Amy Austin Holmes
Term
Professional affiliation
Wilson Center Projects
- Mass Displacement in Syria and the Role of Turkey: Part of the Problem or Part of the Solution?
- Between Democratic Autonomy and Authoritarianism: The Political Ambitions of PYD-aligned Kurdish Militias in Syria and Iraq
- After the Caliphate: Governance Challenges in the Semi-Autonomous Region of Northeast Syria
Full Biography
Amy Austin Holmes is currently a Public Policy Fellow at the Wilson Center. She has a PhD from Johns Hopkins University, with expertise on US security relations and contentious politics in Europe and the Middle East. Dr. Holmes previously served as a tenured Associate Professor at the American University in Cairo, and has held Visiting Scholar positions at Harvard University and Brown University. A former Fulbright scholar in Germany, she is the author of Coups and Revolutions: Mass Mobilization, the Egyptian Military, and the United States from Mubarak to Sisi (Oxford University Press 2019) and Social Unrest and American Military Bases in Turkey and Germany since 1945 (Cambridge University Press 2014). Having spent a decade living in the Middle East, she has published numerous articles on Turkey, Syria, Iraq, Egypt, Tunisia, and Bahrain. Professor Holmes is the first person to have conducted a field survey of the Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF) based on numerous trips to all six provinces of Northeast Syria between 2015-2020. Her current research is about governance challenges of the semi-autonomous Kurdish-led region of northern Syria.
Major Publications
Select Publications for Bio – Amy Austin Holmes
Book
Social Unrest and American Military Bases in Turkey and Germany since 1945, Cambridge University Press, 2014; paperback released in 2016
· Featured in a Review Essay in Perspectives on Politics, Vol 15, No 1, March 2017
· Reviewed in International Journal of Comparative Sociology, July 2016
Peer-Reviewed Articles
“Working on the Revolution in Bahrain: From The Mass Strike to Everyday Forms of Medical Provision” Social Movement Studies, July 2015
A Region of Resistance: Mass Protests in Egypt and Turkey (editor), South Atlantic Quarterly, 113:2, Duke University Press, spring 2014
“On Military Coups and Mad Utopias”, in: A Region of Resistance, South Atlantic Quarterly, 113:2, Duke University Press, spring 2014
“The Base that replaced the British Empire: De-Democratization and the US Navy in Bahrain”, Journal of Arabian Studies June 2014
“There are weeks when Decades happen: Structure and Strategy in the Egyptian Revolution” Mobilization, 17(4), December 2012, p 391-410
Articles, Edited Volumes, and Book Chapters
“Egypt’s Nubia: Drowning by Government Decree” Real Clear World, September 27, 2017
“Tightening the Noose on Egypt’s Civil Society” Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, Sada Middle East Analysis, June 1, 2017
“The Attack on Civil Society outside Cairo” Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, Sada Middle East Analysis, January 26, 2017
“Sisi’s US Army War College Thesis: 10 Years Later”, op-ed in Mada Masr, March 15, 2016
“Egypt’s Protests by the Numbers”, co-authored with Hussein Baoumi, Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, Sada Middle East Analysis, January 29, 2016
“What are the Kurdish Women’s Units Fighting For?” Washington Post, December 23, 2015
“As Kobane comes under ISIL attack, Kurds encircle, cut off caliphate”, Informed Comment June 26, 2015
“What the Battle for Kobane says about U.S. overseas military bases” Washington Post, February 2, 2015
“Why Egypt’s Military Orchestrated a Massacre” Washington Post, August 22, 2014
“In Egypt, Industrial Scale Death Decrees”, op-ed in Providence Journal, May 5, 2014
“The Military Intervention that the World Forgot: Saudi and Emirati Forces continue to police Bahrain”, op-ed on Al Jazeera, March 27, 2014
“Before the Bloodletting: A Tour of the Rabaa Sit-in”, Cairo Review of Global Affairs, August 16, 2013
“Everywhere is Taksim: The Crackdown on the Commons”, Counterpunch, June 26, 2013
“The Royals’ New Rules: Backsliding in Bahrain”, Cairo Review of Global Affairs, February 27, 2013; Re-posted on Jadaliyya in slightly revised form on March 5, 2013
“Egyptians blame military for failures of transition period”, Ahram Online, June 28, 2012
“Is US Support for the SCAF Unconditional?” Atlantic Council, November 25, 2011
“The real force of stability in Egypt is its people, not its government” op-ed in the Baltimore Sun, February 8 2011 (written under a pen name)