Purpose: A one-day international symposium hosted by the Marine Corps University (MCU) and the Marine Corps University Foundation to enhance the overall understanding of Iran, exploring its internal dynamics, regional perspectives, and extra-regional factors and examining its near-term political and strategic options and their potential impact on the course of action of the United States and the USMC.
Contains the collected work from a one-day international symposium, held at Marine Corps Univ. It sought to clarify the waters -- to examine the "puzzle piece" labeled Iran and understand how it fits into the larger, global puzzle. These papers came out of that symposium; they provide insight into the multifaceted nature of Iran and its regime. Contents: Introduction; Iran Under Ahmadinejad; Talking to Tehran: With Whom, About What, and How?; When U.S.-Iranian Negotiations Start: A Primer; The Iranian Nuclear Issue; Iran's Policies and Iraq; Iran in the Israeli Threat Perception; The 2009 Iranian Presidential Election and Its Implications. Glossary. Map and diagram of Iranian Power Structure.
This book contains the collected work from "The Iranian Puzzle Piece: Understanding Iran in the Global Context." This one-day international symposium, held at Marine Corps University (MCU), was cohosted by MCU and the Marine Corps University Foundation and was coordinated by the Marine Corps University's Middle East Studies (MES) that was established in 2007. The symposium from which these essays originated offered a forum to enhance the overall understanding of Iran, exploring its internal dynamics, regional perspectives, and extra-regional factors and examining its near-term political and strategic options and their potential impact on the United States and the Marine Corps. This event joined together colleagues from the Armed Services, joint, interagency, coalition partners, and security communities and explored various perspectives to help develop an understanding of the role played by the Islamic Republic of Iran in the global community.
This book contends that the transition of leadership from Ayatollah Ali Khamenei will result in a crisis of legitimacy for the Islamic Republic of Iran. Using Max Weber’s typology of legitimacy, the book explains that the Islamic Republic’s legitimacy was based on the charismatic authority of the regime’s founder, Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini. Since Khomeini’s death in 1989, the regime has failed to develop the rule of law necessary for legal-rational authority. Moreover, it abandoned the logical underpinnings justifying clerical rule when a mid-ranking cleric rather than a Grand Ayatollah was placed in the position of Supreme Leader. With neither a legal basis nor a traditional basis of authority, the new leader relied extensively on the cover of Khomeini’s charismatic shadow for legitimacy. After nearly four decades, this shadow is fading. Not only will Khamenei’s successor lack the same direct ties to Khomeini, but the demographic and societal changes in Iran have made the charisma of Khomeini a historical concept rather than a viscerally felt experience. First the book analyzes the likely succession scenarios, finding the most probable outcome is the appointment of a hardline conservative backed by the regime’s security forces. Next, the regime’s economic, political, and social failures are presented, in order to explain why the new leader is likely to try to return to a traditional basis of legitimacy – religion. Thereafter, the book explains how this hardliner focus on religion is likely to result in an aggressive Iranian foreign policy toward the United States, Israel, and Saudi Arabia, impacting the region’s security.
Asia is a complex and diverse continent, which has seen the scope and pace of transformation increase rapidly over the past 30 years. In turn, the economic growth and social change seen in the region, combined with new global security profiles and environmental challenges, have contributed to placing Asia at the forefront of international affairs. This Handbook brings together leading scholars of different disciplines, including Politics and International Relations, Security Studies and Law, to provide a comprehensive analysis of both the prospects and problems which have emerged from Asia’s rise. Examining how developments across the continent have influenced global politics and how the region has responded to the international community in the modern era, the sections cover: Major actors in Asian politics, especially China, Japan and India, International relations in Asia and intra-Asian tensions Special issues of world politics in Asia including modern conflicts in and attitudes towards the Middle East The Routledge Handbook of Asia in World Politics will be useful to students and scholars of Global Politics, International Relations and Asian Studies.
This book discusses the diversity and resilience in a hybrid regime where civil society organisations are either provided with complex sets of opportunities or face severe constraints. By studying the case of Iran between 1997 and 2013, it shows how the Islamic Republic regime went into two opposite directions under two presidencies and played in-between supporting and suppressing advocacy NGOs. After accommodating a novel theoretical framework enabling scholars to identify the contributing factors of diversity in the regime, four case-study chapters are designated for comparing the women’s rights and environmental NGOs across local and national governments. These two political and technical policy areas demonstrate the different scopes of freedoms for advocacy NGOs. The contrasting narratives of the civil activists and policymakers imply paradoxes and shifts in the arrangement of opportunities for action and advocacy, although the leadership and structure of the regime remained unchanged during the period of study.
"The current debate revolving around Iranian and North Korean nuclear programs highlights the need to foster a more complete understanding of the multidimensionality of states' decision-making process on whether to acquire and retain nuclear weapons. Case studies from the greater Middle East region offer the opportunity to examine the factors such states take into consideration when determining which path to follow. Such factors include threat perceptions, the interpretation of lessons learned from the experience of other countries, the calculus of perceived costs and benefits for national security, the envisioned modes of employment of nuclear weapons (political and military), and the legal/ethical considerations -- all from the perspective of regional actors. Furthermore, a country's specific political decisionmaking process and its institutions are also key factors in understanding how actual and potential regional nuclear powers make decisions on the nuclear issue. As such, an understanding of the motivations and of the perceived utility of nuclear weapons from the perspective of recent and potential nuclear powers can help senior leaders craft more effective U.S. and multilateral nonproliferation, counterproliferation, and deterrence strategies. The two papers included in this monograph offer insights into the differing paths taken by two countries in the greater Middle East region -- Libya and Pakistan -- with the former relinquishing its nuclear program and the latter acquiring a military nuclear capability."--Page [4] pf cover.
