Iranian Review of Foreign Affairs (IRFA)

Iranian exceptionalism has been a major factor in preventing rapprochement between the US and Iran. There are two major factions within the foreign policy establishment of the Islamic Republic representing “reconciliation discourse” and “resistance discourse”. These two can be seen as sub-discourses within the Islamic Revolution discourse engaged in a struggle over its “correct” interpretation. The “reconciliation discourse” seeks development as the main goal of Iran’s foreign policy, and, hence, considers reconciliation with the US to be a precondition to that goal. Its arguments imply that Iran is not an exceptional country. The resistance discourse, on the other hand, is deeply exceptionalist and deems resistance against the US and maximalist independence to be the main objectives of Iran’s foreign policy. This discourse strongly opposes mending ties with the US because such a move would be understood as a threat to Iran’s exceptionalism. 

The Islamic Republic of Iran's Middle East policy and its fundamentals are among the most discussed issues in the MiddleEast's international politics. The present paper seeks to analyze the structure and formation of Iran's foreign policy interests in the region with a view of bureaucratic diplomacy. Based on Graham Allison's framework of organizational trends and bureaucratic politics, this study assesses two recent Iranian presidents' foreign policy toward Saudi Arabia. Bureaucratic diplomacy of Iran, along with military and security apparatus formulate and implement Iranian foreign policy tactics. Ahmadinejad focused on developing a personal relationship with Saudi leaders, which was not aligned with his bureaucratic diplomacy, though. However, Rouhani embarked on making use of JCPOA as a model to negotiate with Saudi Arabia. The region's constantly evolving situation, the hostile approach of Saudi Arabia, and the maximum pressure of the U.S. on Iran prevented Rouhani’s bureaucratic diplomacy from succeeding. 

The relationship between the United States and the United Arab Emirates is becoming increasingly complex and strategic. The two countries’ strategic partnership in the fields of security, military, political, and intelligence has also acted as a facilitating variable in this field. The UAE acts as the US financial arm in support of institutionalization and democratization and promotion of liberal values in Iraq, Syria, Lebanon, Afghanistan, Pakistan, Libya, Yemen and, Palestine. The article’s main question is that how and why the United Arab Emirates and the United States aretrying to contain Iran in the Middle East? In this regard, using the theoretical propositions of aggressive realism, the hypothesis is that the United States has defined a unique role for the UAE in transferring responsibility to regional actors to decrease Washington's balance cost in the Middle East and North Africa. The method used in the present article is based on a descriptive-analytical approach and the data is collected through library researches, interviews with experts, and reliable internet sources.

Egypt is a strategic country for the United States. On the one hand, maintaining Egypt friendly to the West due to its geopolitical location and influence in Arab League, keeping Suez Canal open for economic and military interests, following the market development opportunities, and securing a settlement with Israel is among the reasons which make Egypt vital for U.S. policymakers on the other the Egyptian foreign policy pattern is based on geography, national interests, cold War setting and leaders of Egypt is mainly affected by U.S. policies. This study uses foreign aid political theory to discuss how the United States uses foreign aid to maintain its interests in Egypt despite the political instability caused by the Arab Spring. The archival research on USAID and U.S. foreign policy towards Egypt demonstratesthat after Nasser's presidency and since the late 1970s, the United States has provided significant military and economic assistance to Egypt to pursue its interests in the Middle East. Although Arab Spring and Egyptian uprisings in 2011 and the Egyptian military’s coup in 2013 made the Obama administration suspend temporarily some U.S. assistance to Egypt, after the re-establishment of aids, the steady rate of U.S. military assistance to Egypt hasn’t been changed. This issue shows that U.S. unceasing influence in Egyptian circles of power was saved by foreign aid and proves the permanence of U.S. strategic interests in the region. As a result, the U.S. utilizes these aids as an influential tool to control Egypt and to pursue its goals in the Middle Eastern countries, including Iran. Due to the close partnership with the United State and Israel, Egypt doesn’t have a stable relationship with the Islamic Republic of Iran.

