jordan pulse -

The Phenix Center for Economics and Informatics Studies is participating in the Civil Society Policy Forum held alongside the Annual Meetings of the International Monetary Fund (IMF) and the World Bank Group in Bangkok from October 13 to 16, 2026, to present priorities regarding social protection, decent work, and fair development financing in Jordan and the Arab region.
​The Center's participation features prominently in the session titled "Bridging the Gap: Designing and Financing Social Protection Systems for Vulnerable and Fragile Groups," held in partnership with the Arab Reform Initiative, the Centre for Social Sciences Research and Action (Ceta/CeSSRA) in Lebanon, Espace Associatif in Morocco, Al Bawsala in Tunisia, and the Arab NGO Network for Development (ANND). The session presents the findings of extensive studies across the four countries, discussing the gap between policies and population needs alongside rights-based financing alternatives reliant on domestic resources.
​Representing the Center is its Director, Ahmad Awad. The Phenix Center's involvement focuses on building comprehensive social protection ecosystems that guarantee benefit adequacy, service quality, and accessibility. These encompass social insurance, healthcare, income security, and unemployment protection, with particular emphasis on workers in the informal economy, women, persons with disabilities, and low-income groups.
​The Center is also co-organizing a session on the political economy of reform in fragile and conflict-affected states, which examines the importance of factoring local political and social contexts into IMF programs. Furthermore, it contributes to organizing a session on jobs and rights in international financial institution-funded reconstruction, drawing on the cases of Lebanon and Syria to address labor rights, social protection, contracting transparency, and accountability.
​The Phenix Center's participation—both directly and through Arab and international civil society alliances and networks—extends to tracks addressing the future of the World Bank's jobs agenda, rising development financing costs, debt burdens, and the impacts of austerity policies on public services and social inequalities, alongside tax justice and a just energy transition.
​These tracks include exploring ways to expand fiscal space for countries to protect social spending, connecting crisis responses to sustainable state-led national systems rather than relying on temporary and fragmented interventions, and strengthening the capacity of public institutions to provide services and buffer against shocks.
​The participation enables dialogue with international financial institutions, experts, and civil society organizations regarding the responsiveness of reform programs to societal priorities. Phenix aims to link these discussions to research evidence and local expertise, promoting transparency, accountability, and community participation in defining development choices, while advocating for policies whose success is measured by improved living conditions, poverty reduction, narrowing inequalities, and the provision of decent work and social protection for all.
​Source: Rum News Agency