Since the end of the Cold War, considerable attention has been paid to "ethnic" or "identitive" conflicts. Some scholars argue that these conflicts tend to draw in 'kin' states who support the belligerent(s) with whom they share identitive affinities. This thesis examines such involvement, based on identitive affinities, in ethnopolitical conflicts. In particular, it analyses the pattern of involvement of one country: Iran. Specifically, it looks at Iran's policy towards five conflicts: Afghanistan, Nagorno-Karabakh, Iraq, South Lebanon and the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. / This thesis argues that kinship is only a permissive cause of involvement while the presence and scope of involvement are determined by other factors, in the following order: security threats, non-security interests (influence, economic interests), and ideology. Proximity is of great importance as security threats usually emanate from neighbours and not from far-away enemies.

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What explains the lack of normalized relations between Egypt and Iran? Despite mutual potential benefits Egypt and Iran could have gained from normalized bilateral relations over the past several decades, a range of factors prevented them from doing so, including personality politics, domestic political and economic considerations, as well as regional and external alliances and competing visions of regional order. Accordingly, the trajectory of modern Egyptian policy toward Iran has been non-linear. Realist and constructivist schools of International Relations theory, on their own, cannot adequately explain how Egypt's foreign policy toward Iran varied from times of hostility, friendship, stagnation, and openness under Presidents Gamal Abdel Nasser, Anwar Sadat, Hosni Mubarak, and Muhammad Morsi. As such, neoclassical realism - with its emphasis on the interaction between geopolitical structural conditions and the roles of leadership and domestic politics in shaping a state's foreign policy - offers the best framework for analyzing Egypt's foreign policy behavior toward Iran.

The usual explanations of the events leading to the Iranian Revolution have been either an analysis of Iranian culture or an analysis of the exploitation of Iran by imperialist powers. This thesis seeks to expand on imperialist theory by using post-imperialist theory to explore the reciprocal affects of transnational class formation which came about with the growth of transnational corporations. This approach is well suited to the Iranian case because of the strong ties that Iran under the Shah had with the international community. / Master of Arts / incomplete_metadata

The years 1951 to 1953 are among the most important and controversial in Iranian history. The period is significant not only for the domestic dynamics of popular nationalism under Prime Minister Mohammed Mossadegh, but also for the role that United States policy played in an interaction with the conflict between a lingering British economic presence and the Iranian move to nationalize its oil industry. An examination of United States national security policy of that time reveals that policy toward Iran was consistent with the overall post-war policy of the United States, dominated as it was by the central theme of preventing the spread of communism. The task for the men who were charged with the application of U.S. policy in Iran during those years was to accommodate two factors which complicated the search for an order which would ensure post-war national security for the United States: Iranian nationalism as epitomized by Mossadegh; and the economic and diplomatic interests of Great Britain. The United States sought to resolve the conflict so that instability in Iran would not invite communist influence or takeover. United States policymakers were influenced by several factors which combined to eventually decide the outcome. The centrality of the perceived world communist expansion threat, McCarthyism in the United States, the role of several key figures with experience in U.S.-Soviet diplomacy, and the change from a Democratic to a Republican administration at the time Mossadegh was experiencing a deterioration of his own domestic political situation; all worked toward the still-controversial outcome of U.S. policy: the overthrow of Mossadegh. The primacy of containment of communism in United States policy did not preclude variations in its application, nor did this emphasis ignore the forces of Iranian nationalism and self-determination. Nonetheless, given the men involved in the policy decisions, the information available to them and the context of the post-World War II international order, the outcome was predictable and entirely consistent at the time with creating an international order conducive to the national security interests of the United States.

There is no abstract available for this dissertation.

