In February 2026, POMEPS and the Project on African Social Research organized a workshop hosted by the University of Florida’s Political Science Department Center for Global Islamic Studies to take stock of these dramatic changes. University of Florida Professor Ben Smith and POMEPS Director Marc Lynch laid out a wide-ranging set of questions for a group of mostly junior scholars to begin a sustained conversation about the transforming political landscape of two closely connected regions which are too rarely put into direct conversation. How can we best explain the emergence of new social and religious movements, setbacks to democracy through military coup and political repression, and shifts in the landscape of Islamist and jihadist politics? And how can the rich empirical data emerging from those countries inform broader questions about political science and religious studies?
Introduction: Political Movements in North Africa and the Sahel
Marc Lynch, George Washington University
From Principle to Pragmatism: Ennahda’s Decline
Ameni Mehrez, William and Mary
Michael Schuster, University of Florida
Beyond “Official Islam”: How State Islamization Blunted Islamist Opposition in Mauritania
Baba Adou, University of Florida
Brahim Afrit, Tulane University
Hind Ahmed Zaki, University of Connecticut
The Struggle to Breathe: The Evolution and Legacies of Environmental Social Movements in Gabès
Mariam Ben Slama, Johns Hopkins University
State exclusion and mobilization in Morocco’s Rif region: the case of cannabis cultivation
Alexandra Blackman, Cornell University
The Gen Z Youth Protests and the Rising King dilemma in Morocco
Mohammed Daadaoui, Oklahoma City University
From Minoritized to Indigenous: Imazighen and the Global Indigeneity Movement
Brahim El Guabli, Johns Hopkins University
Civilian Support for Coups and Post-Coup Buyer’s Remorse in the Sahel
Salah Ben Hammou, Rice University; Jonathan Powell, Campbellsville University
Areas of Operations: A new methodology for tracking the geography of armed group activity
David Russell, University of Florida
Explaining Pro-Democratic Mobilization in North Africa and the Sahel
Md Maniruzzaman Mamun, University of Florida