My research focuses on international relations, with a geographical emphasis on the Gulf and Egypt, and their interactions with the EU, US and rising powers. My theoretical and empirical contributions to International Relations focus on economic factors (versus ideational and geo-strategic factors) in foreign policy and alliances, security and development studies, and Muslim minority – state relations. I have contributed to academic and policy events covering Gulf politics, Asia – Middle East relations, and Euro-Med relations.
My current and recent research projects focus on civil nuclear power in the Middle East, transnational security cooperation in the Mediterranean, Saudi political economy, and de-escalation measures targeting the Saudi – Iranian rivalry and proxy conflicts.
Recent conference participation includes presentations at the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences and at the 1st Area Studies Forum at Tsinghua University, Beijing. I also co-convened a workshop on sustainable consumption and production in the Gulf at the Gulf Research Meeting, University of Cambridge in July 2019.
Forthcoming:
– Middle East Politics in Perspective, (AUC Press)
– Transnational Security Cooperation in the Mediterranean (Palgrave Macmillan)
– The Gulf States and the Horn of Africa: Interests, Influence and Instability (Manchester University Press)
– International Relations of the Gulf: Strategic Competition in an Uncertain World (Manchester University Press)
with Gawdat Bahgat, “Civil Nuclear Energy in the Middle East: Demand, Parity, and Risk“, Arab Gulf States Institute in Washington (AGSIW), 11 April 2019.
“Structural Reform and Political Consolidation: the Pathway to Modernization in the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia”, paper for the workshop “Challenged by the Decreased Price of Oil: Adjustment Policies in the Arab Gulf and Beyond since 2014”, Beirut, Lebanon. 14-15 March 2019. Hosted by the Lebanese Oil and Gas Initiative (LOGI) and the German Institute of Global and Area Studies (GIGA).
Also presented at the Department of Near Eastern Studies/The Institute for the Transregional Study of the Contemporary Middle East, North Africa and Central Asia (TRI), Princeton University, in April 2019.
