Planning and development of rural and semi-urban settlements

Abstract

The author, a cultural anthropologist, Professor Emeritus, Social Research Center, American University in Cairo, and a member of UNESCO's International Bioethics Committee and Egypt's National Bioethics Committee, after completing her Ph. D studies at Cornell University, has been for 25 years Professor and Director of the Social Research Center, American University in Cairo, while also acting as Senior Fellow, Population Center, Harvard University; Senior Visiting Associate, Population Program, California Institute of Technology; Research Project Director, United Nations Research Institute for Social Development, Geneva. Parallel to the above, she has been consultant for, and member of numerous international evaluation missions and expert committees of the UN Economic and Social Department, the UN Population Division, UNFPA, UNESCO, UNICEF, WHO and FAO. She has also been Secretary General of the Organization for the Promotion of Social Sciences in the Middle East; member of the Smithsonian Center for the Study of Man and of the Board of the International Union for Ethnological and Anthropological Sciences; member of the World Society for Ekistics (WSE),of which she was Vice-President for four years. The various distinctions awarded to Dr El-Hamamsy for her overall scientific achievements include the Distinguished Alumni Award of the American University in Cairo and the President Award of the American Anthropological Association. The text that follows is a slightly edited and revised version of a paper presented at the WSE Symposion "Defining Success of the City in the 21st Century," Berlin, 24-28 October, 2001.