This study offers an alternative analysis of the current literature regarding foreign involvement in the Syria civil war. The initials briefly describe the current situation in Syria, international relations and why the conflict is interesting to analyse from a scientific standpoint. The relevant actors and theoretical construction are also introduced. In the previous research chapter, the current research is presented concerning the global superpowers as well as the interventions that have taken place in Syria. In the theory chapter realism and liberalism are presented, and a number of important factors are discussed. In the result, the decisions and events that have taken place during the conflict in Syria is analysed through the lens of previous named theories. The actors studied are the USA and Russia. There are both realistic and liberalist elements in the decisions made by the actors. The final part of the essay discusses the result. The underlying interest of the players largely determines which decision is ultimately taken. Moreover, there are underlying tones of realism even in clearly liberalistic decisions.

The principal aims of the research are to identify the nature and scope of Turkish foreign policy change towards Iran in the period 2002-2012 - the first ten years of the successive governments of the Justice and Development Party (AKP). Then, individual sources of foreign policy change and their respective roles in shaping Turkish foreign policy toward Iran will be investigated. As the research is theoretically grounded in the subfield of foreign policy analysis known as foreign policy change, the reader is familiarized with a variety of different models used in the study of foreign policy change. In order to assess the relevance of the individual sources, an alternative explanatory model is designed. The application of the designed foreign policy model highlights the necessity of applying a wider approach in the quest to assess Turkish foreign policy change, taking into account the different domestic and international sources in order to achieve a comprehensive explanation that can evaluate the relative power of international and domestic political, economic, and ideational sources serving as its driving mechanisms. The role of economic factors - long seen as fundamental in shaping Turkey's foreign policy toward its neighbors - and the role of security concerns are subsequently identified as...

This thesis studies attempts by Arab Gulf states to effectively lobby the US government. It explores aspects of their lobbying behaviour in order to identify the factors that lead to success and those that lead to failure from their lobbying endeavours. In this respect, the research utilizes two case studies: one in which Arab Gulf state lobbying was successful, and another in which lobbying failed. For each case study, the different elements involved in lobbying are analyzed and factors that lead to success as well as to failure are inferred. In tandem with an analysis of the strategies—or lack of them—behind Arab Gulf states’ lobbying, the research examines additional relevant factors such as the organization and activism of the US Arab American community, the strategic value of the Arab Gulf to the US, and the negative image of Arabs in America. The research then considers the hurdles and obstacles facing the establishment of an effective Arab Gulf lobby in the US. As a conclusion, the research evaluates the prospects of an effective Arab Gulf lobby, and highlights the research areas that should be tackled in the future.

The focus of this thesis is the establishment and evolution of the Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC). Furthermore, analyzing the U.S. relations with the GCC multilaterally and the Gulf States bilaterally. The final phase is to analyze the prospects of future relations between the U.S. and GCC collectively and individually.

The United States and Israel share a special relationship, but this has not always been the case. The cultivation of this alliance took many years and was done at the hands of various Presidents. While in most cases the Executive Office and State Department have shares a close relationship, in the case of Israel policy the two factions have butted heads considerably. This article argues that it has been Presidents alone who have created the policy towards Israel that set up for the special relationship the U.S. and Israel share today.

Foreign policy making often involves the balancing of priorities and tradeoffs. U.S. foreign policy to Central Asia has changed over time, in response to regional concerns and domestic priorities. This study examines U.S. foreign policy motivations in Central Asia, the limitations and counterweights in the region, and the results of U.S. foreign policy to the region. Security, energy, and democracy building are the primary areas of U.S. interest in the region, with security having taken precedence in the aftermath of the 9/11 attacks. In a complex region, surrounded by many interested international players, poorly calibrated U.S. policy and balancing of policy interests resulted in the souring of relations between the U.S. and Central Asian countries. Many have charged that bungled policy and the reentrance of large neighbors Russia and China resulted in a turning point that led to a large and costly decline in U.S. influence. Did the U.S. lose Central Asia? Was it inevitable that Central Asia’s neighbors would reemerge as primary influences? This study assesses mismanagement of U.S. foreign policy interests, the interests and policies of Russia and China in the region, the future outlook of U.S. policy, and possibilities for cooperation between the U.S. and neighboring superpowers in the region. / text

