He previously taught at Georgetown University, New York University, Columbia University, and the American University in Cairo. He received a bachelor’s from the University of California at Berkeley, a Master of Philosophy from the University of Cambridge, and a PhD from the Politics Department at Princeton University in 2000. Shehata’s research interests include Middle East politics, Islamist politics and movements, U.S. foreign policy toward the Middle East, the political economy of the Middle east, social class and labor, “development,” elections, Egyptian politics, ethnography, and the Hajj. He served as a Middle East and North Africa adviser for Freedom in the World.