Our senior fellows, faculty leave fellows, and junior research fellows conduct research, teach, and do impactful work at institutions around the world. We highlight here their current positions and the research they have done for the Crown Center.
Jump to Alumni (by last name):
Current position: Assistant Professor of Cultural Anthropology at Utrecht University
Crown Center publications:
July 2020
Crown Conversation 3
“Policing and Protests: Insights from the Middle East”
Co-author with Yazan Doughan and Youssef El Chazli
May 2020
Middle East Brief 135
“Proactive Policing, Crime Prevention, and State Surveillance in Turkey”
Current position: Associate Professor at Oxford School of Global and Area Studies, St. Antony's College, University of Oxford
Crown Center publications:
January 2020
Crown Conversation 1
“Iran, Iraq, and Lebanon after Soleimani”
Co-author with David Siddhartha Patel and Kelly Stedem
September 2019
Middle East Brief 130
“The Informal Roots of the IRGC and the Implications for Iranian Politics Today”
Current position: Researcher at the Arab Center for Research and Policy studies and Non-resident fellow at CarnegieMEC
Crown Center publications:
January 2017
Middle East Brief 105
“Sistani, Iran, and the Future of Shii Clerical Authority in Iraq”
June 2016
Middle East Brief 100
“From Maliki to Abadi: The Challenge of Being Iraq’s Prime Minister”
Current position: Lecturer in History at University of Massachusetts, Amherst
Crown Center publications:
February 2024
Middle East Brief 157
“Order and Disorder: The Politics of Seminaries in Iran”
January 2023
Crown Conversation 16
“Becoming Hezbollah: The Party’s Evolution and Changing Roles”
May 2021
Middle East Brief 141
“Continuity Despite Revolution: Iran’s Support for Non-State Actors”
Current position: Lecturer in the History of the Middle East, King's College London
Current position: Senior Lecturer in Anthropology in the Department of Anthropology and Sociology at SOAS University of London
Crown Center publications:
April 2020
Crown Conversation 2
“Iran’s Response to the Coronavirus Crisis”
Current position: Associate Professor of Political Science & Legal Studies at Suffolk University
Crown Center publications:
November 2023
Crown Conversation 18
“After the Israel-Hamas War: Likely Scenarios and Outcomes for Israelis and Palestinians”
With Shai Feldman, Yezid Sayigh, and Khalil Shikaki
Current position: Head of the Center for Middle Eastern Studies at the Metropolitan University Prague and the Director of the Oriental Institute of the Academy of Sciences of the Czech Republic
Crown Center publications:
July 2009
Crown Paper 2
“From Visiting Graves to Their Destruction: The Question of Ziyara through the Eyes of Salafis”
Co-Authored with Pavel Tupek
January 2009
Middle East Brief 33
“Divided We Survive: A Landscape of Fragmentation in Saudi Arabia”
April 2008
Middle East Brief 28
“The Sword and the Book: Implications of the Intertwining of the Saudi Ruling Family and the Religious Establishment”
Current position: Assistant Professor of History at MSU Denver
Crown Center publications:
July 2021
Middle East Brief 143
"Reconceptualizing Noncitizen Labor Rights in the Persian Gulf"
Current position: Assistant Professor of Political Theory in the Department of Political Science at the University of Minnesota, Twin Cities
Crown Center publications:
September 2020
Middle East Brief 137
U.S.-Iran Relations under Maximum Pressure: A Narrow Path to Negotiations
Current position: Assistant Professor of History at Vanderbilt University
Crown Center publications:
August 2018
Middle East Brief 121
“After ISIS: Development and Demography in the Jazira”
Current position: Assistant Professor in the Department of Anthropology at the London School of Economics
Crown Center publications:
July 2020
Crown Conversation 3
“Policing and Protests: Insights from the Middle East”
Co-author with Hayal Akarsu and Youssef El Chazli
March 2020
Middle East Brief 134
“The New Jordanian Patriotism After the Arab Spring”
