Frederic Wehrey is a senior associate of the Middle East Program at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace. He is the author of Sectarian Politics in the Gulf: From the Iraq War to the Arab Uprisings (2013), chosen as a Best Book on the Middle East by Foreign Affairs magazine. He holds a DPhil in International Relations from Oxford University.

This collection seeks to advance our understanding of intra-Islamic identity conflict during a period of upheaval in the Middle East. Instead of treating distinctions between and within Sunni and Shia Islam as primordial and immutable, it examines how political economy, geopolitics, domestic governance, social media, non- and sub-state groups, and clerical elites have affected the transformation and diffusion of sectarian identities.
Particular attention is paid to how conflicts over distribution of political and economic power have taken on a sectarian quality, and how a variety of actors have instrumentalized sectarianism. The volume, covering Syria, Iraq, Lebanon, Saudi Arabia and the Gulf, Iran, and Egypt, includes contributors from a broad array of disciplines including political science, history, sociology, and Islamic studies.
Beyond Sunni and Shia draws on extensive fieldwork and primary sources to offer insights that are empirically rich and theoretically grounded, but also accessible for policy audiences and the informed public.

Introduction
Frederic Wehrey
BEYOND SECTARIANISM IN THE MIDDLE EAST? COMPARATIVE PERSPECTIVES ON GROUP CONFLICT
Paul Dixon
THE SECTARIANIZATION OF THE SYRIA WAR
Heiko Wimmen
SHIA-CENTRIC STATE BUILDING AND SUNNI REJECTION IN POST-2003 IRAQ
Fanar Haddad
THE UNRAVELING OF TAIF: THE LIMITS OF SECT-BASED POWER-SHARING IN LEBANON
Joseph Bahout
TWITTER WARS: SUNNIS-SHIA CONFLICT AND COOPERATION IN THE DIGITAL AGE
Alexandra Siegel
THE POLITICAL ECONOMY OF SECTARIANISM: HOW GULF REGIMES EXPLOIT IDENTITY POLITICS AS A SURVIVAL STRATEGY
Justin Gengler
THE ROOTS OF SECTARIAN LAW AND ORDER IN THE GULF: BAHRAIN, THE EASTERN PROVINCE OF SAUDI ARABIA, AND THE TWO HISTORICAL DISRUPTIONS
Staci Strobl
THE KINGDOM AND THE CALIPHATE: SAUDI ARABIC AND THE ISLAMIC STATE
Cole Bunzel
RELIGIOUS SECTARIANISM AND POLITICAL PRAGMATISM: THE PARADOX OF EGYPT'S AL-NOUR SALAFIS
Stephane Lacroix
RELIGIOUS AUTHORITY AND SECTARIANISM IN LEBANON
Alex Henley
Conclusion: How The State Has Restructured Religious Life
Frederic Wehrey