Mexico and China established official diplomatic relations in 1972. Since then, their mutual economic, political and social links have been developed in an unprecedented way. However, from the perspective of International Relations, the analytical richness of the relationship is obscured by hegemonic conceptualisations of global power, materiality or teleological truths. The literature dealing with the relation in itself has not prioritised a theoretical or holistic approach. Through an analysis of the discursive production of a series of diplomatic, media and academic sources, this thesis demonstrates that, embedded in the great technological and political transformations of the contemporary world, Mexico‐China relations have embodied a complex process of knowledge formation out of the confrontation of their socially constructed conceptions of time, space and otherness: a cultural encounter. During the period from 1972‐2012, not only did Mexico‐China relations involve state and trade interactions, but also a complex intellectual construction of the world and of themselves ranging from the formation of a common anti‐Western identity and the erection of binary oppositions between them, to the formulation of rich proposals for self-criticism and cultural learning. Mexico-China cultural encounter, therefore, provides a fundamental case for understanding world politics and human interaction from a truly global perspective beyond reductionist views of materiality.

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The intent for this thesis is to explain and inform the process of the Iranian Nuclear Program throughout the last decades. The stand of the Islamic Republic of Iran has brought very delicate issues and confrontations to the international community. This thesis discusses the history of key countries that play an important part into developing the Iranian nuclear program. These countries being the United States, Israel, Russia and other countries part of the UN Security Council. This thesis also attempts to analyze and focuses on the domestic policies the government of Iran and its people have interacted with the nuclear deal. The nuclear deal between the UN Security Council members and the Islamic Republic of Iran have shown an array of acceptance and rejection within, specially, the United States, Arab countries in the region and Israel. The implementations of the solution to future confrontation are probably the main ideal to a healthy international community who can adapt to new measures and policies to a safer world. Using classical realist theory, based on Hans J. Morgenthau realist theory, the Iranian nuclear program could be explained with a different perspective. There are other international relations theories that could help explaining Iran’s government behavior and how it interacts with the international community. Iran’s move in the past years has shown progress towards the international community and has lowered the potential military action against Iran. Some countries like Israel continue on the dissatisfaction against the nuclear deal signed by Iran and the UN Security Council member countries. This thesis will show the behavior the country of Iran has had towards other countries based on their domestic policy.

Recent AI advancements have prompted calls for regulatory measures, which have faced opposition due to foreign policy concerns about China. This study researches the origins and implications of these concerns by analyzing U.S. public opinion toward China in the context of AI and foreign policy. It examines how these attitudes correlate with social and political factors and uses the ‘Micro-Foundation of International Relations Theory’ to assess potential impact on U.S. policies. The research employs a quantitative analysis of 2018 survey data from the Future of Humanity Institute at Oxford University. Using game theory models, the study operationalizes foreign policy attitudes through survey responses. Responses are analyzed utilizing cluster analysis, logistic regression, and multinomial logistic regression. The results indicate that 21% of the U.S. population adopts more conflict-promoting views, likely individuals with high political capital and conservative leaning. Another 29% share the first group’s general opinions and characteristics but differentiate in prioritizing U.S.-led de-escalation and liberal-leaning. 29% support cooperation with China but also preemptive armament; they are younger, liberal-leaning, and have lower political capital. 20% abstained from expressing clear opinions due to lack of knowledge, indicating socio-economic disparities. Policy implications include a future high risk of an AI arms race.

