First doctorate degree in interdisciplinary social sciences awarded to Salim Abu Thaher

Birzeit University has awarded its first-ever doctorate degree to Salim Abu Thaher, a student at the doctorate program in social sciences offered by the Faculty of Graduate Studies.

Abu Thaher defended his thesis, titled “On Geopolitics: Spaces and Places―A Study of the Palestinian urban political economy: Ramallah and Al Bireh as a case study,” online in front of the committee chair and thesis supervisor Liza Taraki and the committee members Rami Daher, an associate professor at the German Jordanian University, and Salim Tamari, a professor emeritus of sociology at Birzeit University.

At the conclusion of the session, the committee announced that Abu Thaher had successfully passed the thesis defense. It applauded its distinctive level and said that its outcomes add value to the field of urban studies.

University President Abdullatif Abuhijleh attended the thesis defense, congratulating Abu Thaher.

The doctorate in social sciences is an accredited program that was launched in the academic year 2014–2015 as an interdisciplinary program in the fields of social sciences, providing students with the necessary analytical tools for understanding complex social, economic, political and cultural phenomena.

The university’s first doctorate program is unique in the Arab world, as it is based on south-south collaboration and aims to produce new knowledge about the Arab world and Palestine from a south-to-south perspective.