Soheil Asefi is an independent journalist and analyst. He is studying political science at The New School university in New York. After a ten-year professional experience with major Iranian media outlets, in 2007, he was imprisoned in Iran and was released on bail. He was the guest of the city of Nuremberg under German PEN project "Writers in Exile" and is the recipient of the prestigious Hermann Kasten award in Nuremberg. He has written extensively on the dimensions of democratisation and neoliberalisation in the Middle East, particularly in Iran today. Soheil Asefi can be reached on Twitter @SoheilAsefi