Ghadah Alharthi

Middle East Specialist; Associate Lecturer, Central Saint Martins, University of the Arts London

Ghadah Alharthi works as a Middle East specialist delivering research and content development to consultancies in the United Kingdom with projects in the Middle East. She is also an associate lecturer at Central Saint Martins, University of the Arts London, where she teaches on social networks, gender and social innovation. During her PhD at SOAS University of London, she dedicated herself to conducting research that is not only rigorous but also capable of positively shaping the world. As a young academic professional and thinker, she studied the workings of complex organizations while shedding light on their intersections, including how international development organizations and foundations interact with private companies, universities, and government agencies to drive the social business (institution-building) agenda in the Saudi context. For the past eight years, Alharthi has been collaborating with key arts and culture institutions in the Gulf and around the world to promote young and established artists from the Middle East. In a previous role at the Edge of Arabia art gallery based in London she worked on delivering a wide range of international events and exhibitions by engaging with governments, universities, social enterprises, and international foundations. Alharthi has an MSc in International Management (Middle East and North Africa) from SOAS University of London, and a BA in financial management and informatics from the University of Sheffield. Her master’s dissertation applied the Triple Helix Model to see how universities, governments, and industries together can help transform a traditional economy into a knowledge-based economy that promotes innovation, research, and entrepreneurship.

Key Elements of Saudi Social Transformation Post-Coronavirus

On August 11, AGSIW partnered with the King Faisal Center for Research and Islamic Studies to host a virtual panel discussion examining social reform programs in Saudi Arabia.