protest if I feel I have to.”

At a jewelry shop in Mazraa, Samer said: “Locally, I don’t think protests will accomplish anything. But globally, I do think so. Perhaps it will change the stance of people in Europe or America to see protesters standing with the Palestinians. But in the Arab world, no. It will not change anything. So no, I would not protest myself here in Lebanon. It is meaningless here.”

Ahmad, a 21-year-old journalist in Mazraa, was more positive. He told The Daily Star that “Lebanon is the only Middle Eastern country where you can protest without fearing to be arrested, unlike Egypt or Syria. We all know that protesting in Beirut can create a ‘domino effect’ in the Arab world.”

But unfortunately, Amhad’s sentiments were not shared by most Beirutis, who felt that no amount of vocal protests would change or solve the Gazans’ current predicament as they face violent siege at the hands of the Israeli military.

BEIRUT: A Carnegie Middle East Center Seminar Thursday at the Rotana Gefinor Hotel in Hamra discussed the effects and repercussions of the Gaza war and the two-year Gaza siege. The discussion did not break much new ground, pointing familiar fingers and shying away from serious analysis on the role of civil society and the prospects of legal challenges to this latest Israeli action on the people of Gaza.

This most recent conflict began in late December and has cost hundreds of Palestinian civilian lives, despite broadly defined, and according to an American lawyer attending Thursday’s event, “ill-conceived,” military goals. Hours after the end of the seminar, the UN passed a resolution calling for a conditional cease-fire, subsequently rejected by both Israel and Hamas.

The event lurched from one topic to the next, as its vocal panelists appeared overly diverse in their capacity to discuss with expertise the Gazan situation.

Mahmoud Soueid, director of the Institute for Palestinian Studies and billed as the panel’s expert on international legal matters, discussed the ramifications of Israel’s “disproportionate” response to Hamas rocket attacks and political belligerence toward the Jewish state.

On this topic, an international human-rights lawyer, Marie Ghantous, who was active following the Lebanon 2006 war in building the legal case against Israel, told The Daily Star after the seminar that “I was disappointed. They did not report anything, nor did they have any plans to follow up. In my opinion, it was just a talk about things that we already know.” Ghantous had hoped that the event would focus more specifically on a practical and logistical plan to aid the Gazans in collecting forensics and building a case against Israeli “human-rights violations.”

The two-hour event did however feature two brief but interesting discussions regarding both the meaning of the current conflict and the tone of the Arab response to Gaza’s suffering.

Discussing the meaning of the conflict, panelist and AUB professor of social and behavioral sciences Sari Hanafi said: “The West’s plan is to make the Palestinian pay dearly for his vote.”

“Though Hamas is using the ‘right to return’ on a popular level, that is unfortunate as it is an individual right and should not be something to be politically manipulated,” he added.

Helmi Moussa of As-Safir newspaper agreed, saying: “This is not a war about the right to return. It is a war regarding a regional solution.”

The panel’s consensus seemed to be that without a regional solution to democratic liberalization and a balancing-out of the West’s hand in the conflict, there would be no progress.

This led to the Arab response, with all panelists speculating that Arab regimes, specifically Egypt and Jordan, were dragging their feet in coming to Gaza’s aid as Hamas represented a domestic threat due to its status as an Islamist political party elected by the Palestinian people.

Event moderator Amr Hamazawy of the Carnegie Middle East Center, an Egyptian himself, speculated that Cairo’s response has to do with minimizing its domestic exposure to Islamist politics, due its “secular ruling elite,” drawing parallels to the current situation in Turkey where there have been recent accusations in Ankara of an alleged secular coup.

BEIRUT: A strategic partnership between Lebanese technology companies EDM and eSharing is breaking the “go-it-alone” status quo of the Middle East IT sector. eSharing will develop enterprise resource software that interfaces directly with EDM’s new Global Positioning System (GPS) and mobile cellular communications (GPRS and GSM) hardware platform for corporate-fleet vehicle management.

