Upon an invitation from the United Nations Development Program (UNDP) and the Lebanese Parliament and with the academic support of the Lebanese Center for Policy Studies(LCPS), a forum was held in Beirut between May 16-18, 2000 on "Developing Arab Parliamentary Work." Over the 3-day period of the forum, forty - five élite parliamentarians from 10 Arab countries, in addition to a number of academicians, specialized researchers in political science, jurisprudence and parliamentary affairs, met together.

The forum's deliberations focused on four main themes which included studies about: Systems of Arab parliaments, their legislative functions, their monitoring roles and the prospects of their development. The deliberations also covered an additional theme on the role of women in Arab parliaments and political work generally. A principal study was presented on each theme which was followed by a number of comments and discussions by the participants.

The four principal studies of the forum adopted, in general, the comparative method in presenting the papers. Furthermore, they concentrated on a number of Arab parliamentary experiments with regard to the legal frameworks, the current parliamentary performance or the means to the development of parliamentary work.