Este trabalho busca analisar como a condição de emergência (de país de capacidades intermediárias) do Brasil no sistema internacional – em particular sua característica reformista ou revisionista da ordem – se coadunou com o projeto de política externa inaugurado em 2003 e motivou um reforço da inserção brasileira no Oriente Médio. Em suma, busca-se mapear as relações entre o Brasil e o Oriente Médio desde 2003 por meio do process-tracing e compreender como a política para a região se relaciona com a inserção internacional brasileira em uma perspectiva mais ampla e quais os seus condicionantes. Destarte, o trabalho pretende, por meio da consideração do caso específico do estreitamento das relações entre Brasil e Irã, Egito e Turquia, introduzir, para além dos determinantes domésticos, a dimensão sistêmica, frequentemente negligenciada nas investigações brasileiras, para analisar a política externa do Brasil. Para além da busca da internacionalização de suas empresas e do incremento comercial, a diplomacia do País iniciou um esforço de maior envolvimento em questões políticas de vulto internacional, amparada no tradicional princípio do universalismo. Logo, a política para o Oriente Médio apresenta importância fundamental no esforço de penetração do Brasil em áreas fora da sua área de influência tradicional. A concepção da “autonomia pela diversificação”, que motiva a aproximação com a região, deve ser compreendida no âmbito da busca brasileira de redistribuição e reconhecimento no sistema internacional. A ação externa brasileira dirigida ao Oriente Médio, em um contexto de entropia no sistema internacional, busca a revisão da ordem por meio do soft balancing, sobretudo via constituição de redes – inclusive de mediação. / This paper seeks to examine how Brazil's emerging country condition in the international system - in particular its reformist or revisionist character - conformed with the foreign policy project inaugurated in 2003 and led to a strengthening of the Brazilian projection in the Middle East. In short, we seek to map the relations between Brazil and the Middle East since 2003 through process-tracing and to understand how its policy for the region relates to Brazilian international integration in a broader perspective and what are its conditioning factors. Thus, the work aims, through the consideration of the specific cases of the rapprochement between Brazil and Iran, Egypt and Turkey, to introduce, in addition to domestic determinants, the systemic dimension, often overlooked in Brazilian research, to analyze Brazilian foreign policy. In addition to the pursuit of internationalization of its companies and to trade improvement interests, the country's diplomacy initiated a greater involvement in international efforts on major policy issues, based on the traditional principle of universalism. Therefore, the policy for the Middle East has fundamental importance in Brazil's efforts to penetrate areas outside of its traditional area of influence. The concept of "autonomy through diversification," which motivates the rapprochement to the region, must be understood within the Brazilian search for power redistribution and recognition in the international system. Brazil's foreign action towards the Middle East, in a context of entropy in the international system, seeks to reform the current order by means of soft balancing, especially via the development of networks, including mediation.

O sistema internacional vem, nas últimas duas décadas, sofrendo modificações em direção à multipolaridade. Países emergentes, como o Brasil, têm buscado maior projeção internacional, motivados por esse cenário em transformação e pela necessidade de promover mudanças no sentido de maior participação das decisões internacionais. Levando em consideração que a legitimidade é necessária à manutenção do poder internacional, pois os custos do uso exclusivo da coerção são muito altos, faz-se necessário o estudo da percepção dos atores internacionais, por ser base para a formação da legitimidade. Dessa forma, o objetivo do trabalho é explicar a percepção de um Estado sobre a atuação de outro. Tendo em vista a relevância da compreensão da projeção internacional brasileira nesse cenário de crescente multipolaridade, cabe analisar a percepção de outros Estados sobre a atuação do Brasil em novas áreas, como o Oriente Médio, e avaliar a atual estratégia brasileira de inserção internacional. Os países estudados são Arábia Saudita, Argélia, Bahrain, Marrocos, Qatar e Tunísia. Foram utilizados os conceitos de leitura da realidade internacional e de postura diante do sistema internacional para explicar os fatores que influenciam a percepção dos atores internacionais. / The international system has been undergoing changes towards multipolarity in the two last decades. Emerging countries, such as Brazil, have been seeking to increase their international projection, motivated by the transformation of this scenario and by the necessity of promoting changes in order to participate more of international decisions. Taking into account that legitimacy is required to the maintenance of international power, as the costs of using exclusively coercion are too high, it is necessary to study the perception of international actors, because it is the basis of legitimacy. In this sense, the objective of this dissertation is to explain the perception of one State about another. Given the relevance of understanding Brazilian international projection in this scenario of increasing multipolarity, it is worth analyzing the perception of other states about Brazilian action in new areas, such as the Middle East, and evaluating its current strategy of international insertion. The countries analyzed are Saudi Arabia, Algeria, Bahrain, Morocco, Qatar and Tunisia. The study uses the concepts of how states understand the international reality and how they stand before it in order to explain the factors that influence their international perception.

