Norton Interviewed on Pope Francis’s Egypt Trip
Augustus Richard Norton, Professor of International Relations and Anthropology at the Frederick S. Pardee School of Global Studies at Boston University, was recently interviewed on the potential political and social pitfalls facing Pope Francis on his upcoming trip to Egypt.
Norton was quoted in an April 24, 2017 article in the National Catholic Reporter entitled “Francis Faces Political, Religious Land Mines on Egypt Trip.”
From the text of the article:
Augustus Richard Norton, who has written several books on political reform in the Middle East and has taught as a visiting scholar at Cairo’s al-Ahram Center, said he thought the land mines for the pope regarding the political opposition in Egypt are “worth navigating.”
Norton said that since the 2013 coup, thousands of Egyptians have been thrown in jail with little regard for due process, simply on suspicion of opposing Sisi. Some in jail are the leaders of the 2011 revolution that overthrew Hosni Mubarak, who had ruled the country since 1981.
“That seems to me to be horrendous,” said Norton, a professor of anthropology and international relations at Boston University. “That’s the kind of thing I would hope, land mine or not, the pope would address because these are quite literally prisoners of conscience.”
If Francis addressed it, Norton said, “it would not make Sisi happy, but I think it would be very appropriate.”
Augustus Richard Norton is a professor of both International Relations and Anthropology at the Boston University Pardee School of Global Studies. He is also a Visiting Professor in Politics of the Middle East at the University of Oxford and a Fellow at the Oxford Centre for Islamic Studies. Read more about him, here.