Dr Robert Mason is Middle East expert, and an award-winning international researcher on Gulf State foreign policies, especially those of Saudi Arabia, Iran, the UAE, Qatar, and Oman.
Robert is a Non-Resident Fellow at The Arab Gulf States Institute in Washington and at the Gulf Research Center in Jeddah. His research explores the international relations of the Middle East, Gulf politics, foreign policy analysis, political economy, and security studies.
He spent three years as Associate Professor and Director of the Middle East Studies Center at The American University in Cairo where he was responsible for teaching, research and outreach, including as co-host of a Korea – Middle East Cooperation Forum in Seoul and a high-level EU – Middle East dialogue in Cairo.
Robert is the author or editor of nine books, including Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates: Foreign Policy and Strategic Alliances in an Uncertain World and the textbook New Perspectives on Middle East Politics: Economy, Society and International Relations. His other recent projects have focused on the Abraham Accords, US – Saudi relations, UK foreign policy, nuclear power in the Middle East, Iranian air power, and Gulf security.
He has been a visiting fellow at the University of Oxford, the London School of Economics, and the King Faisal Center for Research and Islamic Studies in Riyadh. He received his BA in International Relations and Politics from the University of Westminster, and his PhD from the Institute of Arab and Islamic Studies at the University of Exeter. Robert has lived in Egypt for a decade and travelled widely across the Middle East.
Robert is a regular commentator for national and global publications, and frequently presents his research at conferences and workshops in the UK and internationally.
Dr Robert Mason FRSA FHEA 