In separate interviews with The Daily Star, EDM managing partner Imad Kozem and eSharing CEO Joe Hage agreed that the partnership bucked a trend in the information-technology (IT) sector in Lebanon and, more generally, throughout the Middle East.

“Lebanese and Middle Eastern companies almost always believe that, [only] by themselves, can they, and should, do anything. Very rarely do they see the value in saying, ‘I need you to be my partner …’ [but by partnering] we obviously benefit,” Kozem told The Daily Star.

Hage echoed Kozem when discussing the value of strategic business partnerships: “In fact, we view it as a recipe for success,” he said.

Hage told The Daily Star that he believed his company’s partnership with EDM represented an American attitude toward cross-company resource sharing. The focus of eSharing is on software development, as well as on IT and localization services, but their expertise is not in building IT hardware.

When considering their core competency, Hage says of eSharing: “We have a mindset that is typical of the United States: Do we build, buy or partner? Let’s make sure we are investing in the right things.”

On the other hand, EDM’s TRAX Locator, a GPS, GPRS and GSM device, highlights its hardware expertise. It allows firms to track the movement and status of their entire fleet of vehicles in real time, combining location and communication services such as tracking, geofencing, mapping and messaging, as well as engine immobilization and service reports.

While such fleet-management platforms are available from Western firms, cost, language, and culture are usually significant barriers for business development in markets outside of Europe and the US. It is these areas that are the target markets for the TRAX hardware and accompanying software.

The firms’ partnership underlines the advantages of competency specialization and draws a clean line between the hardware manufacturer and software developer, potentially limiting both initial and total costs.

In so doing, the partnership is also testing Lebanon’s potential as a technology-outsourcing and off-shoring hub with specific advantages, including an educated population, a centralized geographic location, and multi-lingual capabilities.

EDM and eSharing initially met at the Termium technology exhibition, and Kozem believed that the annual event is a good opportunity for meeting potential partners. However, he told The Daily Star that, though those events that are effective networking arenas in Lebanon, they are rare and often expensive to attend.

This is likely both a symptom of, and a reason for, the ingrained aversion to similar business partnerships in Lebanon, whether or not they are in the IT sector. That the most entrepreneurial of Lebanon’s population leave the country in droves clearly reinforces roadblocks to corporate-openness to resource sharing and dynamic strategies.

Whether this collaboration will stand as an example of the benefits of cross-company resource sharing in the Middle East remains to be seen. The global financial crisis will certainly test the standard “go-it-alone” business model in the region. Partnerships that allow companies to focus on economies of scale and core-competency, while reducing cost of ownership, will increase their competitiveness even as budgets tighten.

Kozem believes that, “2009 will be tough … Obviously a company shouldn’t partner for partnership’s sake, but the right partnership is one that takes advantage of specific expertise.”

BEIRUT: The Education’s Ministry decision to make intellectual property rights (IPR) the theme of its SchoolNet project in 2009 highlights the growing prioritization of anti-piracy initiatives in Lebanon. Education Minister Bahia Hariri delivered a speech to a workshop on Monday in Beirut, highlighting the need for a cultural shift, beginning with young people, in Lebanon’s attitude toward intellectual property rights and violations. The workshop kicked off this year’s SchoolNet initiative, entitled, “Intellectual Property Rights: Duty or Necessity?”

The initiative will teach students about the inherent consequences, both individual and systemic, that arise when Lebanese consumers and businesses violate intellectual property rights by buying pirated software, music, movies, print material, and other trademarked products.

The Education Ministry’s initiative also aims to educate students about the struggle to end Lebanon’s unfortunate reputation as one of the world’s most flagrant violators of intellectual property rights, trademarks, and copyrights.

Lebanon’s accession to the World Trade Organization hangs to a significant extent on the country’s ability to improve its reputation and record on intellectual property rights. Combined legislative and enforcement efforts by government, non-government, and corporate entities brought recognition this year, as the United States upgraded Lebanon’s status from “Priority Watch List” to “Watch List.” The country’s previous status had threatened its lucrative trade relationship with the United States.