Since the Islamic Revolution in 1979, Iran has been affected by economic sanctions imposed by Western countries especially the U.S. Since 2006 and with increasing Iranian nuclear standoff with the P5+1 group, the United Nations has frequently imposed economic and financial sanctions against Iran. As a result of these international restrictions and their management by an international organization, Iran's exports have been heavily reduced. Given the sanctions on the oil industry in Iran and the lack of a comprehensive model of export performance of Iranian petroleum products in the sanctions period, this research can help improve and develop this industry in international markets. The research method is phenomenological and the statistical population includes export and marketing managers and oil industry experts. Non-probable sampling and snowball sampling methods were used in this research. In this qualitative study, semistructured in-depth interviews were used to gather information, and 7 in-depth interviews on saturation law were conducted. Structural, internal, interpretive, and descriptive validity were used for validation. For surveying reliability, revision while coding and surveying by another informed person were used to ensure correct coding. This research uses a qualitative study to determine the effect of returning sanctions on the export performance model of Iranian petroleum products. After open, pivotal, and selective coding and the use of Atlas quality software, the background of Iran's oil products export performance in sanctions is market orientation, company resources, marketing mix, macro environment, and items of Iranian oil products export performance in sanction includes: financial performance,customer satisfaction and customer retention in sanction situation. Most of the previous studies have focused onpositivism and quantitative research methodology while we used the qualitative and mixed-method in this research. 

The South Caucasus region is experiencing crises that have continued for many years. Russia's war with Georgia in 2008 and the Armenian-Azerbaijani conflict over the Nagorno-Karabakh region after the collapse of the Soviet Union (1991) changed the security order in the South Caucasus. Russia has interests as a global player in the South Caucasus region and Kremlin considers it's near abroad as its backyard and exclusive sphere of influence. This article uses a descriptive-analytical method as well as the theory of regional security of Barry Buzan to answer the question of what is Russia's security strategy towards the South Caucasus region. The main hypothesis emphasizes that Russia's strategy in the South Caucasus region is to prevent securitization of the region against its economic and political interests, as well as prevent the influence and presence of NATO, in the region. The results show that in tensions with Georgia, Russia seeks to prevent Western interference and urges them to recognize the separation of Abkhazia and South Ossetia from Georgia. On the other hand, Russia's foreign policy in the face of the Nagorno-Karabakh crisis is to maintain a balance between the two parties involved, Armenia and Azerbaijan, to cooperate with both countries, and to resolve the Nagorno-Karabakh conflict by a political solution, not a military one. The purpose of this article is to examine Russia's security strategy in the South Caucasus, with a particular focus on Georgia and the Nagorno-Karabakh crisis from the beginning of the crisis until 2020. And then it offers specific reasons for the confrontation between Russia and the West, as well as Iran's role in regional security issues. 

Foreign policy is implemented in the international environment with special and various tools; one of those tools witha prominent role in diplomacy. However, along with traditional diplomacy, with the emergence of new actors after the Cold War and the entry into the age of communication and technology, diplomacy took new forms. One type of diplomacy that has received more attention in recent years is science diplomacy. So far, scientific diplomacy in the world and especially in Iran has not been fully and sufficiently studied and the interest in this issue is more related to the development in recent years. Additionally, due to its less attractive scientific aspect in the world compared to many other countries, Iran should strengthen its international scientific cooperation networks. So, this article focuses on this issue and the main question is how the Islamic Republic of Iran performed in the application of science diplomacy in the field of medical sciences with Eastern Europe between 1991 and 2018. The hypothesis of this research is: The performance of the Islamic Republic of Iran in various dimensions of science diplomacy including memorandums of understanding and agreements, collaboration desks, international meetings and visits, summer schools, international seminars and congresses, visiting professors, and joint articles towards the Eastern European region from 1991 to 2018 has been increasing. The present study is applied research with the experimental scientific method and hypothesis- deductive research strategy and the review of these activities based on the indicators of science diplomacy shows that during the years 1991 to 2018, these activities have increased significantly in most of the proposed indicators.

This article seeks to identify and explain the process of securitizing ISIS by the Islamic Republic of Iran. The mostimportant question of this article is: How did the Iranian government manage to portray ISIS as an existential threat to itscitizens and how to involve them in their foreign and military policies against this terrorist group? This article uses thesecuritization theory to explain the Iranian war with ISIS in Syria and Iraq. It aims to consider the process and dynamics ofsecuritization of ISIS in Iranian society which led them to support the military combat with ISIS. The research hypothesis isthat the focus on securitization theory prepares the constant framework for understanding how the Copenhagen notion of security helps the Iranian government to justify the enemy narrative of ISIS through the trend of exclusion, exceptionalities, and use of physical force. Iranian government actively uses the securitization process to make required changes and adjustments for confronting ISIS to gain support and legitimacy from ordinary people. This article considers the role of the audience in the process of decision-making and how rulers use this opportunity to mobilize and organize armed forces. The Iranian government in the process of securitizing ISIS has shown that it can involve the people in the process of decision-making and the implementation of its foreign and military policies.

