As Editor and Chair of the Section, I am delighted to present the Fall 2020 issue of the APSA MENA Politics Newsletter.
We lead with a report by Nermin Allam, Gail Buttorff and Marwa Shalaby about the results of a survey of MENA scholars on the impact of COVID-19 on their research and careers. The results are sobering, and pose a profound challenge across generations – particularly for women, who have been disproportionately affected. The impact of COVID-19 is also unevenly distributed across methodologies, and has struck MENA research more than it has other regions of the world, which could produce long-term inequities and imbalances in MENA political science. The leadership of the MENA Politics Section is deeply committed to working with our colleagues and partner institutions to try to mitigate these difficult problems.
The rest of the Fall 2020 issue is dedicated to a symposium on women and gender in the politics of MENA. The symposium, based on papers presented to a virtual workshop organized by Gamze Cavdar, ranges widely across methodologies, countries and issues to paint a fascinating picture of the complex evolution of the role and status of women in MENA. There are few more important issues for the Newsletter to take up, and I’m deeply grateful to Gamze Cavdar and her colleagues for producing this exemplary work of engaged scholarship.
Marc Lynch
Washington, D.C. – October 14, 2020
Chair of the MENA Politics Section and Newsletter Editor
Prerna BalaEddy
Newsletter Assistant Editor
TABLE OF CONTENTS
WELCOME MESSAGES
Marc Lynch
Message from the Section Chair and Editor
Marc Lynch
Section 2020 Award Winners
Ahmed Morsy and Andrew Stinson
Note from APSA
REPORT
Nermin Allam, Gail Buttorff and Marwa Shalaby
COVID-19 Pandemic Compounds Challenges Facing MENA Research
RESEARCH SYMPOSIUM: WOMEN AND GENDER IN MENA
Gamze Cavdar
Introduction: Looking Beyond Islam
Lillian Frost
Unequal Citizens: State Limitations on Women’s Nationality Rights
Lihi Ben Shitrit
Gilead in Palestine
Catherine Warrick
Gender and the Law in the Arab World: Text, Pretext, and Citizenship
Shirin Saeidi
“We Don’t have Citizenship:” Liberation and Other Conceptual Frameworks for Understanding Iranian Women’s Activism in the MENA and Beyond
Erika Biagini and Paola Rivetti
State repression and activist organizing in informal spaces: Comparing feminist movements in Egypt and Iran
Aili Mari Tripp
Why Autocrats Adopt Women’s Rights: The Case of Morocco
Gamze Cavdar
Implications of Islamist Rule for Women’s Employment in Turkey
Marwa Shalaby
Gender Stereotypes and Women’s Political Representation in MENA
Lindsay J. Benstead
What Explains Patriarchal Attitudes? The Role of Women’s Employment and Household Structure
Nermin Allam
A Case for Community Engaged Research in Gender Studies and The Middle East