Doing Research as a Native: A Guide for Fieldwork in Illiberal and Repressive States

Doing Research as a Native examines the specific challenges faced by researchers conducting fieldwork in their native repressive and/or illiberal countries. It presents narratives from 19 scholars, representing 15 countries in Africa, Asia, the Caribbean, Eastern Europe, South America, Central Asia and South Asia, who conducted fieldwork in their native repressive and/or illiberal countries. These researchers encountered obstacles directly related to their native status, particularly with regard to their gender, race and ethnicity. This volume also provides practical guidance on how to address these challenges.

Kira D. Jumet is Associate Professor of Government and Director of the Middle East/Islamicate Worlds Studies Program at Hamilton College. Her research focuses on social movements, authoritarianism, and national identity in the Middle East and North Africa. With an academic backround in Political Science and Middle East Studies, Jumet takes an interdisciplinary approach to her scholarship. She is the author of Contesting the Repressive State: Why Ordinary Egyptians Protested During the Arab Spring (2018) and has also published on violent Islamism and repression in Egypt. Jumet has conducted fieldwork in Morocco for her current work on nation-building in the country.

Merouan Mekouar is Associate Professor of Social Science at York University and specializes in norm diffusion, social movements, and authoritarian practices in North Africa and the Middle East. Originally trained in political science, Mekouar draws upon a wide range of disciplines--including comparative politics, international relations, political sociology, development studies, and behavioral economics--to examine diverse political phenomena ranging from the emergence and adoption of new authoritarian practices and means of contention to regime learning and stress contamination in security organizations. In recent years, he has expanded his scholarship to include critical fieldwork methodologies in illiberal and authoritarian countries.