Growth of Arab Financial Expertise

With the spread of education in the Arab world, especially in the first three decades of this century, many young Arabs started to enter the modern sectors of their own economies. They began to take over some of the jobs which had formerly been carried out by foreigners, either expatriates from Europe serving in the area for short stays, or more permanently resident foreign nationals, such as those living in large numbers in Beirut, Alexandria and Cairo. In the field of banking and finance many young Arabs already worked for the foreign banks represented in the Middle East even in the closing decades of the nineteenth century, but most did not rise above the lowest clerical positions, and many were employed as messengers and in other similar menial tasks. By the 1920s however this situation was changing and, although few Arabs had reached the position of branch managers in the commercial banking system, many of the jobs up to cashier level were filled by local citizens. These moves went furthest in Egypt and the Levant, as school-leavers from the foreign colleges, where many wealthy local merchants sent their families, were in heavy demand by the banks. Teaching in schools such as the American College in Cairo was entirely conducted in English, and the basic numerate and literary skills imparted were the same as those taught in western schools.1