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Talent Management (TM) is of growing interest within academia and in the strategic HRM literature in particular. Despite many attempts to study TM from different perspectives, it remains an ambiguous and elusive concept that is difficult to define and hence challenging to explore and address. Studies on TM are based within Western contexts and therefore it is questionable whether TM models and theories are transferable to other nations and contexts. This research examines the nature of TM in the Middle Eastern context of Oman, from the perspective of Institutional Theory. Through a qualitative, multiple case-study approach, data was collected from four banking and petroleum-sector organisations through semi-structured interviews. The findings suggest that the different influences of institutional pressures (e.g. nationalisation, competition, organisational characteristics) have significantly shaped TM in these organisations. The findings show that TM effectiveness and sustainability depends upon a range of factors including: generational differences, employee expectations, the role of expatriates and national culture. Thus, TM and its approach has to be understood and framed within the context of institutions which interact with organisational characteristics; this shapes the way in which the organisations define their TM approach in order to seek legitimacy, business continuity and effectiveness.

abstract: One in six children in the developing world is engaged in Child labor. Child labor is considered an issue that violates children's rights in many countries and Iraq is no exception. In 2004, Iraq had 1,300,000 children between the ages of eight and sixteen years engaged in work (UNICEF.com, 2004). This study identifies the major causes of child labor in Iraq and investigates the consequences of this issue. In this thesis I draw on the comparison of former regimes in Iraq and Egypt and how those regimes were mistreating their citizens by making them live under poverty and oppression while they were receiving support from the U.S. Poverty is the major cause behind Iraqi children engaging in work. I used the data I collected in Iraq, in the city of Nasiriyah, of 28 working children to explain the relationship between poverty, students drop out of school, family attitude towards education and the child engagement in work. At the end of the thesis I offer a list of recommendations to try to address the problem of child labor in Iraq. The recommendations and regulations are for Iraqi government and the NGOs to take into consideration in trying to resolve and regulate the issue of child labor to rescue the children in Iraq from more exploitation in the future. / Dissertation/Thesis / M.A. Social Justice and Human Rights 2011

abstract: This study is a feminist historiography of Al-Raida, a Lebanese feminist journal introduced in 1976 by the Institute for Women's Studies in the Arab World at the Lebanese American University. This study recovers foundations of modern Lebanese feminist discourses as they are articulated in the journal by employing Foucauldian CDA as a means to trace discourse strands, or conversations, which include Family Planning, development, politics and narratives of the Lebanese civil war. This study explores, by situating each discourse strand within dominant and local historical contexts, the shifting rhetorical function of the journal through various historical moments. Tracing the dominant discourse strands within the first decade of the journal, this study rhetorically analyzes the ways in which arguments are positioned, research studies are presented, and methodologies are employed to forge viable solutions to Middle Eastern women's issues. First, the study traces the conversation on Family Planning in Lebanon and its relevance to the economic and social situation during the late 70s. Second, the study presents the shift in the early 80s towards a discourse on development and explores how Al-Raida presents the issue of development, attempts to define it, and in doing so outlines some of the concerns at this time, including illiteracy, access to health care, access to paid employment, and women's access to developmental opportunities. Third, the study presents the discourse in the mid-80s on the civil war in Lebanon and highlights Al-Raida's rhetorical function by documenting trauma and war narratives through personal interviews, testimonies, and ethnographies. The shift in the methodologies of the research articles published in the first decade, from quantitative studies towards qualitative studies, indicates the journal is rhetorically situated within both the dominant international discourse and within the local context, exhibiting an ability to respond to the nuances in the local Lebanese women's movement while simultaneously maintaining international visibility. / Dissertation/Thesis / Ph.D. English 2012

