For decades, Maghrebi decision-makers have instrumentalised friend and foe narratives with regard to Israel and Iran, two of the most controversial regional actors in the MENA region. Only Morocco has official relations with Israel, only Algeria and Tunisia with Iran. A systematic analysis of...

Islamist parties have, in Western public opinion, long been seen as an obstacle to democratization in the Arab world. This perspective is strongly qualified, however, by evidence from Arab states in which Islamist parties have been given a chance to participate in political processes.This study...

When Libya's international isolation ended in 2004, Western leaders expressed their hope that political liberalization would follow. However, Qadhafi's repressive regime has so far turned out to be stable and resistant to reforms. Diplomatic normalization reduced the danger of regime change from...

The idea of generating solar electricity in the Sahara Desert and exporting it to Europe is captivating, both from the climate and energy perspective and with an eye to Europe's goal of intensifying cooperation with its southern neighbours. Correspondingly great has been the political and media...

During the course of the so-called Arab Spring, observers were quick to refer to the uprisings as "Facebook revolutions" or "Twitter revolutions". Although the important role of social media in the 2011 upheavals in the Middle East and North Africa (MENA) is widely acknowledged, its impact on...

Since 2015, the management of refugee and migration movements has been high on the agenda of the European Union (EU) and its member states. Great hopes are being pinned on development policy interventions that offer the people who are willing to migrate prospects in their home countries. This...

The transition to a hydrogen-based economy is gaining momentum in both Germany and the European Union (EU). Used as an energy carrier, hydrogen holds the promise of freeing hard-to-decarbonise sectors like heavy industry, aviation, and maritime trade from their emissions. At the same time,...