The genesis of this report lies in an earlier research project that resulted in the publication Iraqi imbroglio: The Islamic State and beyond in November 2014. At the time, we realized it was too quick a job to do justice to the complexities of Iraq and we came to see that it was not the Islamic State that was the key to understanding the future of Iraq, but the country’s Shi’a political groups.

The research that is developed in the pages that follow was primarily conducted for the Dutch Ministry of Foreign Affairs and our appreciation goes to Joep Tummers, Monique Korzelius, Sara Offermans and Tim Kreuk for their patience and support.

In addition, we would like to acknowledge the excellent contribution from Renad Mansour (Chatham House) who not only wrote a discussion paper that fed into this report, but also proved very knowledgeable company during field work in Baghdad. His contributions are more fully recognized in the policy brief that follows the report’s publication. Likewise, Nissrine Majdi has our grateful appreciation for the background research she conducted on some of the non-state armed Shi’a groups that currently operate in Iraq.

As good research about places is hard to produce without having been there, we owe a debt of gratitude to those Iraqi parliamentarians, government representatives, clerics and representatives of armed groups who received us graciously and agreed to be interviewed in a time during which their country remains embroiled in serious internal conflict. Neither would our work in Baghdad have been possible without the warm welcome and support of Sajad Jiyad and Ali al-Mawlawi at the Al-Bayan Center for Planning and Studies. Thank you.

In the same vein, we are very appreciative of the advice of Hayder al-Khoei (European Council on Foreign Relations) and Razzaq Alseedi (Iraqi embassy in The Hague), as well as Wael al-Hafoth’s support and translation services.

The report also significantly benefited from a good peer review and our thanks for this go to Ahab Bdaiwi (University of Leiden), Esben Bruhn Skivild (Danish Ministry of Foreign Affairs), Ali al-Malawi (Al-Bayan Center), Renad Mansour (Chatham House) and Fransje Molenaar (Clingendael). Finally, the report was professionally edited by Jane Carroll and competently typeset by Textcetera. Our thanks to all of you.

It remains to emphasize that the contents of the report are the authors’ responsibility alone and the same obviously goes for any omissions or errors.