Faculty Profile

BIO

Professor Tessler specializes in Comparative Politics, Public Opinion, and Middle Eastern and North African Studies. He received his Ph.D. in Political Science and African Studies from Northwestern University.  At the University of Michigan, he has served as Director of the Center for Political Studies, Director of the International Institute, and Vice Provost for International Affairs.  He has received the University’s Distinguished Faculty Achievement Award, which honors senior faculty who have consistently demonstrated outstanding achievements in scholarly research and/or creative endeavors.  He has also received an award in the highest recognition of excellence in undergraduate education from the Department of Political Science.

Professor Tessler has conducted field research in Tunisia, Israel, Morocco, Egypt, Palestine (West Bank and Gaza), and Qatar. Many of his scholarly publications examine the nature, determinants, and political implications of the attitudes and values held by ordinary citizens in the Middle East and North Africa. He has focused in particular on attitudes and values pertaining to governance, to women, to religion, and to international relations.  Professor Tessler’s current research, funded by the US National Science Foundation, examines the nature and consequences of the differing ways that ordinary Muslim citizens in Arab countries interpret Islamic prescriptions and codes pertaining to important present-day issues.

Professor Tessler is a pioneer in the study of political attitudes held by ordinary citizens in the Arab world.  Some of his early contributions are discussed in his 1987 co-edited volume, The Evaluation and Application of Survey Research in the Arab World.  Many of his scholarly contributions based on public opinion research are brought together in his 2015 book, Public Opinion in the Middle East: Survey Research and the Political Orientations of Ordinary Citizens.

Professor Tessler has also written extensively on the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. He is one of the very few American scholars to have attended university and lived for extended periods both in Israel and in several Arab countries. His 1000-page book, A History of the Israeli-Palestinian Conflict, has received national honors and awards. His reports from the field during the turbulent 1980s are brought together in his 1989 co-authored book, Israel, Egypt, and the Palestinians: From Camp David to Intifada.  His research on Arab and Jewish minorities in Israel and several Arab countries is presented in his 2020 book, Religious Minorities in Non-Secular Middle Eastern and North African States.  

Professor Tessler is co-founder and co-director of the Arab Barometer survey project. Arab Barometer gives voice to the opinions and concerns of ordinary citizens across the Arab world.  It is the first and largest project of its kind, having conducted 94 nationally representative public opinion surveys over eight waves: 2006-2009, 2010-2011, 2012-2014, 2016-2017, 2018-2019, 2020-2021, 2021-2022, and 2023-2024. The ninth wave of surveys will begin in the fall of 2025. Data from Arab Barometer surveys may be downloaded without charge from the Arab Barometer website (arabbarometer.org)

Arab Barometer surveys have been carried out at least once in each of the following 16 countries: Algeria, Bahrain, Egypt, Iraq, Jordan, Kuwait, Lebanon, Libya, Mauritania, Morocco, Palestine, Qatar, Saudi Arabia, Sudan, Tunisia, and Yemen.  More than 135,000 adult men and women have been interviewed, most through face-to-face interviews at their place of residence.  The Arab Barometer survey instrument includes questions that ask, among other things, about governance and political affairs, personal and national economic circumstances, women’s rights and gender equality, religiosity and the political and societal role of religion, and international relations.  

Professor Tessler has received over $30 million in grants and contracts for research, institutional development, and capacity-building projects, many in the Middle East and North Africa. Among these projects is the establishment or expansion of research centers and programs in Arab countries, as well as at the University of Michigan and other universities where Professor Tessler has taught. Projects supported by these grants also include numerous research and capacity-building seminars and workshops for Arab scholars and graduate students, some held in Arab countries and some held in the US.  Finally, some of Professor Tessler’s grants have supported the development and contribution of scholarly resources in the form of new datasets and instructional materials.  

Notable among Professor Tessler’s contributions to the profession is his 2022 book, Social Science Research in the Arab World and Beyond: A Guide for Students, Instructors and Researchers.  The book presents and discusses the logic and method of positivist social science research adapted mainly for instruction at Arab universities and for research in Arab countries, but with applicability beyond the region. It illustrates major concepts and methods with examples of previous research carried out in the Arab world and with exercises using Arab Barometer and other datasets. 

البحث الاجتماعي في العالم العربي وخارجه: دليل للطلاب والأساتذة والباحثين is a translation of Social Science Research in the Arab World published by Qatar University Press in 2023.  Both the original and the translation are open access and are downloadable without charge from the publishers’ websites.  As of mid-2025, the English and Arabic versions have together been viewed, and presumably downloaded, more than 30,000 times.

Professor Tessler has also spent several years teaching courses on the theory and method of social science research, most often in French, at universities in Sub-Saharan Africa, including the national universities in Rwanda, Liberia, and Democratic Republic of the Congo (then Zaire).