Mostafa El Sharkawy

I'm a Ph.D. candidate in Political Science at the University of Michigan. I study  the politics of religion, identity, and violence with a focus on the Middle East and the Muslim world. 

My dissertation asks why state-employed religious elites sometimes act against the interests of the states that employ and depend on them. I answer this question using large-scale social media data, machine learning classification, and fieldwork on clerical political speech in the Gulf region. In other research, I examine the role of religious identities and religious regulations in shaping individual political behaviors and state behavior.  My research is motivated by a broader interest in how religion structures (and challenges) political authority and social identity.

I am grateful to the Global Islamic Studies Center, the Center for Political Studies, the Institute for Humane Studies and the American Political Science Association for supporting my research.

My CV is here. You can reach me at melshar[at]umich.edu.