Melani Cammett

Topics of Interest:
Political Economy of Development, "Identity" Politics, Middle East

Countries/Regions of Interest:
MENA region, Morocco, Tunisia, Egypt, Palestine, Jordan, Lebanon

List of Publications

Books:
A Political Economy of the Middle East, 4th ed. Boulder, CO: Westview Press, March 2015. (With Ishac Diwan, Alan Richards and John Waterbury)

Compassionate Communalism: Welfare and Sectarianism in Lebanon. Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press, 2014.

The Politics of Non-State Social Welfare. (Co-edited with Lauren Morris MacLean). Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press, 2014.

Globalization and Business Politics in Arab North Africa: A Comparative Perspective. New York: Cambridge University Press, 2007, 2010. 

Articles in Refereed Journals:
“Does Risk Promote or Undermine Citizen Trust in Government? The Case of Health Care in Europe.” Forthcoming in Perspectives on Politics. (With Julia Lynch and Gavril Bilev)

“Sectarianism and the Ambiguities of Welfare in the Middle East.” Forthcoming in Cultural Anthropology, special issue on the “Politics of the Urban Poor,” co-edited by Veena Das and Shalini Randeria.

“Is There an Islamist Political Advantage?” In Annual Review of Political Science, vol. 17(May/June 2014). (With Pauline Jones Luong)

“Governance and Health in the Arab World.” In The Lancet, vol. 382(2013): 1-13. (With Rajaie Batniji (lead author), Sanjay Basu, Rita Giacaman, Amaney Jamal, Lina Khatib, Geoffrey Sweet, and Paul Wise)

“Power-Sharing in Post-Conflict Societies: Implications for Peace and Governance.” In Journal of Conflict Resolution 56, no. 6 (December 2012): 982-1016. (With Edmund Malesky)

“Informal Politics and Access to Health Care in Lebanon.” In International Journal for Equity in Health. 11, no. 23(2012): 1-8. (With Bradley Chen)

“Introduction: The Political Consequences of Non-State Social Welfare in the Global South.” Article in special issue of Studies in Comparative International Development on “Non-State Actors, States and Citizens and the Provision of Social Welfare in the Global South.” 46, no. 1(Spring 2011): 1-21. (With Lauren Morris MacLean)

“Partisan Activism and Access to Welfare in Lebanon.” Article in special issue of Studies in Comparative International Development on Non-State Actors, States and Citizens and the Provision of Social Welfare in the Global South.” 46, no. 1(Spring 2011): 70-97. (PMCID: PMC4043299)

“Bricks and Mortar Clientelism: The Political Geography of Welfare in Lebanon.” In World Politics 62, no. 3(July 2010): 381-421. (With Sukriti Issar). (PMCID: PMC4029429)

Winner of the 2011 Alexander L. George Award, Section on Qualitative and Multi-Method Research, American Political Science Association.

“Labor Standards and Labor Flexibility in the Middle East: Freer Trade and Freer Unions?” In Studies in Comparative International Development 45, no. 2(Summer 2010). (With Marsha Pripstein Posusney): 250-279.

“Business-Government Relations and Industrial Change: The Politics of Upgrading in Morocco and Tunisia.” In World Development 35, no. 11(2007): 1889-1903.

“Development and the Changing Dynamics of Global Production: Global Value Chains and Local Clusters in Apparel Manufacturing.” In Competition and Change 10, no. 1(March 2006): 23-48. 

“Fat Cats and Self-Made Men: Globalization and the Paradoxes of Collective Action.”  In Comparative Politics 37, no. 4(July 2005): 379-400.

“International Exposure, Domestic Response: Financiers, Weavers and Garment Manufacturers in Morocco and Tunisia.”  In Arab Studies Journal 7, no. 2/8, no. 1(Fall 1999/Spring 2000):
26-51. 

“Defensive Integration and Late Developers: The Gulf Cooperation Council and the Arab Maghreb Union.” In Global Governance 5, no. 3(July-September 1999): 379-402. 

Works in Progress and Under Review:
“Inequality and Perceptions of Public Welfare in the Middle East.” Manuscript in progress. (With Nisreen Salti)

“The Politics of Social Spending in Turkey.” Manuscript in progress. (With Mine Eder and Ernest Sergenti)

“Religion, Politics and the Quality of Service Provision in Lebanon.” Manuscript in progress. (With Aytug Sasmaz)

“State-Building in Historical Perspective in the Middle East.” Research in progress. (With Aytug Sasmaz)

“Sunni-Shi’a Relations and Pro-Social Behavior in Lebanon.” Research in progress. (With David Romney)

Book Chapters:
“The Effects of War and Violence Conflict on Youth in the Middle East.” In the Arab Human Development Report, United National Development Program, 2015. (With Nisreen Salti.)

“Development and Underdevelopment in the Middle East.” In Carol Lancaster and Nicolas van de Walle, eds. Handbook of the Politics of Development. New York: Oxford University Press, forthcoming 2015. 

