Benjamin Schütze - EDP Network

Benjamin Schütze

EDP Network Member

Benjamin Schütze is a Senior Researcher at the Arnold Bergstraesser Institute (ABI) in Freiburg. His research examines transregional authoritarian practices and the politics of intervention via a focus on US and European attempts at ‘democracy promotion’ in Jordan, US-Jordanian military collaboration and the political economy of renewable energy infrastructures and projects in the Middle East and North Africa. His work is situated at the intersections of international relations, Middle Eastern politics, critical security studies and transregional studies.

Before working with the ABI, Benjamin was a postdoctoral research fellow at the University of Freiburg’s Department of Political Science (2016-2021), where he gained extensive experience in teaching and supervising undergraduate and postgraduate students in a range of IR-related topics and the politics of the Middle East. In 2016, he completed his doctoral research at the School of Oriental and African Studies (SOAS) in London, during which he conducted extensive field research in Belgium, Jordan and the USA. Prior to his PhD, Benjamin worked with UNDP’s Crisis Prevention and Recovery Unit in Beirut and studied Political Science and Arabic Studies in Leipzig, Beirut and London.

His key publications include ‘Promoting Democracy, Reinforcing Authoritarianism: US and European Policy in Jordan’, (Cambridge University Press, 2019; reviewed in The Middle East Journal and Democratization), ‘Rethinking Authoritarian Power: The Logistics Space and Authoritarian Practices in and between Secondary Port Cities of the Global South‘ (International Studies Quarterly, open-access, 2020, with Alke Jenss), ‘Marketing parliament: The constitutive effects of external attempts at parliamentary strengthening in Jordan’ (Cooperation and Conflict, 2018) and ‘Essential Readings on “Democracy Promotion”’ (Jadaliyya’s Middle East Studies Pedagogy Initiative (MESPI), 2020).

More about Benjamin Schuetze here.

Contact: benjamin.schuetze [at] external-democracy-promotion.eu