Jonathan Fisher is reader in African Politics at the University of Birmingham and visiting fellow at the Stellenbosch Institute for Advanced Study (STIAS) at Stellenbosch University. He studied at University College London and the University of Oxford and has worked in Djibouti, Eritrea, Ethiopia, Kenya, Malawi, Namibia, Nigeria, Rwanda, South Africa and Uganda. His research - which has been funded by the AHRC, British Academy, ESRC and Facebook, among others - focuses on the nature and characteristics of authoritarian states in Africa.