[pt] A tese investiga as narrativas de crise e crítica na trajetória das teorias de relações internacionais, a fim de compreender como o atual debate acerca do fim ou crise da disciplina expõe os limites paradoxos da crítica neste campo. Para tanto, a tese está dividida em dois movimentos estruturantes. No primeiro movimento (Capítulos 2 a 4), questiona-se as atuais narrativas da crise teórica em sua trajetória histórica e conceitual, a fim de debater suas implicações políticas e axiológicas. No segundo movimento (Capítulos 5 a 7), explora-se o status teórico das narrativas críticas contemporâneas, a tendência para a análise crítica incorrer em dogmatismo, e a possibilidade de resistir o potencial dogmático das narrativas de crise nas relações internacionais. De maneira geral, a análise apresenta crise e crítica como diferentes possibilidades de articular a política moderna, apoiadas em pressupostos distintos sobre (i) temporalidade, (ii) soberania, e (iii) conhecimento. Consequentemente, a tese argumenta que os pontos mais vulneráveis das narrativas de crise na política internacional se dão em relação aos limites do sujeito do conhecimento e da política soberana de amigos e inimigos. Nesse contexto, uma abordagem mais efetivamente crítica da política deve oferecer um enquadramento distinto do problema, no qual o sujeito estético abra a possibilidade de buscar formas de universalidade que se baseiem em uma afirmação mais profunda da diferença e da pluralidade, bem como em um maior entendimento dos limites das narrativas - mesmo as mais progressistas - sobre o sujeito soberano do conhecimento. Esse argumento aponta para a necessidade de as teorias de relações internacionais irem além de si mesmas. / [en] The dissertation investigates the narratives of crisis and critique expressed at significant moments in the history of international relations theory in order to explain how recent debates on the end or crisis of international relations theory expose the paradoxical limits of critique in this field. The dissertation is structured by two organizing movements. The first movement, Chapters 2-4, examines the recent debates about a crisis of theorizing, placing them in their historical and conceptual context, and highlighting their axiological and political stakes. The second movement, Chapters 5-7, explores the contemporary theoretical status of claims to critique, the tendency for critical analysis to relapse into dogma, and the possibility of resisting the dogmatic potential of narratives of crisis in international relations. The overall analysis presents crisis and critique as two different possibilities of framing modern politics, predicated on diverging assumptions about (i) temporality, (ii) sovereignty, and (iii) knowledge. As a consequence, the dissertation argues that the points at which claims about crisis and international politics become most vulnerable to dogmatic tendencies occur in relation to the limits of the subject of knowledge and the sovereign politics of friends and enemies. A more effectively critical approach to politics in this context must work through a different framing in which the aesthetic subject may pursue claims to universality that rest on much stronger affirmations of difference and plurality and a much greater awareness of the limits of established and even progressive accounts of a sovereign subject of knowledge. Thus international relations theory must consider what it means to go beyond itself.

[pt] Nesta tese proponho uma nova abordagem epistemológica para as Relações Internacionais, desafiando o modelo estadocêntrico preconizado por essa área de estudos, ampliando as possibilidades analíticas para além deste paradigma, em direção a pluralidade e reconhecimento de comunidades políticas alternativas. Na direção de contestação e descolonização epistêmica, sugiro um programa para a disciplina de Introdução aos Estudos de Relações Internacionais, com uma abordagem decolonial que permite a leitura de diferentes formas de organização política, com foco nas experiências dos quilombos enquanto comunidades políticas e de resistência. Essa proposta vai na contramão do modelo estadocentrista de pensar e fazer política, oferecendo um olhar afrodiaspórico para analisar a política internacional. Para tal, busco confrontar os fundamentos teóricos mainstream da área, contrapondo-os com leituras racializadas que evidenciam as limitações e exclusões implícitas no modelo hegemônico de política internacional, baseando-me na teoria do Contrato Racial. Em segundo lugar, realizo um levantamento da complexidade histórica e política dos quilombos e como elas podem informar caminhos de organização política autônoma e espaços de resistência que desafiam as estruturas coloniais de poder. Por fim, dedico-me a construção de um programa curricular para a disciplina de Introdução aos Estudos de Relações Internacionais, incorporando à literatura convencional referências afrodiaspóricas. Essa proposta visa descolonizar o ensino e a produção do conhecimento em Relações Internacionais desde o início de seu percurso acadêmico. Dessa forma, contribuo para a formação de um campo de estudos mais sensível às dinâmicas de poder globais racializadas e às narrativas silenciadas na trajetória da formação das Relações Internacionais. / [en] In this thesis, I propose a new epistemological approach to International Relations, challenging the state-centric model advocated by this field of study and expanding the analytical possibilities beyond this paradigm towards a plurality and recognition of alternative political communities. Moving in the direction of epistemic contestation and decolonization, I suggest a program for the Introduction to International Relations Studies course, with a decolonial approach that allows for the exploration of different forms of political organization, focusing on the experiences of quilombos as political and resistance communities. This proposal goes against the state-centric model of thinking and practicing politics, offering an Afro-diasporic perspective to analyze international politics. To this end, I aim to confront the mainstream theoretical foundations of the field, contrasting them with racialized readings that highlight the limitations and exclusions implicit in the hegemonic model of international politics, drawing on the theory of the Racial Contract. Secondly, I conduct a survey of the historical and political complexity of quilombos and how they can inform paths of autonomous political organization and spaces of resistance that challenge colonial power structures. Finally, I dedicate myself to constructing a curriculum for the Introduction to International Relations Studies course, incorporating Afro-diasporic references into the conventional literature. This proposal aims to decolonize the teaching and production of knowledge in International Relations from the very beginning of the academic journey. In doing so, I contribute to shaping a field of study that is more attuned to global racialized power dynamics and the silenced narratives in the development of International Relations.

