Offers a rare insight into the dynamics, realities and potential of the Iranian business community. Uses a sample of 40 Iranian executives to empirically study the impact of the economic constraints and the values of executives on the performance of Iranian business organisations. Emphasizes the implications of this study to Iranian business organisations and their current and potential trading partners during this period of proposed economic change in Iran.

Journalists in Iran work in a complex situation. In this study through conducting in-depth interviews with 12 Iranian journalists, I tried to understand this complex context. More specifically by conducting a critical discourse analysis on their words, I examined how these journalists make sense of their news work and what meanings emerge from it. I also, based on the framework of journalism ideology Deuze’s (2005), compared their meanings and values with mainstream journalists on a global level. I realized there are two main, even contrasting, categories of meaning for them. On the one hand, they feel frustrated about the future of their jobs at the personal level, and also the entire journalism profession at the broader level. In fact, they see how their job, both as a profession and as a social responsibility, is losing its importance. On the other hand, despite all those frustrating forces, they try to remain active. They engage in processes in order to make sense of their working lives. They attribute other meanings to their job in order to feel they are still useful, efficient, and influential. Iranian journalists are influenced more by the context, most importantly censorship and economic hardships, they live in rather than what they think are universal journalism norms.

The lack of favorable outcomes produced by recent attempts at counterinsurgency by Western countries shows that the importance of uncovering a more effective approach for conducting external counterinsurgency operations cannot be downplayed. In an attempt to discover what this approach might entail, prior successful interventions conducted by democracies in the Philippines and Kenya were compared to the recent failure in Iraq, using three variable groupings as a lens through which to view all three conflicts and allow cross-conflict comparison of conditions that contributed to success or failure. Through evaluation of indicators linked to these variable groupings, it was determined that there were many similarities in conditions between the two successful examples and an inverse correlation for those conditions in the unsuccessful example. In order to be more successful in the future, intervening states should attempt to replicate the specified conditions found in Kenya and the Philippines, approach interventions with a strategic mindset, and execute interventions holistically instead of with a narrow tactical approach. Finally, planning for counterinsurgency contingencies during an intervention should start before the first dollar is spent or the first bullet fired.

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The intent of this paper is to explore the relationship between strategic culture theory and how it interacts with war-parallel usage of cyber methods. Cyber methods, at times incorrectly classified as "cyberwarfare", as a means of statecraft are becoming increasingly prevalent, and developing an understanding of how states use them, particularly during conflicts, would be a great boon to the field of security studies. Strategic culture theory, an international relations theory focusing on the relationship between culture and strategy, may be an effective means to analyze conflict-parallel use of cyber methods. This paper will consider the relationship between strategic culture and cyber strategy, and develop a model through which to analyze it.

No description available.

The research presented here provides a deeper assessment of the effects of economic sanctions on Iran’s economy, especially macroeconomic variables. According to the study project, the exposure of Iran’s nuclear program prompted the international community; the US, the UN, and the EU to impose severe economic sanctions on Iran. Indeed, the sanctions targeted macro variables of the economy and people in order to influence the Iranian leadership’s political conduct. So, this research aims to investigate the rationale behind and efficacy of sanctions against Iran and add a fresh viewpoint to the sanctions debate, which has typically claimed that sanctions are ineffective even though governments frequently choose to employ them. Considering the sanctions placed on Iran initially were less economic and gradually became more severe, the impact of the sanctions between 2000 and 2015 was investigated through a comparative case study of Iran. Despite disagreements concerning the effectiveness of sanctions, this paper concludes that sanctions are a far more successful instrument than military action because economic pressures and financial difficulty finally compelled Iran to return to discussions and ratify the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action in 2014.

Thesis advisor: Ali Kadivar / Determining the empirical causes of recruitment to nationalist militant organizations is a pertinent topic, given the global rise in neo-nationalist attitudes. In this article, I seek to explore one prospective cause through a case study of the Kurds in Iran. The Kurdish population within Iran has witnessed rising levels of insurgency into militant nationalist organizations. These organizations routinely conduct armed operations against Iranian forces in historically Kurdish regions within Iran, with the goal of reclaiming territory and halting perceived inequitable treatment of the Kurdish minority by the Iranian government. My research intends to explore the root causes of this rise in violence and whether historical political mobilization within Kurdish-dominated regions of Iran has resulted in the increased Kurdish insurgency efforts. I employ an original database and three models to test the relationship between an area's mobilization history and its subsequent insurgency recruitment levels. Ultimately, my results point to contextual variables as the driving factor behind insurgency recruitment compared to the aforementioned historical variables. My research provides a foundation for future exploration into the historical causes of Kurdish insurgency in Iran. A more sophisticated approach to data collection may generate a wider pool of data from which further analysis may be conducted. / Thesis (BA) — Boston College, 2021. / Submitted to: Boston College. College of Arts and Sciences. / Discipline: Departmental Honors. / Discipline: Sociology.

The purpose of this study was to investigate the development of higher music education in Iran and music teacher training from 1868 to 1978, prior to the establishment of the Islamic Republic.

Problem. This study was conducted to identify the incidence of specific Iranian middle-class social and moral values in the content of children's story books. Four questions were used as research guides: (1) To what extent are Iranian middle-class social and moral values present in the content of the selected story books? (2) To what degree of frequency and level of intensity are the values presented? (3) What additional values, if any, are not presented in the list of the specific values? (4) How do the findings of this study compare with those of a previous study of social and moral values in the textbooks used for the elementary level in Iran? Purpose. The purpose of this study was to gather data related to the presence of specific values from nineteen of the most popular children's story books for ages seven to eleven in Iran. Procedures. In collecting the data, a coding form was used for each of the books, as adopted by Ghandi, in her study. The form consisted of sixteen major Iranian middle-class social and moral values which were selected by six Iranian sociologists. The values were: Marriage, Religion, Country, Family, Authority, Education, Cleanliness, Kindness, Work, Thrift, Honesty, Boy as favored sex, Justice, Charity, Friends, and Hospitality. With the assistance of five Iranian students as coders the validity and reliability of the coding procedures were validated. Findings and Conclusions. There was no balance in the presentation of the sixteen major values in story books. Three values: Honesty, Justice, and Work received strong attention (42%). Two values: Boy as a Favored Sex, and Cleanliness received the lowest attention (2%). Five additional values: Prudence, Cleverness, Conservativeness, Being greatful, and Bravery were identified in the content of the story books. The results of comparing the two studies indicated that three values: Work, Education, and Religion received the major emphases, while the value Boy as a Favored Sex actually was not observed in either study. Implications and Recommendations. The findings may help Iranian children's writers to be aware of the value content in story books and create stories appropriate for young readers' moral development. The findings may help parents, teachers, and librarians and other interested persons in identifying and/or selecting books emphasizing specific social and moral values. The findings may assist the children's writers to follow a consistent pattern in presenting values in story and textbooks. Further studies should be done in the following areas: a study similar to this for ages other than seven to eleven; indepth studies to explore the manner in which social and moral values are internalized by children; studies to compare findings of this study and those story books translated from other languages into Farsi.