Those efforts notwithstanding, Hariri raised the question of complicity at Monday’s workshop, asking: “Should we bring our children to account for not respecting intellectual property rights when they did not even learn about these rights in school? Can education about intellectual property rights be more effective than [only] strict implementation of laws?”

Many of those individuals and organizations that are working to increase awareness of, and to strengthen, intellectual-property legislation and enforcement were on hand at Monday’s workshop at the UNESCO building.

“Educating consumers and businesses about the importance of intellectual property and how they can benefit from acting within the law is key, along with proper enforcement,” Aly Harakeh, a Microsoft Lebanon executive, told The Daily Star.

The Education Ministry and the Schoolnet Initiative have historically worked closely with Microsoft Lebanon. Because of Microsoft’s involvement with digital intellectual property enforcement in the Levant, this year that relationship is especially important.

Also attending the SchoolNet workshop was Pierre al-Khoury, representing the Commercial Law Strengthening Project, whose Lebanese component is specifically focused upon intellectual property law. The project stretches across four nations in the Middle East: Lebanon, Tunisia, the United Arab Emirates (specifically Dubai), and Yemen.

Khoury told The Daily Star that “intellectual property law is something new in Lebanon … [few] know about it. The problem is that the enforcement of law is not applicable – you can go out on the street and buy any software for, say, LL1,000.”

Asked about socially engrained cultural challenges, he said: “When there are campaigns highlighting this issue, talking about intellectual property on television and on the radio, it’s easy to make the point.”

The Brand Protection Group (BPG) initiated two such campaigns over the past five years, both with considerable success.

These campaigns followed a 2003-04 BPG study that found brand counterfeiting led to an annual loss of as much as $100 million loss to the Lebanese Treasury. This study seemed to at least partly validate Microsoft’s assertion to The Daily Star that intellectual property violations and piracy accounted for an annual $1 billion loss to the Lebanese economy.

The BPG’s conclusion was that “the negative impact is on all [Lebanese], and therefore all [Lebanese] should bear the responsibility of fighting this phenomenon.”

In 2005 and 2007, the BPG organized hotline call centers, advertising campaigns, and press releases to highlight the importance of reporting the sale of, and the refusal to purchase, counterfeit consumer products.

Post-campaign studies showed a considerable drop in Lebanese apathy toward intellectual property violations, validating Khoury’s theory that the Lebanese people are not culturally immune to respecting copyrights and trademarks.

Harakeh and Khoury agreed that, following the BPG’s campaigns, there has been a “change in perception.”

The widespread availability of pirated brands and software, and limited government action to combat their illicit sale – usually in broad daylight – is at the heart of Lebanon’s poor track record with intellectual property violations.

However, Khoury did tell The Daily Star that there are four separate pieces of legislation in Parliament to strengthen intellectual property rights, though Harakeh pointed out that “without enforcement, this will not be enough.”

But whether the parliamentary elections scheduled for the spring of 2009 will prevent timely consideration of such legislation is difficult to predict.

Kawkab Sinno, chair of the Brand Protection Group’s government relations committee, told The Daily Star that “serious Lebanese homegrown companies are aware of the importance of IPR protection for their innovation and brand names in Lebanon and outside the country. But first they need to respect the IPR protection given to other well-known names and there should be better government enforcement in this category of products and innovation.”

On the subject of enforcement, Harakeh said that Microsoft recently brought legal action against a Lebanese engineering firm whose profits were in the hundreds of millions of dollars, and whose 80 or more office computers allegedly lacked a single genuine license for their software.

Harakeh used this story to demonstrate that the reasons for software piracy among Lebanese businesses are not always related to cost, but rather willful, or at least apathetic, non-compliance.

Yahia Ramadan, a liaison for Microsoft’s attorney, confirmed to The Daily Star that he had participated in a raid on the allegedly offending engineering company with the Cyber Crime Unit of the Internal Security Forces.

