Gilbert Achcar grew up in Lebanon, researched and taught in Beirut, Paris and Berlin, and has been since 2007 Professor of Development Studies and International Relations at SOAS, University of London. His many books include: The Clash of Barbarisms: The Making of the New World Disorder, published in 15 languages; Perilous Power: The Middle East and U.S. Foreign Policy, co-authored with Noam Chomsky; The Arabs and the Holocaust: The Arab-Israeli War of Narratives; The People Want: A Radical Exploration of the Arab Uprising; and Morbid Symptoms: Relapse in the Arab Uprising.
BilgeYabanci is Marie Skłodowska-Curie fellow at the Department of Philosophy andCultural Heritage of Ca’ Foscari University of Venice. She is also a formerOpen Society Fellow and took part in the human rights cohort of the OSF fellowshipprogram in 2017-2019. Bilge’s currentresearch project explores thepoliticization of the civic space and courts under democratic backsliding andthe co-existent dynamics of oppositional mobilization and co-optation indemocratic backsliding contexts through the case of Turkey. Her broader research interestsextend into populism, reflections ofpartisan polarisation in the civic space and the role of emotions andperformance in political mobilization. She has published several journal articles. Her twolatest publications “Turkey’s Tamed Civil Society: Containment andAppropriation under a Competitive Authoritarian Regime” and “Work for theNation, Obey the State, Praise the Ummah: Turkey’s Government-Oriented Youth Organizations in Cultivating a NewNation” appeared in Journal of Civil Society and Ethnopolitics. ORCID: 0000-0002-3937-9789
Dr. Tamirace Fakhoury is an associate Professor of Political Science and Global Refugee and Migration Studies at the Global Refugee Studies Research Group (GRS) at Aalborg University in Copenhagen. She is also the Scientific advisor to the Kuwait Chair at Sciences Po in Paris (2020-2022). Dr. Fakhoury has taught at the summer sessions at the University of California in Berkeley between 2012 and 2016. In fall 2018 and summer 2019, she will be a visiting fellow at the Käte Hamburger Kolleg/ Centre for Global Cooperation Research where she will carry out a project on the European Union’s role in the polycentric governance of displacement.
Francesco Cavatorta is professor of political science at Laval University in Quebec City Canada. His research focuses on dynamics of democratization and authoritarian resilience in the Arab world. He is currently working on a project examining the relationship between neoliberal economics and Salafi political parties.
Andrea Teti is Associate Professor of International Relations at Aberdeen University and formerly Director of the Arab Transformations Project. He has published widely on the Middle East, democratization, and EU-Middle East relations, including being lead author of Democratization Against Democracy: How EU Policy Fails the Middle East (2020) and The Arab Uprisings in Egypt, Jordan and Tunisia (2018); and co-editing Hidden Geographies: Informal Power in the Greater Middle East (2014).
Selin Çağatay is a postdoctoral researcher in the ERC-funded project ZARAH: Women’s labour activism in Eastern Europe and transnationally, from the age of empires to the late 20th century at the Department of Gender Studies and the Department of History, Central European University, Austria. Her research concerns past and present gender politics and equality struggles in Turkey and transnationally. Before joining CEU, she was a postdoctoral fellow in the international research project Spaces of resistance. A study of gender and sexualities in times of transformation at the Department of Cultural Sciences, University of Gothenburg, Sweden. Selin has a recently
published monograph, authored collaboratively with Mia Liinason and Olga Sasunkevich, titled Feminist and LGBTI+ activism in Russia, Scandinavia, and Turkey: Transnationalizing Spaces of Resistance(by Palgrave Macmillan, Thinking Gender in Transnational Times Series).
Adam Hanieh is Professor of Political Economy and Global Development at the Institute for Arab and Islamic Studies, University of Exeter, and Distinguished Research Fellow at the Institute of International and Area Studies (IIAS) at Tsinghua University, Beijing, China. His current research focuses on issues of political economy, oil, and capitalism in the Middle East. His most recent book is Money, Markets, and Monarchies: The Gulf Cooperation Council and the Political Economy of the Contemporary Middle East (Cambridge University Press, 2018), which won the 2019 British International Studies Association, International Political Economy Group Book Prize.
Nadine Sika is associate professor of Comparative Politics at the American University in Cairo. She was Humboldt Foundation Visiting Fellow at the German Institute for International and Security Affairs in Berlin (2014-2015). She is the book reviews editor of Mediterranean Politics. She is author of Youth Activism and Contentious Politics in Egypt: Dynamics of Continuity and Change (Cambridge UP, 2017) and co-editor with Eberhard Kienle of the Arab Uprisings: Transforming and Challenging State Power (I.B. Tauris 2015). Her recent articles appeared in journals such as Democratization, Political Studies, and the British Journal of Middle Eastern Studies.