In a golden era for comic based media, this paper uses the hypothetical emergence of superheroes to analyze the assumptions and predictions of three international relations theories: realism, liberalism, and constructivism. Comics consistently reflect the real world, paralleling events and concepts discussed in foreign affairs dialogues. The thought experiment, and the comic genre itself, provides a vehicle for thinking broadly about the political and social ramifications of successful or failed problem solving, state interaction, and scientific advances.

This dissertation seeks to conceptualise and operationalise the concept of soft balancing in international relations by articulating a “theory of tripartite strategic balancing” which is applicable to both international and regional unipolar systems. It has a twofold purpose: one theoretical and the other empirical. First, it seeks to develop a theory of tripartite strategic balancing which encompasses three forms of strategic balancing: internal, external, and soft balancing. The second part seeks to test the theory’s utility in explaining international political outcomes in the post-Cold War international system. In particular, it seeks to ascertain whether and how “second-tier great powers” have strategically balanced against the United States on a global level since the end of the Cold War. The analyses will focus largely on the foreign policies of Russia and France – the chief soft balancers. However, this dissertation also seeks to extend the concept of soft balancing into the regional level of analysis by examining whether and how minor-regional powers soft balance against regional unipolar leaders. For instance, it will examine whether and how the Russian Federation has been soft balanced against by states in the “European Near Abroad.” The analyses will focus primarily on the foreign policies of Poland – the chief soft balancer in the region. The dissertation will employ three in-depth case studies – the Kosovo Crisis (1999), the Iraqi wars (1991-2003), and the Georgia Crisis (2008) – to verify whether or not tripartite strategic balancing is actually occurring as the theory predicts. It will heavily rely on sources and interviews conducted during my time working at the United Nations Security Council and the Polish Ministry of Foreign Affairs. These findings seek to contribute a more nuanced strand of thinking to the realist paradigm in international relations, and they offer practical implications for both US and Russian foreign policymaking.

The Sino-Soviet Split of the late 1950s and the beginning of the 1960s was a multidimensional crisis of nationalism, national interests, domestic politics, personal problems, cultural differences, border issues, Soviet-American détente, communication misunderstanding, and different interpretations of ideology. The goal of this diploma thesis is to analyse the important domestic and foreign factors which contributed to the worsening of Sino-Soviet relations. In this interdisciplinary study, the author wants to over bridge the differences between Diplomatic History and International Relations Theory, the subfields of History and Political Science. In the first part, there is an analysis of current Sino-Soviet Split historiography (Lorenz Lüthi, Sergey Radchenko, Xia Yafeng, Austin Jersild) by using theories of International Relations (liberalism, realism and constructivism). The second part provides a historical description of the Sino-Soviet Split. Emphasis is placed on the Chinese side and especially regarding the role of Mao Zedong. This thesis focuses on the period between 1958 and 1964, nevertheless it is neccessary to include preceding and subsequent phases of the relations. It is essential due to cultural, ideological and national factors. These factors endured a long time and it would be impossible to...