Current position: Associate Professor in the Political Science and International Relations Department at TOBB University of Economics and Technology in Ankara
Current position: Associate Professor of History at St. Lawrence University and Non-Resident Scholar at the Middle East Institute
Current position: Associate Professor/Maitre de conférences of Sociology at the University of Paris 8 Vincennes – Saint-Denis
Crown Center publications:
January 2021
Crown Conversation 5
“The Egyptian Revolution, 10 Years On”
Co-author with Hannah Elsisi and Neil Ketchley
July 2020
Middle East Brief 136
“Revolution as a Life-Altering Experience: The Case of Egypt”
July 2020
Crown Conversation 3
“Policing and Protests: Insights from the Middle East”
Co-author with Hayal Akarsu and Yazan Doughan
Current position: Professor of Political Science at the Baskent University in Ankara, Turkey
Crown Center publications:
November 2007
Middle East Brief 22
“The Changing Face of Turkish Politics: Turkey’s July 2007 Parliamentary Elections”
August 2006
Middle East Brief 9
“Are Former Enemies Becoming Allies? Turkey’s Changing Relations with Syria, Iran, and Israel Since the 2003 Iraqi War”
May 2006
Middle East Brief 6
“Turkish-American Relations Since the 2003 Iraqi War: A Troubled Partnership”
Current position: Senior Lecturer in Comparative Politics of the Middle East at SOAS London
Crown Center publications:
July 2015
Middle East Brief 94
“The AKP and the Gülen: The End of a Historic Alliance”
Current position: Research Fellow at the Pembroke College, University of Cambridge
Crown Center publications:
January 2021
Crown Conversation 5
“The Egyptian Revolution, 10 Years On”
Co-author with Youssef El Chazli and Neil Ketchley
Current position: Adjunct Associate Professor of Political Science at Columbia University
Crown Center publications:
February 2022
Crown Conversation 12
“A Changing Middle East: The View from Israel”
Current position: Adjunct Professor, Graduate Management Program, University of Maryland University College
Current position: Associate Professor of Anthropology at Rice University
Current position: Assistant Professor in the Aga Khan Program for Islamic Architecture at MIT
Crown Center publications:
September 2021
Middle East Brief 144
“The Birth of Sadr City and Popular Protest in Iraq”
Current position: Associate at Analysis Group
Crown Center publications:
March 2018
Middle East Brief 116
“Lebanon's Hostility to Syrian Refugees”
Current position: Assistant Professor of Global Studies and Anthropology at the University of Minnesota, Twin Cities
Crown Center publications:
June 2017
Middle East Brief 111
“Turkey’s Failed Peace Process with the Kurds: A Different Explanation”
Current position: Professor and Director of Middle East Studies & WGST Department Chair at Texas Christian University
Current position: Research Fellow at the Hebrew University’s Truman Institute for the Advancement of Peace and Senior Lecturer in Department of Middle Eastern and Islamic Studies at Shalem College
Crown Center publications:
June 2009
Middle East Brief 37
“The Shiite Community in Lebanon: From Marginalization to Ascendancy”
Current position: His Highness Sheikh Hamad Bin Khalifa Al Thani Professor of Contemporary Islamic Studies at Oxford University
Crown Center publications:
October 2023
Middle East Brief 156
“Saudi Salafi Clerics under MBS: Reform and Survival”
Current position: Associate Professor in the Department of Islamic and Middle Eastern Studies at Hebrew University of Jerusalem
Current position: Faculty Leave Fellow at the Crown Center for Middle East Studies
Crown Center publications:
May 2024
Crown Conversation 21
“Beyond Erdoğan: Lessons from Turkey's 2024 Local Elections”
With Evren Balta
Current position: LSE Fellow in Gender and Human Rights at the London School of Economics
Current position: Assistant Professor of Jewish, Islamic, and Middle Eastern Studies at the Washington University of St. Louis
Current position: Assistant Professor of Anthropology at the University of North Carolina Wilmington
Crown Center publications:
April 2015
Middle East Brief 91
“How New Is Erdogan’s ‘New Turkey?’”
