Maajid Nawaz is an author and Founding Chairman of Quilliam – a globally active think tank focusing on matters of integration, citizenship & identity, religious freedom, extremism and immigration.

Human rights and a respect for individual liberty are matters close to Maajid’s heart. His work is informed by years spent in his youth as a leadership member of a global Islamist group, and his gradual transformation towards liberal democratic values.

Having served four years as an Amnesty International adopted ‘prisoner of conscience’ in Egypt, Maajid is now a leading critic of his former Islamist ideological dogma, while remaining a Muslim.

He encourages the reform of Islam today, inclusive citizenship-based participation of Muslims in their respective countries, and seeks to synergize a respect for human rights with the civic liberal imperative to defend those in danger of being stigmatized by extremists of all stripes due to their personal choices.

Maajid’s autobiographical account of his life story RADICAL has been released in the UK and US.

Maajid is a Fellow of the Royal Society of Arts, an Honorary Associate of the National Secular Society and has been listed as one of the most influential people in the UK Debretts 500 index, and the Who’s Who index. Maajid is also a Daily Beast columnist, and provides occasional columns for the London Times, New York Times and Wall Street Journal among others. Maajid was the Liberal Democrat Parliamentary candidate for the May 2015 British General Election, and remains the Parliamentary spokesman for Camden Liberal Democrats in London.

A British-Pakistani born in Essex, Maajid speaks English, Arabic and Urdu, holds a BA (Hons) from SOAS in Arabic and Law and an MSc in Political Theory from the London School of Economics (LSE). He is personally interested in Arabic grammar & morphology, Muslim Medieval jurisprudence and scholastics and emerging modern political thought and trends.

Maajid can be contacted on Twitter: @maajidnawaz