Economic diplomacy, in terms of the importance of economic relations in foreign relations, is one of the important tools to advance the long-term goals of economic growth and development and even increase the security of countries.Recently, Afghanistan, India and Iran have reached an agreement called the Chabahar Agreement. Due to its location, this port has the appropriate geopolitical, geo-economic and geostrategic potentials in comparison with the ports of the countries in the region and has a very high security margin; in addition, the port at the intersection of the North-South and East-West corridors can serve as a gateway for transportation, in other words, a central trade link between Central Asia, India, Pakistan, Afghanistan, Russia and Europe. In this research we want to answer this question: What impact can economic diplomacy have on post-Taliban developments in Afghanistan? And what is the position of Chabahar port in that country's economic diplomacy? The findings of this descriptive-analytical library research show that: Economic diplomacy in the post-Taliban era by adopting programs such as; attracting foreign investment and expandingrelations with the countries of the region and constructive interaction with them, has been able to have positive effects on development in Afghanistan; And the port of Chabahar, as a field for attracting foreign investment on the one hand and its role in xpanding Afghanistan's relations with countries in the region on the other, has found a special place in the country's foreign policy. 

The emergence of future powers is one of the most important features of the contemporary international system. The collapse of the Soviet Union and a new wave of globalization of the economy and the movement of Russia and China towards a market economy in the early 1990s forced governments around the world to reconsider their foreign policies. At this time, India was experiencing the worst economy of its time. The demonstration of the inefficiency of state socialism made New Delhi think for a change. In the present study, by using the explanatory-analytical method, we seek to answer the question "How and with what methods and tools does India pursue its strategy towards becoming a world power?" The proposed hypothesis for the question is that “India seeks to achieve the position of a global superpower by special emphasis on domestic strategies and relying on a pragmatic foreign policy." Therefore, due to the increasing importance of emerging powers during the transition of the international system, the analysis and examination of characteristics, perspectives and global effects of their empowerment can deepen our understanding of the evolvinginternational system.

When it comes to diplomacy, it is generally believed that entry into this field is possible only by experienced diplomats and through the Ministry of Foreign Affairs in most countries. But modern international relations, due to the increasing complexity and the variety of different issues, in the process of political dialogue and negotiations, need something more than what has been common before. Professional politicians must know all the tools of national power and use them as leverage to influence other countries to advance their interests. Military power is one of the most important components of national power and plays a vital role in pursuing the policies adopted by states. In fact, it hasbecome an inseparable part of diplomacy because of the many capabilities that military power creates for foreign policy. In this regard, military diplomacy is a way for presenting military power to achieve peaceful ends, avoid violence, and increase deterrence, which has become a tool for achieving foreign policy goals, especially among the great powers. This article aims to study the role of military diplomacy in the foreign policy of states. Studies show that "adopting such an approach increases the ability of countries to pursue foreign policy goals through increasing the scope of action,  providing a positive image, increasing the sphere of influence, shaping the security environment, expanding the operational environment and etc. "In light of the realization of these cases, we will see an increase in their power and roleplaying in international developments." Efforts have also been made to outline the prospects for Iran's military diplomacy.  

Since two decades ago, the Iranian nuclear issue became a full-scale international conflict. Iran's main preference is to guarantee its national security. In fact, the lack of a strategy for Iran and the channels of intense conflict around it, the scarcity of conflict management strategies and mechanisms, are forcing Iran to pursue a nuclear program. Furthermore, some severe institutional and structural confinements and limitations on Iran and the immediate need to recover its vulnerable economy have forced Iran to subsidize its fortified attitudes and behave like a rational actor in the international atmosphere. But the United States’ preference is to stabilize the regional equation with regard to support of its strategic resources and allies in the Middle East. The lack of similar understandings and different levels of calculation between Tehran and Washington over nuclear politics led to long-lasting conflict. While Iran justifies its political logic with normative paradigm and consistency with international regimes, Washington’s political calculations are standing forsecurity, threat and deterrence approaches. Moreover, whereas Iran explains its nuclear activities at the regional and transregional levels, the US analyzes it at the international level disordering the global status quo. In this paper, the game theory models will be used to understand the past and current relationship between US-Iran. Furthermore, the possibility of an equilibrium movement regarding the Iranian nuclear problem will be discussed. This analysis will focus on the preferences and interests of each state, which mainly determine the foreign policy-making process.