His first book, Egypt in a Time of Revolution (Cambridge, 2017), considers the diverse forms of mass mobilization and contentious politics that emerged during the Egyptian Revolution of 2011 and its aftermath. It won the 2018 Charles Tilly Distinguished Contribution to Scholarship Award from the American Sociological Association. Results of Neil’s research – including on the origins of political Islam, the effects of protest on political attitudes, and the logics of purging following revolutionary change – have appeared in journals such as the American Political Science Review, the Journal of Politics, and Comparative Political Studies.

For the 2023/2024 academic year, Neil was Mid-Career Fellow of the British Academy and an associate researcher at the Centre d’Études et de Documentation Économiques, Juridiques et Sociales in Cairo, Egypt, completing a book manuscript on the 1919 Egyptian Revolution.

His current research interests include the transformation of political elites following revolutionary state capture and attempts to suppress pro-Palestinian activism in Western democracies.

Neil received his PhD in Political Science from the London School of Economics and Political Science.