Lina Attalah, Century International Board of Advisors
Lina Attalah is an Egyptian media figure and journalist. Attalah was the editor of the Egypt Independent before it was shut down, and later cofounded Mada Masr, an independent media platform, where she is the editor in chief. In addition to Egypt and the recent uprisings, her areas of interest include migration, border communities, technology, and intellectual history.
Thanassis Cambanis, Senior Fellow and Director of Century International
Thanassis Cambanis is an author, journalist, and director of Century International. His work focuses on U.S. foreign policy, Arab politics, and social movements in the Middle East.
Rabab El-Mahdi, Contributor
Rabab El-Mahdi is associate professor of political science at The American University in Cairo. She wrote her dissertation on the impact of neo-liberal economic reconstruction on changing patterns of state-civil society relations in Egypt and Bolivia. El-Mahdi’s research interests cover the areas of state-civil society relations, social movements and resistance, as well as the political economy of social policy.
Michael Wahid Hanna, Century International Board of Advisors
Michael Wahid Hanna is director of the U.S. program at International Crisis Group. He was a senior fellow at The Century Foundation and co-director of TCF’s foreign policy program until 2021. He is also a non-resident senior fellow at the Reiss Center on Law and Security at New York University School of Law. Hanna works on issues of international security, international law, and U.S. foreign policy in the Middle East and South Asia.
Karl Sharro, Contributor
Karl Sharro is a Lebanese-Iraqi-British architect and satirist. He lives in London and blogs about the Middle East as KarlreMarks.
TCF World Podcast: Universal and Minority Rights in the Middle East
This podcast is in English. To listen in Arabic, click here.
The question of universal rights in the Middle East is a delicate one. As pluralism and rights come under threat from communal violence, authoritarianism, and religious identity politics, the call for universal rights becomes even more necessary. Yet marginalized groups face unique challenges that set them apart from the wider population. Our guests discuss the basis of rights and how to create inclusive forms of citizenship. The biggest challenge they contemplate is how to push for universal rights without erasing difference.
This podcast is part of “Citizenship and Its Discontents: The Struggle for Rights, Pluralism, and Inclusion in the Middle East,” a TCF project supported by the Henry Luce Foundation.
Participants include: