BASSAM TIBI is Professor of International Relations at the University of Gottingen and, since 1988, a Research Associate at Harvard University. He is the author of Crisis of Modern Islam, Arab Nationalism: A Critical Enquiry and Islam and the Cultural Accommodation of Social Change. He has written six monographs in German and co-authored books in English, German and Arabic including Tribes and State Formation in the Middle East, Human Rights in Africa: Cross-Cultural Perspectives and The Study of the Middle East: International Perspectives. He is a member of the Fundamentalism Project of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences and co-author of the second volume of this international project.