On 29 March 2007, resolution 365, proposed by Egypt and Kuwait and calling for a summit to address exclusively the economic and social development issues facing the Arab world, was passed at the Arab League summit in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia.

[5] In June 2007, the secretary-general of the Arab League convened an extraordinary session of the ESC, which had been tasked with organising the summit under the terms of resolution 365, and it was agreed that the responsibility of preparing for the first summit would fall to a preparatory committee, consisting of Saudi Arabia, Sudan, Syria, the chair of the ESC for the time being, and the two member-states that had proposed resolution 365, Egypt and Kuwait.

[5] In October 2007, the secretary-general appointed Egyptian ambassador Mervat Tellawi the co-ordinator-general for the upcoming summit and established a management committee within the framework of the general secretariat of the Arab League, later renamed the Development Summit Management Committee, that included the newly appointed co-ordinator-general, Mervat Tellawi, and various assistant secretaries-general of the Arab League.

[5] By the 2008 Arab League summit in Damascus, Syria, advanced progress had been reported by the preparatory committee to the eighty-first session of the ESC, and having received an offer to host the summit from the emir of Kuwait, US$2 million was approved by the Arab League for financing.

The speaker of the Parliament of Lebanon Nabih Berri called to invite Syria back to the summit, which has caused major turmoil in the Arab League.