CIAO DATE: 11/2010
Volume: 9, Issue: 2
Summer 2010
Iran's Foreign Policy during Ahmadinejad: From Confrontation to Accommodation (PDF)
Amir M. Haji-Yousefi
Some scholars have observed that Iran's foreign policy has leaned toward assertiveness since Mahmood Ahmadinejad came to power in 2005. They have tried to attribute this assertiveness to some internal and external factors. After reviewing the literature, we argue that the assertiveness of Iran's foreign policy during the first period of Ahmadinejad`s presidency is rooted in psychological (Ahmadinejad belief system), social (the social base of the new government), political (factional rivalries), historical (ideals of the Islamic Revolution), and external (the way Western countries treated Iran during Khatami) factors. On the contrary, it seems that Iran's foreign policy since the recent presidential election in 2009 has somehow softened and it appears to be less confrontational. This change, if real, may have significant implications for Iran's relations with the Western countries, particularly the United States. We seek to identify the main reasons for this change and explicate its main consequences for the Iranian foreign relations. This paper has four sections. First, we discuss the main features of Iran's assertive foreign policy during the first period of Ahmadinejad`s presidency. Secondly, we try to explain the main origins of this assertiveness. Thirdly, the recent developments in Iran's foreign policy, especially Ahmadinejad`s new moderate orientation, will be discussed and the main causes will be spelled out. Finally, the main implications of this change in Iran's foreign behavior will be discussed.
How worthy Israeli Relations for Turkey? (PDF)
Halil Erdemir
Palestine is a crucial and well-known place for humanity in general for the region in particular. The area is important for religious, cultural, political, strategic and economic matters. Judaism, Christianity and Islam are connected with the region. The well-known world empires and cultures left their ethnic, cultural and/or political marks in the life of regional people. The lucrative energy stocks are either located or connected with the region. The strategic location, military and economic capabilities of Turkey and Israel is significant and noteworthy in the region. They have played roles in the recent past and it seems they will continue to play in the near future. The both countries relationship required delicate policies due to their domestic and international sensitivities. There are ethnic and religious rivalries as well as political and economic clash of interests in the region. Alliances and co-operations in various fields shaped the recent history of the region. The region seems to be the most interesting arenas of political, economic, cultural and military manoeuvres of the influential world and regional powers. Turkey and Israel will play their active or passive roles in the wider scenarios accordance with their influences in regional and/or international politics. The relationship will be affected either upwards or downwards depending on their domestic and international perspectives of the issues. Regional and international developments are influential in shaping consistency of bilateral relations and regional peace.
Chinese Aid to Africa: Filling the gaps that others left (PDF)
Max Rebol
Western observers sometimes shockingly reduce Chinese Aid to Africa to a way of securing access to natural resources. A closer look does not only reveal that China’s disbursement of Aid to the continent is relatively unrelated to natural resources, but also that it fills exactly the areas that Western aid has increasingly neglected: Infrastructure, industrialization and manufacturing. Chinese and Western aid work but in many ways can be seen as complementing rather than competing. Western aid since the 1980s focuses almost exclusively on basic social needs, while China’s Aid to Africa is more based on industrial cooperation. The tools, such as preferential loans, that China uses hereby are often similar to what has been successful when China was in the role of the Aid recipient. Aid should therefore not be seen as a philanthropic one way transfer, but part of a mutually beneficial strategy that uses policy to channel investment into areas in which they are needed most. There is a fine line between aid and business, but in its relations with Africa today, China is well aware that at home it was not aid that lifted 200 million people out of poverty.
Right-wing Populism and the European Union (PDF)
Somdeep Sen
Since its inception the European Union has transformed itself from a mere economic partnership to a regional cooperation, supposedly, embodying laws and values ‘universally’ accepted as ‘good’. This very character has encouraged the EU to pursue the role of a global actor that not only personifies this ‘value-system’ but also strives at disseminating them into the rest of the world. But, over the years the rise of right-wing populism throughout Europe has threatened to challenge some of the core orientating aspects of this ‘value-system’. While electoral victories have demonstrated their ability to impact the character of the EU within its boundaries, this study wonders what impact the rise of the right-wing populism could have on the European Union as a global actor.
The Shifting Global Power Balance Equations and the Emerging Real 'New World Order' (PDF)
Alex Igho Ovie-D'Leone
Expansion in globalization arising from increased interconnectivity and interdependence across the world is causing a shift both in the focus of what now could determine the principal international power variables and the criteria for power balancing calculus. One direct challenge to the status quo is the emergence on one hand of new state actors which are becoming more assertive, as well as some other new key non-state actors now matching states seemingly one-on-one on the world stage in many spheres of international political concourse. Consequently, there is a visible or perceptible shift from the current USled unipolar ‘New World Order’ to a new form of multi-faceted power balancing structure that abstracts sharply from the traditional patterns of international power balancing calculus. The predominant position of the US in a post-Cold-War order is being threatened on several fronts. Consequently, unipolarity appears to be obviously on its decline. However, the US has started to respond in kind to such new threats to its continued international hegemony. It is a unilateral response that seeks to perpetrate unipolarity. But how long can it hold on to its grip and status as a global hyper power balancer? The challenges presented by such sundry scenarios including also other new related developments are exhaustively tackled here in this article.
Thucydides: An Author Still Relevant for the Contemporary Analysis of International Relations? (PDF)
Alexandra Dobra
The present paper aims to assess the relevance of Thucydides’s study for international relations, via focusing on his most eminent text, The Peloponnesian War. The analysis of its relevance will be done through a tripartite structure, in which the first two parts are symmetric. In a first part, the continuities between Thucydides’ historical account and the realist and neorealist theory of international relations will be analysed. While in a second part, the continuities between Thucydides’ historical account and the constructivist theory of international relations will be dealt with. Finally, in a third part a limit will be raised, via the study of the prescriptive accuracy of The Peloponnesian War (on the grounds of new forms of violence).