Mehran Kamrava is professor and director of the Center for International and Regional Studies at Georgetown University’s School of Foreign Service in Qatar. He is the author of a number of journal articles and books, including The Impossibility of Palestine: History, Geography, and the Road Ahead (2016); Qatar: Small State, Big Politics (2015); The Modern Middle East: A Political History since the First World War (3rd edition, 2013); and Iran’s Intellectual Revolution (2008). His edited books include Fragile Politics: Weak States in the Greater Middle East (2016); and Beyond the Arab Spring: The Evolving Ruling Bargain in the Middle East (2015).
Gerd Nonneman is professor of international relations and Gulf studies at Georgetown University’s School of Foreign Service in Qatar, where he served as dean in 2011–16. Prior to this, he was professor of international relations and Middle East politics and Al-Qasimi professor of Gulf Studies at the University of Exeter; he has also directed the Institute of Arab and Islamic Studies and the Centre for Gulf Studies at Exeter. He has published widely on the political economy and international relations of the Gulf and wider Middle East, including (with Paul Aarts) Saudi Arabia in the Balance (2005; 2nd edition in Arabic, 2012) and (with Ginny Hill) Yemen, Saudi Arabia and the Gulf States: Elite Politics, Street Protests and Regional Diplomacy (Chatham House, 2011).
Anastasia Nosova is studying for a PhD in political science at the London School of Economics (LSE), and is affiliated with the LSE Kuwait Programme. She holds a master’s degree in Gulf Studies from the University of Exeter, and a bachelor’s degree in Asian and African Studies from St Petersburg State University, Russia. Her main research interest is the dynamics of political participation of the business sector in Kuwait.
Marc Valeri is senior lecturer in the political economy of the Middle East and director of the Centre for Gulf Studies at the University of Exeter. He is the author of Oman: Politics and Society in the Qaboos State (2009) and co-editor of Business Politics in the Middle East (2013).