Dr. Hossein Ghazian was a government consultant during the presidency of Mohammad Khatami and an adviser to political, cultural and media figures. In 2002, he was arrested after publishing a survey conducted in collaboration with the Gallup Organization and imprisoned on the charge of “collaborating with a hostile enemy.” He spent one out of a three-year sentence in solitary confinement. Ghazian graduated from the Teacher Training University [in Tehran] and is an expert in survey methodology, political sociology, gender and culture. He is a visiting scholar at Syracuse University in New York.