Call for Papers: Special Issue on Political imaginaries of domestic and regional orders in the MENA
Editors: Tereza Jermanová and Jan Daniel, Charles University
Deadline August 14, 2026
This Special Issue aims to examine how future domestic and regional political orders in the Middle East and North Africa (MENA) are imagined amid the current situation. The present moment is marked by momentous reconfigurations triggered by the October 7 Hamas attack on Israel and the subsequent Israeli onslaught on Gaza. These events have prompted powerful actors such as the United States and Israel to advance their visions of regional and domestic orders, while also giving impetus to diverse local actors as well as diasporas to advance their own imaginaries of future orders in Iran, Lebanon, Syria, and Palestine.
At the same time, the present moment is also marked by continuities. Authoritarian regimes appear to have weathered the challenges posed by the protest movements of 2011–2019, yet persistent structural tensions continue to fuel discontent. Regionally, the vision underpinning the Abraham Accords remains influential, aligning with economic strategies across MENA regimes that emulate Gulf-inspired authoritarian neoliberalism. Like the ruptures, these continuities may, too, inspire the imagining of alternative futures.
This Special Issue aims to explore emerging political imaginaries, focusing on questions such as: What domestic and regional visions of the future arise amid these (dis)continuities? Who formulates them, and who is excluded? How do visions advanced by different groups and elites interact, coexist, or clash? How do current visions build on – or contest – past imaginaries of domestic and regional orders?
We approach these questions from a broad understanding of political imaginary as the way people envision future political orders and seek to put them into practice. Political imaginaries may be articulated by protest movements, opposition groups, activists, diasporas, non-state actors, governments, international actors, etc. They may be expressed through diverse formats, including political manifestos, protest demands, policy documents, constitutional reforms, local community-building projects, everyday practices, and so on.
We welcome diverse methodological and theoretical approaches that engage these questions, particularly (but not exclusively) in relation to the following themes:
Please send a 400-word abstract and a CV (including past publications) by August 14 to imvision@ff.cuni.cz. Selected participants will be notified in August. They will be asked to deliver an 8 000-word paper by 31 December 2026, and will then be invited to participate in a two-day workshop in Prague in February 2027, which will aim to provide them with feedback to revise their papers. The aim is to submit the Special Issue to a journal before June 2027.
The workshop is hosted by the project “Envisioning (Im)possible Futures: Imaginaries of Political Transformation in the Middle East” at Charles University. The project will be able to provide participants with a contribution to travel costs to and from Prague, as well as accommodation for two nights. Those participants with access to funding from their home institutions will be asked to contribute towards their travel costs in order to enable the participation of early career researchers. Should you have any questions, please contact imvision@ff.cuni.cz.