Innovation Ecosystem Development Under Military Occupation: An Assessment and Strategic Pathways for the West Bank, Palestine
Name
bahour-abahour-sm-sdm-2026-thesis.pdf
Size
3.34 MB
Format
Adobe PDF
Checksum (MD5)
4d5281a404d95ad441e2e3a86d67b771
Author(s)
Bahour, Areen
Advisor(s)
Rubin, Joan
Date Issued
February 2026
Publisher
Massachusetts Institute of Technology
Abstract
Humans are no strangers to innovation. We as a species have been innovating since early civilizations as a means to survive, expand, and be more efficient. Innovation ecosystems have gained prominence with the rise of digital technologies and deep tech, where regions like Silicon Valley, Singapore, Shenzhen, and others have risen to fame as clusters of innovation, attracting capital and talent. There is substantial research on the emergence of these innovation clusters in developed economies, but rather limited research on constrained economies, especially in regions with geopolitical complications that restrict local and regional governance. This research uses the MIT 3-S Framework, comprising of System, Stakeholder, and Strategy, to evaluate the West Bank in Occupied Palestine. A region that is defined by a severely complex geopolitical economy. The MIT framework is used as a guideline to assess the system capacities and stakeholder strengths and weaknesses to propose a national innovation strategy for the region. The analysis considers the existing constraints, but acknowledges the rapid, ever-changing reality on the ground. The strategy this research proposes is a two-dimensional approach with a national (internal) strategy to support the entrepreneurial and innovation capacities in the region, and an international (external) strategy to mobilize the large Palestinian diaspora to invest in Palestine. This research initially intended to cover the State of Palestine as a whole (i.e., the West Bank and Gaza Strip) but was limited to the West Bank due to the complete destruction of infrastructure and the massive death toll inflicted by the 2023 Israeli genocide on the Gaza Strip during the period of this study. The analysis relies on secondary sources but recommends that further research focuses on primary sources to ensure alignment between the lived Palestinian experience and the theory presented.
MIT Department
System Design and Management Program.
Terms of Use
In Copyright - Educational Use Permitted
Copyright retained by author(s)
Persistent DSpace Link
