Thirteenth Nordic Conference on Middle Eastern and Studies

Thirteenth Nordic Conference on Middle Eastern Studies

A new world order - a new Middle East?

University of Oslo, Norway, 25–27 September 2025

Registration for the 2025 conference is now closed for presenting participants. Non-presenting audience can still register here. The conference takes place at the University of Oslo, Blindern campus. For more details and other practical information, click here.

The program for the Thirteenth Nordic Conference on Middle Eastern Studies can be found here.

The 13th NSMES conference is organized and hosted by the Department of Culture, Religion, Asian and Middle Eastern Studies (IKOS) at the University of Oslo. The NSMES is an independent non-profit association for scholars in the Nordic countries working on the Middle East. It covers all subjects in the humanities and social sciences, from antiquity to the present day. The NSMES conference takes place every third year and is organized and hosted by universities in the Nordic countries. It is also open for participants beyond the Nordic countries. This time the theme for the multidisciplinary conference is “A new world order - a new Middle East?”.

Keynote speakers

Bjørn Olav Utvik, Professor Emeritus at the University of Oslo

Bjørn Olav Utvik is Professor Emeritus of Middle East Studies at the University of Oslo, where he has taught courses on the modern political and economic history of the Middle East and on political Islam. He is the author of The Pious Road to Development: Islamist Economics in Egypt (2011) and (co-ed. with Kjetil Selvik) Oil States in the New Middle East: Uprisings and Stability (2016), in addition to Islamismen (in Norwegian, 3 ed. 2020), a comprehensive history and analysis of Islamism in the Middle East and North Africa.

Utvik has published numerous articles, book chapters and reports dealing primarily with issues from the contemporary political history of the region. Utvik has combined scholarship on movements such as the Muslim Brothers with research programs of high political relevance and directed several large research projects, funded by the Norwegian Ministry of Foreign Affairs: Faultlines of Islamism (2007-2010), The New Middle East: Emerging Political and Ideological Trends (2011-2016), and by the Norwegian Research Council: The Gulf Research Unit: Economic and Political Developments in the Gulf Region (2008-2013). Utvik has also translated Arabic fiction into Norwegian, notably Naguib Mahfouz’s novel Midaq Alley (Zuqaq al-Midaq). From 2015 to 2020 he headed the Department of Culture Studies and Oriental Languages at the University of Oslo. He has appeared in Norwegian media countless times to comment on current affairs in the MENA region.

Utvik has for many years been one of the pillars of Middle East studies in Scandinavia: He is one of the founders of the Middle East study program at the University of Oslo and he is a former President of NSMES (1998-2007).

Dana El Kurd, Associate Professor at the University of Richmond

Dana El Kurd is an assistant professor at the University of Richmond in the Department of Political Science, and a senior nonresident fellow at the Arab Center Washington. She specializes in Palestinian and Arab politics, particularly on topics related to mobilization, public opinion, and international intervention. El Kurd is a well-known and respected analyst and comentator on Palestinian affairs and international politics.

Her first book, titled Polarized and Demobilized: Legacies of Authoritarianism in Palestine was published in January 2020 with Oxford University Press, to great acclaim. She has been praised for the complex and multimethod character of her work as well as her analytical sophistication. El Kurd has published in prominent academic journals such as Global Studies Quarterly, PS Political Science & Politics, and Democratization. She has contributed to media outlets such as The Nation, Foreign Policy, Foreign Affairs, Financial Times, +972 Mag and more.

Marc Owen Jones, Associate Professor at Northwestern University, Qatar

Marc Owen Jones is an Associate Professor of Media Analytics at Northwestern University in Qatar, where he specializes in exposing disinformation campaigns and investigating digital authoritarianism in the Middle East. A leading expert in social media manipulation, disinformation and political repression, his groundbreaking research has uncovered networks of fake journalists and state-sponsored bot/trolls campaigns targeting global politics.

In addition to his other academic publications, Jones has authored two books: Political Repression in Bahrain (Cambridge University Press, 2020) and Digital Authoritarianism in the Middle East (Hurst/Oxford University Press, 2022). His work has earned multiple accolades, including the British Council's UK Alumni Professional Achievement Award and one of Foreign Affairs' 2023 "Books of the Year." His PhD thesis also won the AGAPS award for best thesis in 2016.

His investigations have made headlines globally, from revealing disinformation surrounding Jamal Khashoggi's murder to successfully challenging the UK Foreign Office in a tribunal over historical torture cases in Bahrain. Jones work appears regularly in major media outlets, ranging from The New York Times and The Washington Post, to Al Jazeera English and the BBC. Jones grew up in Bahrain and Saudi Arabia, and has worked and studied in Sudan, Syria, Germany and the United Kingdom.

Call for Papers

The present decade represents a defining political moment for the world, and the Middle East and North Africa is deeply entangled in crucial processes. The wars in Ukraine and Gaza, and subsequent reactions from Europe and the United States have raised questions about the universality of international law, possibly marking a turning point for the Israel-Palestine conflict. Democracy is in decline globally, and populist leaders call for disintegration from international institutions and treaties. China is becoming a more powerful global actor, investing heavily in the Middle East and African countries, while the United States is losing its role as the world’s only superpower. Artificial intelligence poses global promises and threats, not least with respect to democracy, and Arab countries are investing heavily in the new technology. At the same time, the climate crisis is growing, posing a grave threat to all countries in the Middle East, as evidenced through recent floods in Libya, Oman, and UAE, while the necessary energy transition proves challenging for the petro-states of the region. The NSMES conference in 2025 spotlights the role that the MENA region plays in the ongoing changes, as well as the implications of these changes on politics, people, and everyday lives in the region.

We encourage papers that address different aspects of these developments, ranging from the religious, cultural, historical, and social to the political. In line with the NSMES’s role as a hub for Middle East and Islamic studies in the Nordic countries, we also welcome papers on other relevant themes pertinent to Middle Eastern and/or Islamic Studies, including the disciplines of Middle Eastern history, anthropology, archaeology, religion, politics, sociology, language, and literature. Membership in the Nordic Society for Middle Eastern Studies at the time of the conference is a prerequisite for attendance - registration for membership is found at the NSMES website.

The deadline for submitting abstracts has now passed.