A decision on the case is still pending, although Microsoft won a conviction in a similar case in 2003.

BEIRUT: Lebanon is well-positioned to offer web development, digital marketing, and information technology services to local, regional and international clients, according to several owners and partners of companies in and around Beirut. These experts agreed that Lebanon’s global position for IT services, outsourcing and off-shoring capabilities is unique, due to its geographical location, its multilingual talents, its cultural convergences between East and West, and its excellent technical education opportunities.

Marcel Farjallah, partner and chief programmer at Fluid Design & Media, said that “as a Lebanese business, for the rest of the world, we can usually provide the same or more expertise for lower prices when compared by with Western businesses.”

Multilingual web-platforms are a hallmark of Lebanese quality, and an obvious advantage of contracting with a Lebanese firm. Joe Hage, CEO of eSharing, told The Daily Star that “almost every customer asks for translation services, and we have an entire team devoted to this.”

“Quality is the advantage in Lebanon,” said Nassib Haddad, managing director of nhgraphics. “It is quite impressive for a country that is so small and has such limited resources … but look at what’s coming out of Lebanon, and look at the many satisfied clients.”

Lebanon’s web sector is currently benefiting from the global financial crises in two ways. On the matter of the global slowdown, Hage said, “In order to edge the competition, in the hard times, even in the United States, corporate decision makers believe [a downturn] to be a good time to optimize their business … A downturn is a positive for us.”

At the same time, the local Lebanese market has remained fairly insulated from the global problems, and in fact has prospered as foreign Lebanese nationals have transferred an enormous amount of capital to Lebanese banks. The pace of this new influx of money has quickened in tandem to an increase in political stability, and Haddad acknowledged that due to “good times in Lebanon,” there are “bigger budgets for innovation and investment.”

This combination of local stability, international recession, and Lebanese prosperity creates a favorable business environment for marketing professionals in general, and web development agencies in particular.

On the matter of local projects, Haddad, Hage and Farjallah were in agreement that the Lebanese market is both very competitive and open.

All griped about local “developers” with limited expertise who are a problem for “more capable, professional developers,” as Farjallah put it. “As a result, for small web-design projects, there is a lot of competition and the client rarely know the difference between good and bad … agencies.”

Haddad seconded this, saying that, “people who take a couple courses … call themselves experts!”

This has increased a sense among the larger and more accomplished agencies that strong referral networks are the key to business development in the Mideast region. Reputation, portfolio, word of mouth and referral remain far more important than advertising for small-to-medium projects.

However, for larger, foreign projects, aggressive business development practices are still needed to guarantee a strong lead pipeline.

“Being a Lebanese company is a big plus when dealing with the Gulf, and a plus when dealing with the world,” said Farjallah. “In the region, Lebanese are usually well regarded, as engineers and people with skills. We have also been more exposed to Western culture which can be argued to be the origin of the regional activities today.”

On this, all were in agreement that an understanding of how to leverage Western business, marketing and cultural practices was important.

Though each company, eSharing, Fluid and nhgraphics, began differently in terms of whether their initial client base was Lebanese or Western, all agreed that their company’s expertise and technical philosophies converged in Lebanon between Middle Eastern and American/European.

Above all else, all saw this as a tactical advantage.

BEIRUT: The American University of Beirut (AUB) on Monday welcomed esteemed Harvard Business School professor John Quelch for a discussion on the ramifications and theories of his most recent book, “Greater Good: How Good Marketing Makes for Better Democracy.”

Quelch, the senior associate dean and Lincoln Filene professor of Business Administration at the Harvard Business School, co-authored the book with Katherine E. Jocz, who was not in attendance.

Quelch’s lecture did not veer considerably off track from the structure of theory that his book presents, and specifically did not address realities of Middle Eastern or Lebanese marketing practices and their effect upon democracy in the region.

However, his schema for addressing the concerns and tactical importance of marketing in the 21st century raised intriguing questions, even if they were confined to the US, where the body of his research is based.