“Social Welfare.” In Tulia Falleti, Orfeo Fioretos and Adam Sheingate, eds., Handbook of Historical Institutionalism. New York: Oxford University Press, forthcoming 2015. (With Aytug Sasmaz)

“Human Insecurity: Poverty and Welfare in Lebanon.” In Donna Lee Bowen and Becky Schulthies, eds, Everyday Life in the Middle East, 3rd ed. Indianapolis, IN: Indiana University Press, forthcoming 2014.

“Epilogue: A Political Economy of the Arab Uprisings.” A Political Economy of the Middle East. Third ed. Boulder, CO: Westview Press, forthcoming 2013. (With Ishac Diwan.)

Abridged versions reprinted in Arabic in Kalamon Al-Thaqafiyya (Fall 2013), Le Monde Diplomatique/Al-Khaleej (October 2013) and Le Monde Diplomatique/Al-Ahram (Sept. 28, 2013); and in English in Jadaliyya (January 2013).

 “Using Proxy Interviewing to Address Sensitive Topics.” In Layna Mosley, ed., Interviewing in Political Science. Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press, 2013.

“The Diversity of Islamic Charitable Activities: Analytical Distinctions Among Shi’a Muslim Organizations in Lebanon.” Manuscript in Progress.” In Raj Brown and Justin Pierce, ed., Charities in the Non-Western World: The Development and Regulation of Indigenous and Islamic Charities. London: Routledge, 2013.

“The Political Economy of Development in the Middle East.” In Ellen Lust, ed., The Middle East, 13th ed. New York: CQ Press, 2013. 

“The Political Economy of Development in the Middle East.” In Ellen Lust, ed., The Middle East, 12th ed. New York: CQ Press, 2010. 

“Challenges to Networks of Privilege in Morocco: Implications for Network Analysis.” In Steven Heydemann, ed. Networks of Privilege in the Middle East: The Politics of Economic Reform Revisited. New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2004, pp. 245-279.

Other Publications:
“How Hezbollah Helps (And What it Gets Out of It).” Monkey Cage Blog, Washington Post, October 2, 2014. Available at http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/monkey-cage/wp/2014/10/02/how-hezbollah-helps-and-what-it-gets-out-of-it/.

“The Syrian Conflict’s Impact on Lebanese Politics.” In PeaceBrief, U.S. Institute of Peace, Washington, D.C., November 18, 2013. Available at http://www.usip.org/publications/the-syrian-conflict-s-impact-lebanese-politics.

“The Dynamics of Democratic Transitions: Insights from Democratization Theory and Case Studies of Non-MENA Countries.” Background paper prepared for the Arab Transitions Report, Middle East and North Africa Division, World Bank, May 2013.

“Democracy in Post-Invasion Iraq.” Report for the Costs of War Project, Watson Institute for International Studies, Brown University, February 10, 2012. Available at www.costsofwar.org.

“The Politics of Economic and Social Change in the MENA.” In “Arab Uprisings: New Opportunities for Political Science.” POMEPS Briefing, no. 12, June 12, 2012. Available at http://www.ssrc.org/publications/docs/POMEPS_Conf12_Book_Web.pdf.

“The Limits of Anti-Islamism in Tunisia.” In Foreign Policy Online, October 31, 2011. Available at http://mideast.foreignpolicy.com/posts/2011/10/31/will_an_islamist_victory_translate_to_democracy.

“Hezbollah in Latin America: Implications for U.S. Homeland Security.” Testimony before the Subcommittee on Counterterrorism and Intelligence, Committee on Homeland Security, U.S. House of Representatives, July 7, 2011. Available at http://homeland.house.gov/sites/homeland.house.gov/files/Testimony%20Cammett.pdf. Video of proceedings available at http://homeland.house.gov/hearing/subcommittee-hearing-hezbollah-latin-america-implications-us-homeland-security.

“Democracy, Lebanese Style.” In Middle East Report Online, August 2009. Available at http://www.merip.org/mero/mero081809.html. 

“The War on Terror: Implications for Data Collection in the Middle East.”  In APSA-CP: Newsletter of the Comparative Politics Division of the American Political Science Association. 18, no. 1(Winter 2007): 16-19. 

“Political Ethnography in Deeply Divided Societies.” In Qualitative Methods: Newsletter of the American Political Science Association Organized Section on Qualitative Methods. 4, no. 3(Fall 2006): 15-18. 

“Habitat for Hezbollah.”  In Foreign Policy, August 2006. Available at http://www.foreignpolicy.com/story/cms.php?story_id=3572. 

Melani Cammett is Professor of Government at Harvard University. Cammett's recent books include Compassionate Communalism: Welfare and Sectarianism in Lebanon (Cornell University Press 2014), which explores how politics shape the distribution of welfare goods by ethnic and sectarian organizations, and A Political Economy of the Middle East (co-authored with Ishac Diwan, Westview Press 2015), which analyzes the interplay of economic, political and social factors in economic and social development in the region. Her co-edited book, The Politics of Non-State Social Welfare in the Global South (Cornell University Press 2014), examines the origins, evolution and consequences of non-state welfare provision for state-building and human security in diverse regions. Cammett’s current research projects explore governance and the politics of social service provision by public, private and non-state actors in the Middle East and identity politics in the region. She is also beginning a new project on the long-term historical roots of distinct development trajectories in the Middle East. Cammett has also published numerous articles in academic and policy journals and consults for development policy organizations.