Both countries will have strong incentives to test the artificial balance established by the US and from which they are excluded. Each state, in the face of continued embargoes, may find the lure of weapons of mass destruction correspondingly increased.

In the wake of the 1979 Iranian revolution, relations between states in the Middle East were reconfigured and reassessed overnight. Amongst the most-affected was the relationship between Iran and Saudi Arabia. The existence of a new regime in Tehran led to increasingly vitriolic confrontations between these two states, often manifesting themselves in the conflicts across the region, such as those in Lebanon and Iraq, and more recently in Bahrain and Syria. In this new and revised second edition, Simon Mabon examines the different identity groups within Saudi Arabia and Iran (made up of various religions, ethnicities and tribal groupings), proposing that internal insecurity has an enormous impact on the wider ideological and geopolitical competition between the two. With analysis of this heated and often uneasy relationship and its impact on the wider Middle East, this book is vital for those researching international relations and diplomacy in the region.

The world appears to be globalising economically, technologically and even, to a halting extent, politically. This process of globalisation raises the possibility of an international legal framework, a possibility which has gained pressing relevance in the wake of the recent global economic crisis. But for any international legal framework to exist, normative agreement between countries, with very different political, economic, cultural and legal traditions, becomes necessary. This work explores the possibility of such a normative agreement through the prism of national constitutional norms. Since 1945, more than a hundred countries have adopted constitutional texts which incorporate, at least in part, a Bill of Rights. These texts reveal significant similarities; the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms, for instance, had a marked influence on the drafting of the Bill of Rights for South Africa, New Zealand and Hong Kong as well as the Basic Law of Israel. Similarly, the drafts of Eastern European constitutions reflect significant borrowing from older texts. The essays in this book examine the depth of these similarities; in particular the extent to which textual borrowings point to the development of foundational values in these different national legal systems and the extent of the similarities or differences between these values and the priorities accorded to them. From these national studies the work analyses the rise of constitutionalism since the Second World War, and charts the possibility of a consensus on values which might plausibly underpin an effective and legitimate international legal order.

Hostile relations between Iran and Saudi Arabia are a major contributing factor to political instability in the Middle East. This book argues that rapprochement between Tehran and Riyadh is possible and delves into the complexities of managing their long-standing conflict. By interviewing scholars and former policy makers from the Gulf region and abroad, the author draws out the core themes, strategies, and dynamics of the conflict since the American invasion of Iraq in 2003 to form a basis of an agenda for achieving peace. The result is a fresh perspective on a dangerous and unpredictable rift that affects not only its primary parties - Iran and Saudi Arabia - but also the geopolitics, economic stability and civil wars of the wider Middle Eastern region.

Is the phenomenon of state failure better understood through a focus on the regional context? To what extent may studies of regional security benefit from a focus on the capacities and vulnerabilities of the states involved? This title addresses these questions.

Global Rogues and Regional Orders examines the relationship between nuclear proliferation and regional order in East Asia and the Middle East, looking at what factors shape the perceptions and responses of relevant regional actors to North Korea and Iran, why some of these regional actors cooperate with the United States while others do not, and the consequences of shifting relations among these countries.

This edited volume discusses security policy and strategic policymaking in the Middle East region. Due to its unique geopolitical, geoeconomic and geostrategic features, the Middle East region has been confronted with challenging security issues. Combined with a lack of an efficient regional security regime this has led to the formation of a full-fledged arms race. This book draws together contributions from international experts to address the factors that have been contributing to the ongoing formation of an arms race in the Middle East as well as the impact of this phenomenon on the regional and global security environment. The book is organized in three sections. The first section outlines the contemporary dynamics of the arms race in the Middle East by focusing on its most recent dynamics and their implications for regional and international security. The second section conducts systematic analysis of case studies of country-specific drivers of the arms race. The third and final section examines the role of external actors in the arms race, evaluating both the responses of regional actors to external interventions as well as the implications of the arms race for extra-regional countries.

This book is a comprehensive analysis of the domestic and foreign politics of Iran, focusing on its complex nature from political, social and cultural perspectives. It has adopted a multidisciplinary approach, combining comparative politics and intellectual and modern history with international relations. It analyses the institutional structure of the Islamic Republic, the main political and social actors and alliances, as well as Iranian opposition forces both inside and outside the country. The book tries to simplify the seemingly intractable complexity of the Islamic Republic by demystifying it and using political science methods to prove that it is a peculiar hybrid regime.

This book examines the foreign policy of the Islamic Republic of Iran towards the Persian Gulf states from 1979 to 1998.

The first edition of this book was praised as "a milestone for present and future research on Arab and Third World foreign policies" (American Political Science Review), and "an indispensable aid for those studying or teaching the foreign policies of the contemporary Middle East" (International Journal of Middle East Studies). It has become a standard textbook in Middle East studies curricula all over the world. This third edition, now in paperback, with new material reflecting the earth-shaking events at the end of the Cold War and the continuation of violence and terrorism, examines foreign policies of nine Arab states in the context of globalization. The editors first establish an analytical framework for assessing foreign policy, which they and other contributors then apply chapter by chapter to Egypt, Saudi Arabia, Jordan, Syria, Lebanon, Sudan, the United Arab Emirates, Algeria, and Iraq. Contributors: Moataz A. Fattah, Karen Abul Kheir, Ali E. Hillal Dessouki, Hazem Kandil, Bahgat Korany, Ann M. Lesch, Abdul-Monem Al-Mashat, Paul Noble, Jennifer Rosenblum, Bassel F. Salloukh, Mohamed Soffar. William Zartman. Foreign Policy Analysis in the Global Era and the World of the Arabs Bahgat Korany and Ali E. Hillal Dessouki Foreign Policy Approaches and Arab Countries: A Critical Evaluation and an Alternative Framework Bahgat Korany and Ali E. Hillal Dessouki Globalization and Arab Foreign Policies: Constraints or Marginalization? Ali E. Hillal Dessouki and Bahgat Korany From Arab System to Middle Eastern System: Regional Pressures and Constraints Paul Noble Regional leadership: Balancing off Costs and Dividends: Foreign Policy of Egypt Ali E. Hillal Dessouki Foreign Policy under Occupation: Does Iraq Need a Foreign Policy? Mohamed Soffar Does the Successor Make a Difference? The Foreign Policy of Jordan Ali E. Hillal Dessouki and Karen Abul Kheir The Art of the Impossible: The Foreign Policy of Lebanon Bassel F. Salloukh The Far West of the Near East: The Foreign Policy of Morocco Jennifer Rosenblum and William Zartman Irreconcilable Role-Partners? Saudi Foreign Policy between the Ulama and the U.S. Bahgat Korany and Moataz A. Fattah From Fragmentation to Fragmentation? Sudan's Foreign Policy Ann M. Lesch The Challenge of Restructuring: Syrian Foreign Policy Hazem Kandil Politics of Constructive Engagement: The Foreign Policy of the United Arab Emirates Abdul-Monem Al-Mashat Conclusion: Foreign Policy, Globalization and the Arab Dilemma of Change Bahgat Korany and Ali E. Hillal Dessouki