Current position: Associate Professor of Political Science at Boston College and Research Affiliate at MIT Security Studies Program
Current position: Keyman Modern Turkish Studies Postdoctoral Fellow at Northwestern University
Crown Center publications:
March 2022
Middle East Brief 147
“Criminalizing Environmental Activism in Turkey”
Current position: Assistant Professor in the Department of Politics and International Relations at Florida International University
Crown Center publications:
March 2014
Middle East Brief 78
“Is Hezbollah Confronting a Crisis of Popular Legitimacy?”
Current position: Associate Professor of International Relations at the Pardee School of Global Studies, Boston University
Current position: Professor of Political Science at UMass Amherst
Crown Center publications:
July 2022
Crown Conversations 14
“Ennahda: Before and After the Coup in Tunisia”
May 2021
Middle East Brief 142
“What Is ‘Muslim’ about Tunisia’s ‘Muslim Democrats’?”
Current position: Associate Director and Assistant Research Professor at the Institute for Middle East Studies in the Elliott School of International Affairs at the George Washington University
Current position: Founder and President of the Moroccan Institute for Policy Analysis (MIPA)
Crown Center publications:
May 2018
Middle East Brief 118
“The Limits of Morocco’s Attempt to Comprehensively Counter Violent Extremism”
April 2017
Middle East Brief 108
“Morocco’s Salafi Ex-Jihadis: Co-optation, Engagement, and the Limits of Inclusion”
Current position: Director of the Project on Shi’ism and Global Affairs and Lecturer on Islamic Studies at Harvard Divinity School and Lecturer on Government at Harvard Faculty of Arts and Sciences
Crown Center publications:
April 2013
Middle East Brief 71
“The Islamic Awakening: Iran’s Grand Narrative of the Arab Uprisings”
Current position: Director of Graduate Studies in Jewish, Islamic, and Middle Eastern Studies, Assistant Professor of Islamic Studies and Anthropology at the Washington University in St. Louis
Crown Center publications:
November 2012
Middle East Brief 68
“Islamist Understandings of Sharia and Their Implications for the Post-revolutionary Egyptian Constitution”
Current position: Lecturer in the Elliot School of International Affairs at Georgetown University, Non-resident Fellow at Crown Center for Middle East Studies
Crown Center publications:
April 2021
Crown Conversation 7
“After Ten Years of War, Who Rules Syria?”
June 2019
Middle East Brief 128
“Why Hasn’t the Asad Regime Collapsed? Lessons Learned from Syria’s History of Tyranny”
Current position: Associate Professor in the Department of Political Science at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology
Crown Center publications:
May 2016
Middle East Brief 99
“The Changing Face of Islamic Authority in the Middle East”
Current position: Assistant Professor of History at Dartmouth College
Crown Center publications:
June 2018
Middle East Brief 119
“Drugs and Drug Policy in the Islamic Republic of Iran”
Current position: Historian of the Modern Middle East and International Philanthropy at Harvard University
Crown Center publications:
March 2015
Middle East Brief 90
“A Passing Generation of Yemeni Politics”
Current position: Middle East Scholar at Harvard Kennedy School’s Middle East Initiative
Crown Center publications:
February 2021
Middle East Brief 140
“The Great Thaw in Arab Domestic Politics”
January 2020
Crown Conversation 1
“Iran, Iraq, and Lebanon after Soleimani”
Co-author with Maryam Alemzadeh and Kelly Stedem
September 2018
Middle East Brief 122
“How Oil and Demography Shape Post Saddam Iraq”
January 2018
Middle East Brief 113
“The Communal Fracturing of the Jordanian Muslim Brotherhood”
