Oussama Cherribi

Cherribi was a Member of the Board of Directors for the Amsterdam Art Council for over 10 years as the organization’s only migrant. He was also placed in charge of Migrant TV (MTV) from 1990-1993.   

Cherribi created the Special Chair of Islam Foundation at the University of Amsterdam (UvA) for philosopher Mohammad Arkoun. This position was created in order to promote liberal Islam in the Netherlands, however the University failed to properly subsidize the program. While there is another chair position at UvA designated for the study of Islam, Cherribi noted that Arkoun’s position was dedicated to the Moroccan and Turkish expatriate communities in the Netherlands, which specifically studies Islam in Europe.

Along with Pierre Bourdieu, Cherribi spearheaded the establishment of network of solidarity cities, or villes refuge, throughout Europe. As a response to the Rushdie Affair, participating cities were to cooperate in assisting and welcoming persecuted writers from around the world into Europe, in order to promote free thought. According to its mission, the cities’ "priority task today is to respond to censorship by creating new areas of freedom, exchange and solidarity" for at-risk writers and thinkers. Berlin, Helsinki, and Vienna are all member cities of this project.   

At Emory, Cherribi has served as assistant to the Provost, Office of the Provost. He also served as Emory’s liaison to The Carter Center for development

Cherribi organized the African Diaspora Roundtable at the US Congress in 2017. 

In 2017, Oxford Press published Cherribi's Fridays of Rage, an in-depth analysis of Al Jazeera’s inception and its role in impacting the public views of the Arab world. The book was praised by Marwan M. Kraidy, professor of communication at the University of Pennsylvania, for making "an original contribution to the already large literature on Al-Jazeera in its articulation of the channel with political Islamism".   

Cherribi served as a member of the Mohammed Arkoun Award Committee, a part of the Mohammed Arkoun Foundation for Peace and Dialogue between Cultures. This foundation is dedicated to popularizing and disseminating the works of Mohammad Arkoun, and promoting the study of Islam in North Africa and Europe—his primary fields of study.

In 2010, Cherribi published In The House of War: Dutch Islam Observed. This book, published by Oxford University Press, discusses "‘the trifecta of coercion’ on Muslims in the Netherlands and Europe, being: expectations and pressures from Islamic orthodoxy, from European society, and from their daily lives in the house of war (Dar al Harb). The book employs many of philosopher-sociologist Pierre Bourdieu’s theories, including Bourdieu’s "five laws" for analyzing the development of Islam in Europe (Sociologie de l’Algérie (The Algerians)). Professor Terry Rey of Temple University, a notable Bourdieu scholar, praised Cherribi, saying: "To my knowledge the only student of Bourdieu’s to have thus far employed his theory of practice in a book length study of religion is Sam Cherribi" (The Oxford Handbook of Pierre Bourdieu, 307-308).  

In April, 2002, Dr. Cherribi served as the Rapporteur and Moderator for the Council of Europe Conference on Cultural Cooperation between Europe and North Africa. The Conference was held in the debating chambers of the Moroccan Parliament, in Rabat. This was a large event put on by the Council of Europe in Morocco, which discussed further collaboration between the two governments.   

In 2002, Cherribi directed, produced and wrote a play, To be or not to be in the Polder.   

As a European Council member representing the Netherlands, Cherribi played a crucial role in the Budapest Convention on Cybercrime. Cherribi drafted and proposed much of the legislation, including crucial additions regarding "Internet Domain Names," that was ratified in November 2001. The Budapest Convention, which was ratified by the United States Congress in 2006, set the pace for future cybercrime laws until today. 

Since 2000, Cherribi has served as an Affiliate Board Member at University of California-Berkeley’s Center for Globalization and Information Technology.

In December 1998 and November 2001, Cherribi joined Dutch delegation as an Official Observer at the New York UN General Assembly, participating in committee meetings, deliberations, and meetings with other delegations.   

Cherribi researched and drafted two best-selling Dutch books, Moslim en de polder (1997), and Islam en democratie (1994), for then-VVD leader Frits Bolkestein and Mohammed Arkoun.

In 1995, in an effort to bring politics to the people, Cherribi founded Den Haag-Online, a Dutch-language discussion board that allowed citizens to communicate with Members of Parliament via cyberspace. The goal of this project was to solidify transparency and accountability in the Dutch government. This project was one of the nascent internet’s first social media outlet.   

Dr. Oussama (Sam) Cherribi is a Moroccan-Dutch sociologist, former politician for the right-of-centre VVD party, and current professor at Emory University. He was member of the Dutch House of Representatives from 1994 to 2002.

Cherribi was elected to the Dutch Parliament in 1994 and continued his tenure until 2002. Throughout his career as a Member of the Dutch Parliament (MP), Cherribi served on the Standing Committees of Foreign Affairs, Technology, Youth, Interior Affairs, Education, Welfare and Health. Furthermore, from to 1995 until 2002, Cherribi was an elected member of the Assembly of the Council of Europe.

He graduated in 1991, and in 1992, Dr. Cherribi entered a joint Ph.D. program at the Amsterdam School of Social Science Research and the University of Amsterdam & Leiden University. In 2000, while in office as a Member of the Dutch Parliament, he received his PhD in the social sciences.

Cherribi also worked as a broadcaster and translator at the Dutch Public Service Television, NOS and, Dutch World Service from 1985-90.

Cherribi studied literature in his town of birth and philosophy and sociology at the University of Rabat, sociology at the University of Nancy in France and, from 1983 onwards, philosophy and sociology at the University of Amsterdam.

Cherribi was born 4 September 1959 in Kenitra, Morocco.