News

New InIIS podcast - First episode with Mabruk Derbésh

In this first issue of our new InIIS InSIGHTS series, Klaus Schlichte meets Mabruk Derbésh and discusses the dynamics of change and intervention in Libya with him.

You can access the conversation here.

Conferences

08.04.2021
ISA Conference 2021: RB44: Political Economy of the Middle East

Chairs and Discussant

* Chair: Mabruk Derbesh
* Discussant: Mabruk Derbesh

This panel features political economy research on the Middle East region:

- Dimming the Lights: Political Succession, Crony Capitalism and Economic Development in Syria | Author: Ammar Shamaileh (Doha Institute for Graduate Studies),
- Ethnic Politics and Resistance to Trade Liberalization in the Arab World | Author: Steve Monroe (Yale-NUS College)
- Saudi Arabia’s Regional Ambitions: Islamic hub for global flows. | Author: Nassar Alnassar (University of East Anglia)

FC40: State and Power in the Middle East (09.04.2021)

This panel explores various ways states in the Middle East are seeking to exercise and expand their power as well as remain resilient in the face of myriad challenges:
* The impact of political change on the state of academia including Academic Freedom in the MENA region |  Author: Mabruk Derbesh
* Children Incarcerated: Untold Stories of Persecution |  Author: Imed Labidi (Doha Institute for Graduate Studies)
* Converging Revolutionary and Reactionary Trends on Middle East Twitter |  Author: Alexei Abrahams (Princeton University)
* The Benefits of Fragmented Counterinsurgencies: Experimental Evidence from a National Survey in Iraq |  Author: Saurabh Pant (University of Essex), Author: Christoph Mikulaschek (Harvard University)
Chairs and Discussants
* Chair: Joshua Goodman (Air War College )
* Discussant: Filippo Dionigi (University of Bristol )

https://virtual2021.isanet.org/agenda

 

Mabruk DerbeshMabruk Derbesh
Research Project on Academic Freedom

 

We are delighted to have our new colleague, Mabruk Derbesh. He just came to us after completing a project at Columbia University, New York - CGC. Prior to that, he taught at the University of Tripoli in Libya, at the Faculty of Economics and Political Science. In the next two years, he will carry out his inspiring research project on academic freedom at the InIIS, equipped with a State of Bremen fellowship. He will be teaching a course on academic freedom as well as his main research project. Aside from his academic work, he is also a writer and a political commentator.
The Corona Pandemic has made his journey to the institute difficult, so we are all very relieved that we can now finally welcome him at our institute, welcome!

 

Lecture on Academic Freedom in Arab World

This lecture was organized with the New School for Social Research (New York) and Off University (Berlin). It provided an introduction to the concept of “academic freedom,” and the situation for academics and intellectuals in the MENA region, but more precisely Libya.

 

Since the Arab Spring began in early 2010s, countless academics in the Middle East and North Africa (MENA region) have been fired from their faculty positions in direct response to ideas expressed in their writing or teaching. In the most extreme cases, their lives have been threatened, and they have been forced to flee.
 

To Be a Mediterranean

Lecture on mediterranean politics at Visegrad Hall, Krakow, Poland.

Justice in Libya

This conference co-hosted by the SOAS Policy Forum and London Middle East Institute brings together practitioners and academics to engage with the SOAS student body on these issues. Please join us for an informative evening with organizations present such as the UN, ICC, Amnesty International among others.

https://www.soas.ac.uk/smei/events/22jan2016-transitional-justice-in-libya.html