Bettina Koch is Associate Professor of Political Science at Virginia Polytechnic Institute and State University. She has published widely on political theory and the history of Western and non-Western political thought. Her work focuses on issues related to the interaction of politics and religion, political violence in transcultural comparison, the concept of terrorism as a topic in political theory, state decline and failure, mass surveillance, and state terrorism. Her most recent monograph is Patterns Legitimizing Political Violence in Transcultural Perspectives: Islamic and Christian Traditions and Legacies (Berlin/Boston: De Gruyter, 2015; paperback 2016). She is editor of the volume State Terror, State Violence – Global Perspectives (Springer: Wiesbaden, 2016) and co-editor (with Cary J. Nederman) of Inventing Modernity in Medieval European Thought, c. 1100 – c. 1550 (Medieval Institute Publications, 2018). In 2016/17 she was Caltech-Huntington Humanities Collaborations Fellow, California Institute of Technology and Huntington Library and Caltech Visiting Associate in the Humanities, California Institute of Technology.

Yannis A. Stivachtis is Associate Professor of Political Science and Director of the International Studies Program at Virginia Tech. He has published widely on international relations and security. His research interests include the global order and contemporary sub-global international societies (Europe, Eurasia and the Middle East), and the application of the comprehensive security approach to regional security in the Middle East. He currently serves as Director of the Center for European & Mediterranean Affairs (CEMA) of the Athens Institute for Education & Research (ATINER), editor of the Critical European Studies book series published by Routledge, and co-editor of the Athens Journal of Mediterranean Studies. His publications include Conflict and Diplomacy in the Middle East (editor, Bristol: E-International Relations, 2018); The Road to EU Membership: The Economic Transformation of Turkey (co-editor; Brussels: Brussels University Press, 2011); Turkey-European Union Relations: Dilemmas, Opportunities and Constraints (co-editor, Lanham, MD: Lexington Books, 2008); European Union’s Mediterranean Enlargement (Frankfurt: Peter Lang, 2002); Co-operative Security and Non- Offensive Defense in the Zone of War (Frankfurt: Peter Lang, 2001); and Non-Offensive Defense in the Middle East (co-author, New York: United Nations Publications, 1998).