Russian foreign policy from the mid-1960s has vacillated between periods of expansion and retrenchment in which the military and diplomatic reach of the state has extended to continents or been retracted to very modest conceptions of national defense. During this period, the financial centrality of energy exports has come to dominate the Russian economy, leading scholars and observers to draw a causal link between the two: as energy revenues go up, expansionism does as well, while declines in revenues lead Russia to behave less assertively. This dissertation outlines an alternative argument for petrostate foreign policy in which positive or negative revenue environments determine the menu of policy options available to policymakers, but that internal politics determine the content of those foreign policy choices. I argue that foreign policy choices are conditional on the mediating political institutions and circumstances existing at the time of booms and busts, namely that how energy revenue shocks affect foreign policy decision-making in a petrostate after a revenue shock depends on the political environment before the shock. The petropolitics foreign policy theory thus provides insight as to when the expansionism might occur. By focusing on revenue yet allowing politicians to retain agency, this “petropolitics” foreign policy theory links structural theories of foreign policy to leadership-driven models of political decision-making. This petropolitics theory then reassesses Russian foreign policy by analyzing leadership tenures from Leonid Brezhnev to Vladimir Putin. I show that Soviet expansionism in the Third World in the 1970s was not simply because of a positive revenue shock, but because of Brezhnev’s political weakness after his installation in a palace coup. Similarly, I show that Mikhail Gorbachev’s retrenchment of foreign policy commitments arose not solely from a lack of energy revenues, but from his political strength in light of the poor performance of his predecessors. Finally, I show that Vladimir Putin’s selective expansionism and retrenchment emerges in a skillful consolidation of domestic political strength, a fortuitous influx of energy revenues, and a willingness to change foreign policy strategies to serve a single preference of maintaining power. / text

This thesis examines relations between the United States and Great Britain in South America between 1939 and 1945. It does so in the broader context of the economic planning for the post-war world undertaken by the US and Britain during the Second World War. Traditional interpretations of Anglo-American post-war economic planning have tended to focus on a process whereby the Franklin D. Roosevelt administration advocated a multilateral system, based on equality of access to markets and raw materials. Doubting Britain’s ability to compete successfully in such a system, the British government baulked at the US proposal and clung to its autarkic structures constructed during the interwar years. This thesis argues that relations between the US and Britain in South America followed a different and more complex pattern. In this region it was in fact Britain that eventually took the lead in advocating multilateralism. This policy was adopted following a lengthy evaluation of British policy in Latin America, which concluded that multilateralism represented the surest means of protecting British interests in South America. The US, on the other hand, demonstrated exclusionary tendencies in its policy toward Latin America, which threatened the successful implementation of a global economic system based on multilateralism. In explaining this divergence from multilateralism in the Roosevelt administration’s post-war economic planning, this thesis pays particular attention to the influence of different factions, both within the administration and in the broader US political and business establishment. By exploring Anglo-American relations in this previously neglected region, this thesis contributes toward a greater understanding of the broader process of post-war economic planning that took place between the US and Britain during the Second World War.

This thesis examines the theory and practice of humanitarian intervention in the early post-Cold War era. Taking as its basis US policy towards Somalia, Rwanda and Haiti between 1992 and 1994, it develops a theory of humanitarian intervention based on constructivist and scientific realist principles. Using identity as the organising concept, the thesis examines the meta-theoretical precepts of constructivism and scientific realism, which are developed into a methodology for analysing questions of foreign policy. Incorporating critical insights from sequential path analysis, morphogenetic social analysis - the notion of a dynamic mutual constitution of structure and agency - and constructivist social theory, the case studies provide a useful new means of conceptualising humanitarian intervention as a foreign policy practice through an identity-driven analysis. The findings of the research shed much light on this practice and its future prospects. They also suggest new directions for a scientific realist/constructivist research agenda.

The purpose of this investigation is to look at the international organization from the point of view of a small, non-military nation to discover if and how it may be useful to such a nation in carrying out its foreign policy objectives in a bi-polar, nuclear world.