November 2016
Middle East Brief 103
“Repartitioning the Sykes-Picot Middle East? Debunking Three Myths”
January 2015
Middle East Brief 87
“ISIS In Iraq: What We Get Wrong and Why 2015 Is Not 2007 Redux”
Current position: Director of NAPI and Independent Researcher and Advisor
Crown Center publications:
May 2017
Middle East Brief 110
“The Failure to End Libya’s Fragmentation and Future Prospects”
May 2015
Middle East Brief 93
“Libya’s Untold Story: Civil Society Amid Chaos”
Current position: Expert in modern Sunni-Islamic movements at the Begin-Sadat Center for Strategic Studies
Crown Center publications:
December 2010
Middle East Brief 47
“The Syrian Muslim Brotherhood and the Asad Regime”
Current position: Professor of Political Science and Director of Middle East Studies at the University of Connecticut
Crown Center publications:
November 2006
Middle East 13
“The United States and the Israel-Hezbollah War”
June 2006
Middle East Brief 7
“United States’ Policy Toward Hamas: An Initial Assessment”
Current position: Senior Economist and Consultant
Crown Center publications:
October 2007
Working Paper 2
“The ‘West Bank First’ Strategy: A Political-Economy Critical Assessment”
February 2007
Middle East Brief 16
“Looking Beyond the Numbers: The Palestinian Socioeconomic Crisis of 2006”
November 2006
Middle East Brief 12
“Gaza Economic Predicament One Year After Disengagement: What Went Wrong?”
Current position: Senior Fellow at the Carnegie Middle East Center in Beirut
Crown Center publications:
November 2023
Crown Conversation 18
“After the Israel-Hamas War: Likely Scenarios and Outcomes for Israelis and Palestinians”
With Michal Ben-Josef Hirsch, Shai Feldman, and Khalil Shikaki
April 2011
Crown Paper 5
“‘We Serve the People:’ Hamas Policing in Gaza”
March 2010
Middle East Brief 41
“Hamas Rule in Gaza: Three Years On”
Current position: Assistant Professor of History at Swarthmore College
Crown Center publications:
February 2017
Middle East Brief 106
“Sisi’s Egypt: Building Political Legitimacy amidst Economic Crises”
Current position: Professor of Political Science and International Affairs at the University of New Hampshire
Current position: Senior Research Fellow at the Moshe Dayan Center for Middle Eastern and African Studies at Tel Aviv University
Crown Center publications:
April 2015
Middle East Brief 92
“Jordan Facing Up to the ISIS Challenge: A Net Assessment”
April 2013
Middle East Brief 72
“Is the Jordanian Monarchy in Danger?”
June 2011
Middle East Brief 52
“Jordan 2011: Uneasy Lies the Head”
February 2010
Crown Essay 1
“The Rise of Hamas in Palestine and the Crisis of Secularism in the Arab World”
March 2008
Middle East Brief 27
“Jordan: Preserving Domestic Order in a Setting of Regional Turmoil”
Current position: CEO and President of the Japan Society
Crown Center publications:
May 2012
Middle East Brief 63
“Turkey’s Time in Syria: Future Scenarios”
Joshua W. Walker
April 2011
Middle East Brief 49
“What Is Driving Turkey’s Reengagement with the Arab World?”
Joshua W. Walker
Co-author with Nader Habibi
November 2010
Middle East Brief 46
“The United States and Turkey: Can They Agree to Disagree?”
Current position: Assistant Professor at the Department of Political Science and Department of Literatures, Cultures, and Languages at the University of Connecticut
Crown Center publications:
May 2022
Crown Conversations 13
“The Tunisian Public and the Rise of Kais Saied”
October 2019
Middle East Brief 131
“Why Did Women's Rights Expand in Post-Revolutionary Tunisia?”
The opinions and findings expressed in these publications belong to the author(s) exclusively and do not reflect those of the Crown Center or Brandeis University.