Elisa OrofinoElisa Orofino is a Senior Research Fellow at the Policing Institute for the Eastern Region (PIER) at Anglia Ruskin University, where she leads research on Extremism and Counter terrorism. Her interest in Islamism started in 2009 during her bachelor ad continued throughout her academic career. She graduated in Political Sciences cum laude and then expanded her research on Islamist groups and Islamist activism during both her Masters and PhD. She conducted research in different national contexts, including Italy, Egypt, the UK and Australia, where she was awarded her PhD in Islamic Studies from the University of Melbourne. Since 2014, Elisa's research focus is on vocal/non-violent extremism and its alleged role as conveyor belt to terrorism. Elisa has conducted first-hand research on this topic, taking the non-violent but extreme Islamist group Hizb ut-Tahrir as a case study.Elisa published extensively on this topic over the years. She is the author of "Hizb Ut-Tahrir and the Caliphate: Why the Group is Still Appealing to Muslims in the West" (London: Routledge, 2020) and several other pieces including edited volumes, journal articles, book chapters and research papers. Elisa also leads different research projects and teaches extremism and counter-terrorism related subjects at both undergraduate and post-graduate level. Read More Read Less