Mrs Dimah Ajeeb
Dimah is the Program Leader for MA Tourism Management and MA Event Design and Management. She is a Senior Lecturer in Architecture, Urban Design, Regional Planning and Tourism at the School of Architecture and Cities and the School of Business. She is a member of the School of Architecture + Cities Research and Knowledge Exchange Committee. Dimah is awarded the Fellowship of the Higher Education Academy (FHEA) through the Professional Recognition and Enhancement Scheme for Teaching (PRESTige).
Dimah holds BArch in Architectural Engineering and Planning (awarded first class honors) and PGDipArch in Architecture and Urban Design (Distinction). Owing to the first rank she achieved in Architectural Engineering in 2006, she had been awarded a fully funded scholarship to pursue a master’s degree in Urban and Regional Planning in the USA and a PhD degree in Urban Planning in the UK.
Dimah holds a master’s degree (MURP) in Urban and Regional Planning (Distinction) and a PGDip in Urban Design and Physical Planning (awarded a full grade and first-class honors) from the State University of New York. Both the MURP and PGDip Urban Design degrees are fully accredited by the American Planning Association/APA. In the UK, her PhD research is on the UK’s political economy and implications on the wider governance and financial arrangements. Along with the academic and research career, Dimah works in architectural design, urban design, and planning consultation since 2006.
Dimah started her academic research as a Research Fellow at Damascus University where she published a number of articles in architecture, regeneration, urban design & planning, housing, and tourism. She had the privilege to engage with and research the European Union's Municipal Administration Modernization (MAM) project to Syria for devolution, institutional reform, and effective local governance in the years 2005-2009.
Her master’s degree dissertation in the USA titled; Local Governments' Urban Design and Planning Strategies and Policies, a comparative case study was published by the University of New York Press and by ProQuest in 2012 and was reserved in the collection of the American Library of Congress in 2012. In the USA, she co-authored a number of publications and worked in teams on key regeneration, community, and urban planning projects in New York, one of them won two planning professional awards granted by the American Planning Association/ APA New York Upstate Chapter (the first award: 2012 planning Excellence Award: Outstanding Project, for the project: Against the Grain: A New Direction for the Old First Ward, and the second award for: Making Great Communities Happen- Reconsidering Atlantis: Inside Buffalo's Grain Elevators).
Dimah's research interests into the political economy, political renewal, EU modernisation, restructuring agendas, decentralisation, and devolution- along with the implications on a country’s wider governance and financial arrangements, has expanded with her Doctorate research intended to examine the implications on England's governance and financial arrangements for tourism, looking specifically at the opportunities and challenges, and the efficacy, of Coalition’s decentralization on England's governance of tourism. The PhD research, started in 2012 at the Bartlett School of Planning- University College London (UCL) has researched the wider political agenda and governance arrangements for England, the localism movements and place- based economies. With the research's interests and potential to UK politics and economy, it has been invited to be carried out at the University of Sheffield and to be sponsored by the E.S.R.C White Rose Social Science Doctoral Training Partnership Scholarships. This invitation was made by both Sheffield's Department of Urban Studies and Planning and Sheffield's Department of Politics. The PhD research has expanded the political economy and planning aspects of it by integrating the businesses aspect of tourism governance by carrying out the research at the School of Management and Marketing, Department of International Business and Economics at the University of Greenwich. With consideration to COVID-19 pandemic and its significant impacts on the tourism industry and Destination Management Organisations, the PhD research interests have evolved away from a focus on tourism governance and financial arrangements and the DMO restructuring in the period post economic recession and post Coalition's 2010 decentralisation, with the associated institutional and reform policies, austerity and political uncertainty, to give greater consideration to the wider crisis context that England has faced in the years 2010 to 2022. During this period, the UK has seen major shifts in political power, with party and leadership changes in the domestic government context as well as newly formed international relations between the UK and the European Union, and with the rest of the World. During this period, the UK’s tourism industry has also experienced a series of crises, such as public sector austerity as a consequence of the global financial crisis, terrorist attacks, flooding, and more recently the COVID-19 pandemic, war in Ukraine, and soaring cost of living. These periods of change and crises have meant that tourism stakeholders and DMOs have had to adapt to dynamic governance landscapes and learn how to be resilient in periods of uncertainty. Dimah’s research interests are alongside these crises and the changing nature of tourism governance in the UK.
In collaboration with a number of colleuges at the University of Westminster, Dimah is working on a UK-based Research and Public Engagement Funds project called: Green Spaces, Transportation Options, and the Mental Well-being of University Students.
