The Faculty of Graduate Studies awarded the researcher Belal Meri a Master’s Degree in Economic Policy Management in response to his thesis entitled “Partnership between Local Government Units and Private Sector and its Role in the Development of Local Economy in Palestine”.

This study aimed to identifying the role of the partnership between local government units and private sector , regarding  the development of local Economy in Palestine through asking a number of questions . Most important of this is : the nature of the partnership between the local government units and private sector , the nature of the joint projects and their size , in addition to the feedbacks and the suggestions of the supervisors of the local government units about this partnership , and also the challenges and obstacles that face it and the necessary requirements to create a partnership . 

The researcher used the analytical descriptive approach in this study , whereas the population of study was 124 local government units in the west bank that represent all municipalities , 54 municipalities chooses which represent the whole municipalities in north of the west bank, 54 questionnaires were distributed to collect first data , of these 45 were collected and analyzed (about 83% of the distributed questionnaires), these questionnaires were used as the basic tool to collect data, time of collecting data was stretched to cover the years 2016 and 2017 , "SPSS " Statistical package for social science" was the program that the researcher used to study and analyze the data  .   

The main result of this study was revealing that there are incomes and benefits for the sake of the municipalities that have projects with the private sector , and the result showed that the most important projects , include the infrastructure and tourist project . and it also showed that supervisors of local government units have wide realization , and awareness towards the partnership , however there are a lot of challenges and obstacles according to this study , most important are : lack the culture of partnership , weakness of the private sector perception for the chances of investment that municipality has in additional to the falling degree of the public acceptance of paying bills for the service they get .

Regarding the necessary basic and essential requirements to construct partnership between local government units and the private sector , the results of the study have shown that there isn’t enough legal framework , and legitimate border line , beside that there isn’t  any stable political climate to promote this partnership , and also there isn’t  any suitable economical and financial climate that supports and encourages this partnership . 

Finally , the most important recommendation of this study is : necessity to create a special unit ; to activate the partnership with private sector in the structure of the local government units with a basic role to look for and establish partnerships with private sector .   

Also this study recommends the necessity to promote and support the arrangements and regulations , which aim at motivating partnership between the local government units and private sector , in addition to revising  a number  of systems that form obstacles , in front of the process of local development . 

Finally this study recommends and emphasizes the necessity to  encourage the private sector , and provide it with the required facilities  to build partnership with local government units .       

The committee consisted of: Dr. Rabeh Murrar as a main supervisor and Chairman, Dr. Shaher Obeid as an external examiner and Dr. Mahmoud Abu Rub as an internal examiner.

At the end of the session, the committee approved the success of the researcher and recommended him a Master’s degree.