Fanar haddad biography of michael

My research focusses on the politics of the modern Middle East and can be split into three overlapping areas: Iraqi politics and governance, identity formation and identity politics, and finally Shia Islamism.

Much of my published work has focussed on sectarian identity formation, sectarian relations, modern Shi’ism, identity politics, religious nationalism and Iraqi politics. I have an especially strong interest in Sunni-Shi’a relations and how these have shaped, and have been shaped by, national politics, regional geopolitics and transnational networks.

I am also interested in theories of the post-Weberian state particularly in relation to hybrid governance and hybrid security actors. I am currently working on Shi'a Islamism as part of an IRFD-funded research project led by colleagues at Aarhus University: "Bringing in the Other Islamists – comparing Arab Shi’a and Sunni Islamism(s) in a sectarianized Middle East."

External positions