IMPACT OF POLITICAL INSTABILITY ON ECONOMIC GROWTH IN THE MENA COUNTRIES: AN APPLICATION OF THE ARDL BOUND TESTING APPROACH

NADIA FARJALLAH,AFTAB HUSSAIN TABASSAM,ABDUL LATIF ,NADIA MAHFOUZ ,HIFSA AKHLAQ ,AMIR MOHIB ,ALTAF HUSSAIN

This study investigates and analyses the profound impact of political stability on Gross Domestic Product (GDP), measured in 2010 constant US dollars, across selected Middle East and North Africa (MENA) countries, specifically Egypt, Libya, Tunisia, and Algeria. The analysis covers an extensive historical period from 1980 to 2018, providing a comprehensive view of the long-term trends. This study employs the Auto-Regressive Distributed Lags (ARDL) econometric approach, originally proposed by Pesaran et al. (2001), which is particularly suitable for examining cointegration and dynamic relationships in time-series data. Rigorous empirical testing demonstrates and confirms the existence of a significant long-term relationship between political instability and economic growth, highlighting how fluctuations in stability can influence the overall economic performance of nations.