Este trabalho busca analisar como a condição de emergência (de país de capacidades intermediárias) do Brasil no sistema internacional – em particular sua característica reformista ou revisionista da ordem – se coadunou com o projeto de política externa inaugurado em 2003 e motivou um reforço da inserção brasileira no Oriente Médio. Em suma, busca-se mapear as relações entre o Brasil e o Oriente Médio desde 2003 por meio do process-tracing e compreender como a política para a região se relaciona com a inserção internacional brasileira em uma perspectiva mais ampla e quais os seus condicionantes. Destarte, o trabalho pretende, por meio da consideração do caso específico do estreitamento das relações entre Brasil e Irã, Egito e Turquia, introduzir, para além dos determinantes domésticos, a dimensão sistêmica, frequentemente negligenciada nas investigações brasileiras, para analisar a política externa do Brasil. Para além da busca da internacionalização de suas empresas e do incremento comercial, a diplomacia do País iniciou um esforço de maior envolvimento em questões políticas de vulto internacional, amparada no tradicional princípio do universalismo. Logo, a política para o Oriente Médio apresenta importância fundamental no esforço de penetração do Brasil em áreas fora da sua área de influência tradicional. A concepção da “autonomia pela diversificação”, que motiva a aproximação com a região, deve ser compreendida no âmbito da busca brasileira de redistribuição e reconhecimento no sistema internacional. A ação externa brasileira dirigida ao Oriente Médio, em um contexto de entropia no sistema internacional, busca a revisão da ordem por meio do soft balancing, sobretudo via constituição de redes – inclusive de mediação. / This paper seeks to examine how Brazil's emerging country condition in the international system - in particular its reformist or revisionist character - conformed with the foreign policy project inaugurated in 2003 and led to a strengthening of the Brazilian projection in the Middle East. In short, we seek to map the relations between Brazil and the Middle East since 2003 through process-tracing and to understand how its policy for the region relates to Brazilian international integration in a broader perspective and what are its conditioning factors. Thus, the work aims, through the consideration of the specific cases of the rapprochement between Brazil and Iran, Egypt and Turkey, to introduce, in addition to domestic determinants, the systemic dimension, often overlooked in Brazilian research, to analyze Brazilian foreign policy. In addition to the pursuit of internationalization of its companies and to trade improvement interests, the country's diplomacy initiated a greater involvement in international efforts on major policy issues, based on the traditional principle of universalism. Therefore, the policy for the Middle East has fundamental importance in Brazil's efforts to penetrate areas outside of its traditional area of influence. The concept of "autonomy through diversification," which motivates the rapprochement to the region, must be understood within the Brazilian search for power redistribution and recognition in the international system. Brazil's foreign action towards the Middle East, in a context of entropy in the international system, seeks to reform the current order by means of soft balancing, especially via the development of networks, including mediation.

O sistema internacional vem, nas últimas duas décadas, sofrendo modificações em direção à multipolaridade. Países emergentes, como o Brasil, têm buscado maior projeção internacional, motivados por esse cenário em transformação e pela necessidade de promover mudanças no sentido de maior participação das decisões internacionais. Levando em consideração que a legitimidade é necessária à manutenção do poder internacional, pois os custos do uso exclusivo da coerção são muito altos, faz-se necessário o estudo da percepção dos atores internacionais, por ser base para a formação da legitimidade. Dessa forma, o objetivo do trabalho é explicar a percepção de um Estado sobre a atuação de outro. Tendo em vista a relevância da compreensão da projeção internacional brasileira nesse cenário de crescente multipolaridade, cabe analisar a percepção de outros Estados sobre a atuação do Brasil em novas áreas, como o Oriente Médio, e avaliar a atual estratégia brasileira de inserção internacional. Os países estudados são Arábia Saudita, Argélia, Bahrain, Marrocos, Qatar e Tunísia. Foram utilizados os conceitos de leitura da realidade internacional e de postura diante do sistema internacional para explicar os fatores que influenciam a percepção dos atores internacionais. / The international system has been undergoing changes towards multipolarity in the two last decades. Emerging countries, such as Brazil, have been seeking to increase their international projection, motivated by the transformation of this scenario and by the necessity of promoting changes in order to participate more of international decisions. Taking into account that legitimacy is required to the maintenance of international power, as the costs of using exclusively coercion are too high, it is necessary to study the perception of international actors, because it is the basis of legitimacy. In this sense, the objective of this dissertation is to explain the perception of one State about another. Given the relevance of understanding Brazilian international projection in this scenario of increasing multipolarity, it is worth analyzing the perception of other states about Brazilian action in new areas, such as the Middle East, and evaluating its current strategy of international insertion. The countries analyzed are Saudi Arabia, Algeria, Bahrain, Morocco, Qatar and Tunisia. The study uses the concepts of how states understand the international reality and how they stand before it in order to explain the factors that influence their international perception.