Nazanin Shahrokni is Assistant Professor of Gender and Globalisation and Director of MSc Programme in Gender and Gender Research at the London School of Economics. Prior to joining the Gender Studies Department at LSE, she held positions in various international settings such as Syracuse University, Lund University, Harvard Academy for International and Area Studies, and the American University of Beirut. Nazanin is the author of the award-winning book, Women in Place: The Politics of Gender Segregation in Iran (University of California Press 2020) which offers a gripping inquiry into gender segregation policies and women’s rights in contemporary Iran. Her research interests fall at the intersection of feminist geography, critical policy analysis, and ethnographies of the state. She brings a critical lens and an ethnographic approach to the study of gendered public spaces and spheres, the reconstruction of gender difference in city spaces, and the complex gendered underpinnings of urban governance and political institutions. Her publications have appeared in Globalizations, Contemporary Ethnography, Current Sociology, and the Journal of Middle East Women's Studies. Nazanin serves on the Executive Committee of the International Sociological Association and is on the advisory board of Middle East Law and Governance, as well, the Global Dialogue.
Gilbert Achcar grew up in Lebanon, researched and taught in Beirut, Paris and Berlin, and has been since 2007 Professor of Development Studies and International Relations at SOAS, University of London. His many books include: The Clash of Barbarisms: The Making of the New World Disorder, published in 15 languages; Perilous Power: The Middle East and U.S. Foreign Policy, co-authored with Noam Chomsky; The Arabs and the Holocaust: The Arab-Israeli War of Narratives; The People Want: A Radical Exploration of the Arab Uprising; and Morbid Symptoms: Relapse in the Arab Uprising.
Francesco Cavatorta is professor of political science at Laval University in Quebec City Canada. His research focuses on dynamics of democratization and authoritarian resilience in the Arab world. He is currently working on a project examining the relationship between neoliberal economics and Salafi political parties.
Rosita Di Peri is associate professor at the Department of Culture, Politics and Society at the University of Turin, Italy where she teaches ‘Politics, Institutions and Cultures of Middle East’ and 'Mashrek Politics and Institutions'. Her research interests are on democracy and authoritarianism in Middle East with a focus on Lebanon. She is the scientific coordinator of the Summer School ‘Understanding the Middle East’ and member of the board of SeSaMO (Italian Association for Middle Eastern Studies). She published several articles in Italian and international Journals, such as ‘Rivista Italiana di Politiche Pubbliche’, ‘Rivista Italiana di Scienza Politica’, ‘British Journal of Middle Eastern Studies’, ‘Politics Religion and Ideology’, 'Mediterranean Politics', ‘Oriente Moderno’ and ‘Meridiana’. She authored a book on the politics of contemporary Lebanon (Il Libano contemporaneo, Carocci, Roma 2017, in Italian) and co-edited several books and Special Issues.
Dr. Tamirace Fakhoury is an associate Professor of Political Science and Global Refugee and Migration Studies at the Global Refugee Studies Research Group (GRS) at Aalborg University in Copenhagen. She is also the Scientific advisor to the Kuwait Chair at Sciences Po in Paris (2020-2022). Dr. Fakhoury has taught at the summer sessions at the University of California in Berkeley between 2012 and 2016. In fall 2018 and summer 2019, she will be a visiting fellow at the Käte Hamburger Kolleg/ Centre for Global Cooperation Research where she will carry out a project on the European Union’s role in the polycentric governance of displacement.
Raymond Hinnebusch is professor of International relations and Middle East politics at the University of St. Andrews, Fife, Scotland. He is founder and director of the Centre for Syrian Studies. His major works include Egyptian Politics Under Sadat (Cambridge University Press 1985); The International Politics of the Middle East (Manchester University Press, 2003, 2nd ed. 2015) and Syria: Revolution from above (Routledge: 2001);. He co- edited The Foreign Policies of Middle East States, with A. Ehteshami, Lynne Rienner Publishers,2nd edition, 2014; Turkey-Syria Relation: between Enmity and Amity, with Ozlem Tur, Ashgate Publishers, 2013; Sovereignty after Empire: Comparing the Middle East and Central Asia, with Sally Cummings, Edinburgh University Press, 2011; The Iraq War: Causes and Consequences, with Rick Fawn; and Syria: From Reform to Revolt: Politics and International relations, with Tina Zintl, Syracuse University Press, 2014.
Professor of Political Science and Director of the Institute of Political Science at Saint Joseph University – Beirut; holder of a PhD in Political Science from the University of Paris I – Sorbonne, and a CAPES in Philosophy and Psychology from the Faculty of Pedagogy at the Lebanese University; author of many publications and research articles. Representative of the President of the Republic at the Permanent Council of the Francophonie.
Professor Kiwan was advisor to the Minister of National Education and Fine Arts 1991-1992 and to the Minister of Culture and Higher Education 1992-1996. She was appointed as expert in many programs of the World Bank and UNESCO. In 2007, she was nominated member of the United Nations University Council until 2013.
Professor Kiwan is nominated by UNESCO member of the senior experts group in charge of revisiting the Report of Jacques Delors on "Education in the 21 century”. She is also member of the Senior advisory experts Committee of the program MOST at UNESCO.
Sensitive to human rights and women rights, she has a lot of articles on these issues and is representative of Lebanon in the Executive Board of the Arab Women Organization. Her priorities in action and research are the following topics: civil society, political parties, pressure groups, political culture and gender issues.