Quelch’s work focuses principally on whether modern marketing practices operate in a back-and-forth transference with consumers that are “more democratic” than American republican democracy. It also considers whether modern marketing practices are in-effect “undermining” democracy, and whether marketing operates within democratic nations to strengthen “social glue” and civic institutions.

Quelch asserted that marketing academia does a “bad job marketing marketing,” preferring to focus on the “marketing tool kit” and not on the broader social implications of wide-spread marketing throughout a civic and democratic society.

He seemed convinced that marketing, as it works with and for consumers to advertise buying choice, selection, and freedom on a day-by-day and minute-by-minute basis, is inherently more “freely democratic” in the traditional sense than modern democracy in America and the United Kingdom – places where politicians are required to prove their worth only once every two, four, or six years.

Quelch also said the same marketing practices that he believed were inherently more democratic than modern politics are also undermining traditional realities of democracy itself.

He gave the example of Starbucks’ mission statement to be the “third place in our customers’ lives,” after home and work. Quelch said this demonstrates how business is replacing state and citizenship with brand and consumer, respectively, in importance.

But the lecture did not connect the theory’s potential implications with Middle Eastern political realities. The only remedy Quelch offered for the region was that governments should use marketing tactics similar to those of corporate entities to advertise the roles of citizens and civic institutions in everyday life.

Speaking with The Daily Star after the lecture, Quelch noted that this was his third visit to Lebanon in the past 30 years, the first in 1983 when he was invited by a consulting firm for a seminar aptly titled, “Marketing Warfare.”

Quelch was clearly moved by the experience of Beirut amid the strife of the early 1980s. He returned to Beirut in 2003, and noted the vast “improvement in morale, stability and reconstruction.” He also mentioned that he had dinner with then-Finance Minister Fouad Siniora.

“It is fascinating to see the political situation evolve,” he said of his most recent trip. He also praised the leadership of President Michel Sleiman.

Discussing the rising status of AUB, he said he was excited to “find someone in the audience from Berkeley,” and was happy to see AUB move to take a global standing.

Asked by The Daily Star about how his theories on modern marketing might have a role within Lebanon, Quelch replied: “I think that in a country that’s had more than its fair share of strife, persuading citizens and especially young people to invest in civic institutions is hugely important … You have to be a citizen first before you can enjoy … being a consumer.”

By yours truly – This is the most fun I’ve ever had writing anything. Ever. Pictures are my own and were not featured in the original article.

Click here for the Original Article from the Daily Star, Published December 2nd, 2008

BEIRUT: The speakers filter over the noise of the crowd at Captains Cabin on Saturday, shuffling between Bob Dylan, Miles Davis, the Red Hot Chili Peppers and Radiohead. “Of course, I have plans for this place. I told you – I’m the past and the present,” says Andre Toriz. The bar’s manager, Toriz is not so much defiant as observant. It is an existential declaration from a man whose whole life is the pub his father opened in 1964.

In 1987, British journalist Robert Fisk wrote that Captains Cabin, one of the few remaining bars in Hamra that held out through the wars and the siege, “has the feel – even the smell – of the late 1960s.”

As Andre tells it, while he hands out one Almaza after another, Captains has weathered every conflict Lebanon has thrown at his inheritance in the past 40 years, the doors always open. Twenty years after Fisk’s article, things are changing, for Andre, for nightlife in Hamra, and for Beirut. Though it still seems to have the feel of the past, one cannot help but notice that the present has caught up with this shabby little bar off of Sadat Street, as wave after wave of young people filter in, buying drinks late into the night, even during mid-week.

Business hasn’t been this good in a long time. A Syrian checkpoint near the bar kept the crowds away even after the wars subsided in Beirut. Old regulars have been replaced by a new, younger group. Yet even these new customers admit readily that something has changed in the past year, perhaps even in the past month. “Even last year,” notes Derek, “on a Saturday night there might be a few people in here, ordering one drink and just sitting around for hours. Yeah, it’s been filling up but this was our private bar for a long time. But we don’t really care – It’s good for Andre.”