This thesis is a historical study of the Ottoman Armenians in the Ottoman Empire from 1918-1923. It seeks to delineate how the Ottoman Armenians reorganised their political position against the massive socio-political crises that led to the collapse of the Ottoman Empire. The thesis analyses the transformation of the Armenian political position by examining the Ottoman Turkish and Armenian press. The study contends that the Ottoman Armenians struggled to reorganise their political and social life after the First World War and established alliances with the Allied Powers to create an independent 'Western Armenia', which would ultimately unite with the Armenian state in the Caucasus. The Ottoman Armenians developed a patriotic approach that sought unification with their compatriots in the Caucasus. However, after the defeat of the Greek army by the Nationalist troops in Anatolia in 1922, the collective approach among the Ottoman Armenians changed significantly. After the Nationalist victory had become inevitable, the Ottoman Armenians sought reconciliation and peace with the Turks. This reconciliation was only possible through the acceptance of 'Turkish supremacy' by the Ottoman Armenians. In other words, the Armenians who chose to remain within the boundaries of Turkey preferred to pledge loyalty to the newly established Nationalist government in Ankara. The establishment of the Türk-Ermeni Teali Cemiyeti (Turkish Armenian Ascent Association) and the reconciliation attempts of the Ottoman Armenians with the Muslim Turks is an example of the transformation of the Armenian collective position among the Ottoman Armenians. This study employs Armenian and Ottoman Turkish media sources published in Istanbul and Anatolia during the Armistice years (1918-1923) to track the post-war interrelationship of Ottoman society in general and the Armenian community in particular, the social and political reorganisations of the Armenian community and the transformation of the Armenian political position in the last years of the Ottoman Empire. By doing so, the thesis challenges both Ottoman/Turkish and Armenian historiographies, and attempts to bring these two historiographic approaches together with a new approach to understand this historical period.

This thesis explores the politics of drugs and addiction in Iran in light of processes of state formation. The case of Iran provides a paradigm of what has come to be known as the 'War on Drugs' in a political and cultural setting that has been characterised, by most of the area studies literature, by other investigations and scholarly questions. Iran, nevertheless, represents an outstanding case for the study of the War on Drugs; it is at the geopolitical crossroads of international drug routes, it has one of the world highest rates of drug 'addiction' - estimated at between 2-3% and 6-7% of the entire population - and it has progressively seen the rise of synthetic, industrial drugs, such as methamphetamines (shisheh). The thesis situates the phenomenon of drug use in the social and political history of Iran with a particular attention to the transformations taking place after the Islamic Revolution in 1979. It provides a genealogical map of policy experimentations in the field of drugs, while it also casts light on the rationale that governs the formation and transformation of state practices vis à vis drugs, especially during the reformist and post-reformist period (1997-2013). To do so, the research combines extensive archival research using Persian sources (newspapers, reports, films, memoires, etc.) starting from the early 1900s, with ethnographic fieldwork in public clinics, rehab centres, drug using hotspots and, more generally, the street. The outcome is an in-depth engagement with narcotic politics, which unearths unstudied dynamics of Iran's contemporary politics and society. Instead of moralising approaches, what is unveiled is a state that adopts both rhetoric and practice that are secularised and in tune with Western models of policymaking. Eventually, the thesis reveals how the image of the Iranian state has not only been misplaced, but it has also been a myth.