By: Behrooz Sabet

This article examines conceptual as well as practical aspects of education in the Middle East. It explores the process of education in the context of culture and suggests profound reform in education as a necessary prerequisite for social reconstruction in the region. The article reviews the prevailing discourse and practice on the quality of education, teaching-learning environment, vocational training, and citizenship and civic education. It analyzes how the educational landscape in the Middle East has responded to academic freedom, modernity, globalization, human rights, and the need for critical thinking and scientific research. Furthermore, it provides a critical analysis of ideological approaches to social sciences and argues that teaching of religious dogmatism and xenophobic, violent content can turn education into a geopolitical liability for the region. The article concludes that it is only through modern scientific education, technological skills, and the social consciousness of living in an interrelated global society that the cycle of underdevelopment can be replaced with new paradigms of progress.