Indeed, everyone knows that what is good for Andre Toriz is good for Captains Cabin.

How does the bar reflect Beirut’s past and present? When asked, “I am the connection,” Andre says matter-of-factly. He continues, “My father was sick. He gave me the keys – He wouldn’t give them to anybody else. I don’t know why.” Andre and his heirloom have remained in business even as many others in Hamra closed their doors. Regarding this, he merely states, “People go, people come. But there are people who stay all the time.”

When asked about the younger people who now keep him busy until late in the night, he reflects, “Before the war, in the 70s, I asked somebody – he saw the kids coming, replacing the older people – and he said don’t worry. Now [those same young customers from the 70s], they’re ministers! I have customers who have been coming here for 30 years! But time changes. The wars and the siege and the checkpoints kept the young away. Now they’re back.”

It is obvious how much Captains Cabin means to Andre. What is equally obvious is how much he and his bar mean to its younger and growing number of customers. Their behavior does surprise him sometimes, but Andre keeps a firm and almost fatherly hand.

“My father and my generations, they were always well-behaved. The younger generation surprises me. They’re crazy sometimes. They can have no manners. But I surprise them,” says Andre with a twinkle in his eye when he relates this, “by being firm. ‘Sit properly,’ you know?” Andre smiles. It doesn’t take long for new customers to understand who is in charge of this old bar.

The bar does have a timeless quality, but Andre is Beirut’s past and present. The beer is still served cold, but now business is good. Andre has even noticed a new increase since the all-night soirée he hosted for the American elections.

Time is no longer standing still in Hamra, and Andre has plans. What are they? He won’t say. But through the dense cigarette smoke and past the empty bottles that signal the increase in business, Bob Dylan sings, “The times they are a changing.”

Update

This article as linked to by the Huffington Post! “Service Taxi” Across the Syrian Border: Damascus to Beirut

See these fine folks talking about Captains’ Cabin at Boston.com: Beirut or Bust Slide 11

Here’s Now Lebanon’s take on Captains’ Cabin: A Long Night

Click here for the Original Article from the Daily Star, Published November 26th, 2008

BEIRUT: Agreements, not controversy, dominated a discussion at the American University of Beirut (AUB) on Tuesday between Rami Khouri and Michael Young, the former a regular contributor to The Daily Star’s Opinion section and the latter its editor. The debate was sponsored by AUB’s Center for American Studies and Research (CASAR), and entitled, “The Middle East Policies of the Bush and Obama Administrations.”

Khouri and Young agreed in principal on a majority of subjects. The event largely focused on the realities of a post-Saddam Middle East, the persistence of Arab dictatorial regimes and their de facto support by America both militarily and politically, and the Palestinian-Israeli conflict.

Basic disagreement, which remained cordial and often unspecific, came in the form of Khouri’s optimism for the future Obama administration’s ability to achieve success in the Middle East, versus Young’s pessimism that the incoming president-elect will lack the means and the leverage to achieve much in the way of progress.

Regarding Iraq, Young’s perspective was that the removal of Saddam Hussein and the Baathist regime in Baghdad was ultimately a positive event, both for Arabs and for the West. He lamented with an equal hand both the extreme failures of the US military and the Bush White House to adequately prepare for the complex realities of post-Saddam Iraq, but also the Arab response to Saddam’s removal from power. On the latter issue, Young insisted that not only did the Arab world prove itself incapable of finding progress and success after Saddam’s ousting, but that its anti-American reaction to the second Iraq war and subsequent Iraqi occupation was both counter-productive and, on the part of “Arab liberals,” unfortunately cynical.

In Iraq, Khouri said, “the totality of the [American] enterprise was a calamity,” but that simultaneously the removal of Saddam’s regime can be counted as an, “American success.” However, Khouri went on to say that “I think the vast majority of the Bush Administration’s foreign policy in the Middle East has been a calamity.”

