Francesco Cavatorta is professor of political science and director of the Centre Interdisciplinaire de Recherche sur l’Afrique et le Moyen Orient (CIRAM) at Laval University in Quebec, Canada. He has published extensively on Islamist parties and movements, and on processes of democratization in the Middle East and North Africa. His work has appeared in Democratization, Mediterranean Politics, Government and Opposition, Middle East Policy, and the British Journal of Middle Eastern Studies, among others. He is also the author and editor of numerous books.