مطالب

This study aimed to investigate the role of financial and non-financial determinants of the sustainability of Iranian banks. Accordingly, the sustainability score of 27 public and private Iranian banks were evaluated in 2017 by employing a sustainability model. The model was developed by the acquisition of sustainability codes, themes, and categories in the banking industry through Meta Synthesis, while its casual structure was determined by a combined method of Interpretive Structural Modeling and Analytical Network Process. Subsequently, we calculated the sustainability scores by using our proposed model to analyze the content of the banks’ disclosed information. Then, the effect of capital adequacy, total assets, financial leverage, loan to deposit ratio, return on assets and number of branches were investigated using multiple regressions on the banks' sustainability scores. Findings depict that total assets have a positive and significant relationship and capital adequacy has a negative and significant relationship with a bank's sustainability. Therefore, banks with more assets are more willing to participate in sustainability activities, due to more appropriate financial resources, as well as to support the bank's brand and its reputation to stakeholders. On the other hand, due to the wrong belief that sustainability is costly, and non-value adding for the banks, they get less involved in order to increase their capital adequacy ratio.

The objective of this research is to identify the technology of cloud computing in terms of its concept, its development, its objectives, its components, models, classifications, and the advantages of its use in the teaching process at the University of Samarra, as well as to identify the most important challenges and obstacles that teachers face in using University of Samarra. The researcher used the descriptive approach in his research. This research was carried out on an objective sample of 40 teaching staff members in the Department of Life Sciences and English at the Faculty of Education / Samarra University. A questionnaire consisting of 22 questions were used as a data collection tool, which included two axes: The first axis: the advantages of using cloud computing technology in the process of teaching at the University of Samarra. The second axis: the challenges of using cloud computing technology in the process of teaching at the University of Samarra. The researcher used the statistical program (SPSS 20) in order to examine the differences between the responses of the members of the research sample. The results revealed that the estimates of the teaching of the advantages of the use of cloud computing technology in the teaching process at the University of Samarra, which included the search tool, came very much, and the results revealed the most important challenges which stand in the way of the use of cloud computing technology in university education. The study recommended institutions of higher learning and universities with a set of important recommendations regarding the use of cloud computing technology in educational institutions. 

The relationship between the United States and the Islamic Republic of Iran has been a confrontational one in the past four decades and been influenced by the nature of the Islamic Revolution and its derived system. After the collapse of the Soviet Union, the United States tried to expand its ideals and structure of the desired order by using the power components in international system as a hegemonic power. However, Iran generally considers the US hegemony as a special type of domination and given the nature of the Islamic Republic of Iran with a unique ideological discourse, the resistance against the domination hegemony is necessary and therefore counter-hegemonic strategies and policies have always been  Iranian policy priorities. This article aims to investigate the relationships between the two countries by using descriptive-analytical method in the framework of Neo-Gramscianism and in the hegemony power and counter-hegemony forms. The findings of the article show that in order to maintain its position of hegemony, the US has applied policies such as the coercive diplomacy, the soft warfare, de-legitimization of Iran and legitimization of the use of pressure through the international institutions against the country. In response Iran has tried to confront the US hegemonic position by adopting self-reliance policies, by making alliances and coalitions as well as pursuing independent political discourse in international system.