Khouri and Young disagreed on whether the Bush administration could have achieved more with regard to the Palestinian-Israeli situation, and also whether the future Obama administration would find success in that arena.

As Khouri noted, “American involvement was not evenhanded, and intervening in Palestinian elections on the part of Abbas and Fatah was a huge mistake which led to its marginalization and de-legitimatization.” He was cautiously optimistic that Obama would build positive momentum.

Young, on the other hand, believed that, “by and large the Bush administration has been like any other,” and though he was “not one to blame the victim,” he was under the impression that “no matter how much America involves itself in the Israeli-Palestinian conflict and discussions it will not succeed due to the complex dynamics of the parties themselves.”

Click here for the Original Article from the Daily Star, Published November 24th, 2008

BEIRUT: Amid rave reviews and the glow of high-definition television screens as far as the eye could see, the 13th edition of the Levant’s Information Technology Exhibition at the Beirut International Exhibition and Leisure center is a look into Lebanon’s potential as a future technology hot spot for the Middle East.

Representing a mix of local, regional, and international companies and organizations, the conference is highlighting Lebanon’s growing market for high-end consumer electronics, high-speed Internet connectivity, and information technology services and software.

The conference also played host to a controversial topic in information technology currently facing Lebanon, the growing demand for the deployment of a high-speed Internet network.

An organization at the conference represented by the Partnership for Lebanon, along with local banks, NGOs, and technology industries, is calling for signatures for its “Broadband Manifesto.” Its goal is to achieve universal Lebanese access to a 100 megabit-per-second network , by 2011. Current speeds in Lebanon are generally limited to 1 megabit per second.

Eli Geahchan, communication manager for Partnership for Lebanon (a conglomeration of multi-national technology companies such as Cisco Systems), highlighted the problems with Lebanon’s current DSL network: “Internet access is very expensive despite its limited speed … It’s important to educate consumers on the fact that what they have right now is not broadband, and that with true high-speed access in Lebanon, the whole country will benefit from economic growth and access to information. Lobbying and marketing are as important in this issue as education and awareness of such a network’s benefits.”

Geahchan underlined the opportunities for deploying high-speed wireless technologies such as WIMAX, especially in mountainous regions of the country. The Broadband Manifesto calls for “reclaiming Lebanon’s position as a regional leader in the provision of products and services” and notes that “broadband connectivity … is an enabler of economic growth and social development.”

It also demands a more competitive marketplace, with an end to Ogero’s government-promoted monopoly.

Geahchan believed the conference was already a success for showcasing the organization’s message.

Dolly Hajjar, account manager of WISE, a Lebanese Internet service provider offering ADSL, wireless microwave, and dial-up services, echoed the sentiment that “definitely the conference is a success.”

The Daily Star inquired specifically about the current state of Internet access and connectivity in Lebanon, and Hajjar agreed with Geahchan’s conclusion that Ogero’s position as a government-owned monopoly limited the free-market’s capacity for innovation and inexpensive products. Still, she was optimistic that there would be “gradual freedom” over time, and that the key to the success of private providers, those that must rent bandwidth from the government-(Ogero)-owned lines, is to increase value through better services and more robust product offerings.

WISE’s position is that “everyone is preparing for” high-speed wireless technologies such as “WIMAX,” and that this will be a way to circumvent the power of Ogero’s monopoly of the phone and DSL lines.

At present, there are roughly 34,000 DSL subscribers in Lebanon and most of them deal with Ogero, which control the bulk of the Internet market.

Critics say that DSL did not spread as officials hoped, adding that there are still 200,000 subscribers who are either using the obsolete dial-up or the illegal cables.

Despite that,Hajjar is confident that ADSL service is the likely future of Internet service here for the next few years, especially since Ogero is planning to increase DSL access next month. Accordingly, wireless access will continue to be an “option” as opposed to a status quo, though she told The Daily Star that “we’re still selling wireless more successfully than was expected.” She added that the private sector must focus on market share and better service in order to have a voice at the table.