Tarek Heggy (Arabic: طارق حجى, IPA: [ˈtˤɑːɾˤeʔ ˈħeɡɡi]; born October 12, 1950) is an Egyptian liberal author, political thinker and international petroleum strategist.

Nor does he believe European colonialism, the global capitalist system, or the league of autocratic rulers who clung (and in places, continue to cling) to power thanks to oil revenues or outside military aid are the causes.

The core of Heggy’s most important contention is encapsulated by this metaphor in The Arab Mind Bound: Arab culture is “shackled with two heavy chains”: attached to one is the species of Islam promulgated by Saudi Wahhabis and to a lesser extent, the Muslim Brotherhood; attached to the other is a dysfunctional educational system that perpetuates the “defective thought processes, intellectual distortions and negative delusions” that yield endemic stagnation in every sphere.

It follows that no attempt to address the myriad political and economic problems facing the Arab-Islamic world will be successful without religious, cultural, and educational reforms.

[4] According to Bernard Lewis, a Cleveland E. Dodge Professor Emeritus of Near Eastern Studies at Princeton University, Heggy is a "courageous and distinctive voice from Egypt" and provides "a candid and provocative inside view of the current problems of the Arab world."