This paper draws on over 40 interviews which took place between 2017-18, with leaders and low ranking members of the Muslim Brotherhood, alongside additional interviews with politicians and non-governmental advocacy groups in the UK and Turkey, to determine how political opportunities and restrictions in host countries drive counter hegemonic mobilisation against the Egyptian state following the military coup of 2013. It questions what impact host states have on dissident groups in exile when they are contesting state narratives on legitimacy, specifically in contexts when authoritarian states follow a transnational approach to suppressing opposition activists in exile via extra-territorial tactics such as extradition orders and Interpol notices. It will do this by examining the Muslim Brotherhood’s ability to challenge the authoritarian state beyond Egypt’s borders via media dissemination on satellite television channels, alongside countering legislative rulings through establishing research centres which seek to undermine Egyptian state rulings, and finally the organisation’s response to authoritarian state framing of contentious events, such as massacres and military trials in Egypt. Specifically, it will argue that the presence of variable challenges, opportunities and legitimacy narratives in the host states of Turkey and the United Kingdom drives the counter-mobilisation strategy of the Muslim Brotherhood since it was ousted from power in 2013.
