Maria Fantappie is no longer with the Carnegie Endowment.
Maria Fantappie was a visiting scholar at the Carnegie Middle East Center in Beirut specializing in state building in the Middle East. Fantappie has written extensively on Iraq’s domestic political development and on the evolution of the Kurdish issue in the Middle East.
Prior to joining Carnegie, Fantappie conducted numerous fieldwork surveys across Iraq. She taught strategic studies and international relations at the University of Rouen and Sciences Po in Paris.
Fantappie is also an associate researcher at the Institut français du Proche-Orient (IFPO) and has consulted for the World Bank regarding the political and socioeconomic challenges facing Iraq. Her work has been published in the Los Angeles Times and the National, and she is a co-author of From Desolation to Reconstruction: Iraq’s Troubled Journey (Wilfrid Laurier University Press, 2010).
As part of the ENGAGE project, Carnegie Europe will be hosting this public event within the framework of the 2-day ENGAGE Regional Symposium on the MENA Region. Speakers will discuss ways for the EU to forge an effective policy towards the region.
While policy debates on Syria have overwhelmingly focused on military developments and political negotiations, a less explored consequence of the hyper-localized war has been the profound reshaping of a less visible but crucial actor, the Syrian state.
As most of Iraq threatens to collapse under the weight of sectarian violence, Kurdistan in northern Iraq stands in sharp contrast. Will Kurdistan seize this opportunity to declare its independence?
During his second term, Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki emerged as a dominant player in Iraq’s political landscape, but his struggle to consolidate power has created a climate of continuous political crisis in the country.
Syrian Kurds are caught between the ambitions of their fellow Kurdish parties in neighboring Iraq and Turkey, and the strategies of a Syrian regime struggling to survive.
As aftershocks of the Arab Spring continue, Turkey struggles to define its role in a turbulent and rapidly changing Middle East.
Acting as an essential mediator in the Syrian crisis could fulfill Iraq's wishes to return to the regional scene and the Kurds’ goal of expanding their influence over neighboring regions.
After years of instability and marginalization, Iraq has recently emerged as a key regional player.
Iraq hosted the Arab League summit last week, a significant development for a country that has been marginalized from its Arab neighbors. But as Arab relations with Iraq improve, relations with its neighbor Syria are deteriorating.
The escalation of the Syrian crisis provides an opportunity for the Turkish Kurdistan Workers' Party to consolidate its influence within Syria and increase its presence on the Syrian-Turkish border.