Dimah is a member at Westminster School of Architecture + Cities Research and Knowledge Exchange Committee. She is a reviewer at one of the top journals in tourism: Tourism Geographies (Published by Routledge / Taylor & Francis), editor/reviewer at the International Journal of Tourism Cities (IJTC), and editor/reviewer at IGI global of Sustainable Tourism.
Dimah is an invited scholary speaker in a number of key national and international events including the Global Council for Politicial Renewal Conference 2023, and the UK House of Lords at the Palace of Westminster to mark the publication of Dr. Henry Tam book ‘Whose Government is it? – the renewal of state-citizen cooperation".
PhD researchers and Visiting Researchers are welcome on specific or interdisciplinary research areas presented in the Research Areas section.
Publications, Research Projects & Presentations
· Ajeeb, D. (2023) Multi-Level Governance of Visitor Economy in England: Lessons for Devolution and Reviving Left-Behind Places. 2023 Regional Studies Association/RSA Conference on: Cities and Regions of Tomorrow: Better Regional Futures. 9th-10th November 2023, London, UK.
· Ajeeb, D. (2023) Tourism Governance in Times of Crisis: A Multi-Level Governance Perspective. 2023 Regional Studies Association/RSA Annual Conference on: Transforming Regions: Policies and Planning for People and Places. 14-17 June 2023, Ljubljana, Slovenia.
· Ajeeb, D. (2023) Multi- Level Governance Framework for Global Political Renewal. Presentation at the Global Council for Political Renewal Conference, 14 &15 April, London, UK.
· Cao, M; Papa, E; Fang, Y; and Ajeeb. D (2023) Green Spaces, Transportation Options, and the Mental Well-being of University Students. UK-based Research and Public Engagement Funds project.
· Ajeeb, D. (2022) English Tourism Governance in Times of Crisis: Limitations and Oppurtunities. Tourism Research Centre- Greenwich School of Management and Marketing. University of Greenwich. London, UK. .
· Floros, C., Cai, W., McKenna, B. and Ajeeb, D. 2021. Imagine being off-the-grid: Millennials' Perceptions of Digital-Free Travel. Journal of Sustainable Tourism . 29 (5), pp. 751-766. https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/09669582.2019.1675676
· Ajeeb, D. (2019) Localism, prosperity, and community- led regeneration: Somers Town a case study.
· Ajeeb, D. (2019) community- led tourism and regeneration.
· Ajeeb, D. (2019) Visitor Routes in Old City of Damascus with Implications and Strategies for Improvements. In: A. Sharma and A. Hassan, eds. Tourism Events in Asia.Routledge. https://www.taylorfrancis.com/books/e/9781351105743/chapters/10.4324/9781351105743-14
· Ajeeb, D. (2017) Community involvement in planning, regeneration and gentrification: Somers Town a case study.
· Ajeeb, D. (2016) ‘Decentralization and England’s Governance of Tourism. Case study: Greater Manchester’. 6th International Tourism Studies Association (ITSA) Biennial Conference. University of Greenwich, London, 17-19 August 2016. International Journal of Tourism Cities. Available at: http://intltourismstudies.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/10/ITSA-2016-C...
· Ajeeb, D. (2012) Local Governments' Urban Design and Planning Strategies and Policies. Master Thesis. The State University of New York. ProQuest Publishing. Availableat:https://search.proquest.com/openview/25504eeef0c54819383b5c1f32f704a3/1?pq-origsite=gscholar&cbl=18750&diss=y.
· Ajeeb, D. et al. (2011) Against the Grain: A New Direction for the Old First Ward. New York: The State University of New York Press. Available at: https://ubir.buffalo.edu/xmlui/handle/10477/1929.
· Ajeeb, D. et al. (2011) Looking Back to Inform the Future: Michigan Street Heritage Corridor (1920s & 30s). A Multicultural Neighborhood Upon the Rising Tides of Racial Tension. University at Buffalo’s School of Architecture and Planning. The State University of New York Press.
· Ajeeb, D. (2010) Municipal Administration Modernization (MAM) Project in Syria, Proposals and Implementations. Damascus: Damascus University Press.
· Ajeeb, D. (2009) The Development of Building Regulations and its Implications on Damascus City. Damascus: Damascus University Press.
· Ajeeb, D. and Adanov, J. (2009) Sustainable Urban Design in the Desert. Damascus: Damascus University Press.
· Ajeeb, D. and Adanov, J. (2008) International Conventions and Heritage (Tunis vs. Lubeck). Damascus: Damascus University Press.
· Ajeeb, D. (2007) Therapeutic Tourist Resorts; Past, Present, and Future. Damascus: Damascus University Press.
· Ajeeb, D. (2007) Principles of Architectural and Urban Design in the Desert: Proportions, Mass, Materials, and Details. Damascus: Damascus University Press.