The continuing diplomatic impasse between the United States and Iran dates back to the turbulent events of the late 1970s. Blame for the 'loss' of Iran, which had been one of the 'twin pillars' of US strategy in the Persian Gulf, has inevitably fallen on the White House incumbent at the time, President Jimmy Carter. This thesis offers a reassessment of Carter's decision making and his responses to the fall of the Shah, the Islamic Revolution and the US embassy hostage taking. It demonstrates that the breakdown of US-Iranian relations was not simply a one-president phenomenon and, more significantly, Carter's handling of Iran was not as dire as it is often portrayed. The research is based on a thorough examination of the available archive material, including newly released documents, as well as recent interviews with the major protagonists. When Carter took office in 1977 he inherited a badly creaking Iranian pillar that was soon to collapse altogether. The flawed policies of his predecessors placed strict limitations on his administration and unwittingly created a ticking time bomb in the form of the Shah. Despite these restrictions, Carter battled to reconcile the strategic necessities of Cold War containment with his moral principles in areas such as human rights and arms sales. In an administration seemingly dominated by the disagreements amongst his top two advisors, Carter remained the key decision maker at all times. He recognised the practical limits of American power and assumed sensible positions in response to an ever changing and uncontrollable crisis. Aside from its contemporary significance, Iran is therefore critical to Carter's disputed legacy and how he rates as a foreign policy president.

During 1946 and 1947, Russia pressured Iran to grant an oil concession in the northern provinces. During this time, the United States supported Iran's right to make its decision free from Soviet pressure.

Iran's foreign policy is consistent and is fundamentally realist with a revolutionist vision while the means are rationalist is the central argument of this dissertation. I make use of the English Schools three traditions of realism, rationalism and revolutionism in analyzing the speeches of Iranian statesmen to identify the ways in which the dynamics of the three traditions have evolved since 1997 and what it means for interpreting the developments of Iran's foreign policy ventures. I utilize both quantitative and qualitative methods of analysis in examining the speeches of the supreme leader, Ayatollah Khamenei, the presidents since 1997. The quantitative method employs a customized software generating figures that represent the recurrence of realist, rationalist and revolutionist terminologies in all the documents downloaded from the official websites of the Iranian statesmen as well as the United Nations and select news agencies and affiliates. The quantitative phase of the analysis, meanwhile, carefully examined selected statements of the supreme leader and the presidents uncovering the foreign policy argumentations and justifications, which were studied alongside foreign policy actions and classified under the three traditions. The findings suggest that Iran's foreign policy is the same as in the other states of international society – it is consistent and dynamic. It is simultaneously realist, rationalist and revolutionist with each tradition serving a specific purpose, which cannot be disentangled from the other two.

This thesis aims to conceptualize what is often referred to in diplomacy, as a policy of “constructive engagement”, by employing neoliberal-institutionalist theories and conflict resolution approaches. The adopted “model for constructive engagement” serves as the theoretical framework and centres on the basic assumption that non-coercive diplomacy coupled with the offer of incentives is best suited at resolving conflict as well as promoting human rights in international relations. Rather than looking at determinants of foreign policy making, the thesis focuses, therefore, on the actual exercise of power and influence in international relations. As such, power, both in terms of a state’s available assets as well as seen as a form causation, is considered the crucial variable in determining diplomatic manoeuvring and negotiation behaviour. The empirical context for the research project is provided by the case of British-Iranian relations during the period from 1989 to 2004. The narrative is divided into two parts: the first one deals with the impact of the fatwa against Salman Rushdie by Ayatollah Khomeini on bilateral relations and investigates British diplomacy towards Tehran, which followed the European Union’s policy of “Critical Dialogue” with Iran. Whilst the promotion of human rights was on the agenda of the “Critical Dialogue”, findings indicate that contrary to other EU member states, most notably Germany, Whitehall was able to genuinely pursuing a policy of “constructive engagement”, demanding meaningful changes in Iranian behaviour. However, findings also show that Britain’s priority was at resolving the “Rushdie affair” and not necessarily at promoting and protecting human rights in Iran. The second part of the narrative looks at the “Comprehensive Dialogue” which was implemented by the European Union in 2000 and established a direct linkage between economic rewards and the improvements of human rights in Iran. Whilst the Iranian government and parliament met EU demands, the country’s maze of power centres, most notably those dominated by hardliners and conservatives, worked against any meaningful improvements in the protection and respect of human rights. Both narratives indicate to what extent diplomacy and negotiations were influenced by domestic constituents, referred to as the Two-Level Game, as well as by asymmetries of interdependence between the EU and Iran. Overall, the data implies that constructive engagement, whilst subject to political and economic interdependence, constitutes an effective form of human rights diplomacy.