Afghanistan

By withdrawing from Afghanistan, the Soviet Union collapsed and the Cold War ended in the 1990s. Throughout that decade, western governments forgot the people of Afghanistan. But the 1998 attack on the U.S. interests in Africa and al-Qaeda attacks of the September 11, 2001 reintroduced the foreign aggression of the Western governments’ coalition against Afghanistan. In the late 2001, NATO countries led by the United States brought down the Taliban regime. Concomitantly, the UN conducted a conference in Bonn, Germany in which political and paramilitary groups agreed to form an inclusive government without presence of the Taliban. The Bonn Agreement contents show that most of its principles are based on the doctrine of Liberal Democracy. Accordingly, in most of the ratified articles of the Eighth Constitution of Afghanistan the doctrine of liberal democracy is reflected. In a country where many political regimes and systems were experienced, the effectiveness of Liberal Democracy doctrine was expected. Meanwhile, Liberal Democracy faced challenges and nation-state building development process witnessed deficiencies. The present paper uses systemic analysis of the liberal nation-state (system input, policy design, policy implementation, evaluation and outcome) to respond the research question. The question is, how have the nation-state building process and political development in Afghanistan been affected by the Bonn Agreement and liberal democracy doctrine? And has that led to the deficiencies in nation-state building and political development in the country? Hypothetically, nation-state building and political development in Afghanistan based on the Bonn Agreement suffered from deficiencies due to the following reasons: disregarding the historical-traditional contexts of Afghanistan, the weak presence of liberal democrats in power, disregard for the demands of the fragmented society, the continuation of nationalist policies, and the incorrect public-private divide in the liberal structure of democracy.

The religious nationalism in Neo-Taliban era implies a process of distancing from tribal legitimacy toward a more nationalistic narration. The research aims to understand the Religious nationalism in the approach of Neo- Taliban toward state-building and the peace process. In this regard, the social theory of Ibn Khaldun is employed to measure the process, the logic and the consequences of the birth of its religious nationalism. It becomes clear that the group spiced its religious narration with nationalist changes to win more social support and legitimacy by overcoming ethnonationalism and emphasizing on nationalistic notions that ultimately weakened its traditional legitimacy.

Turkey as one of the regional actors in the Middle East has taken the ‘Look East’ policy in its foreign policy since 2002, when the Justice and Development Party (AKP) has come to power. Although the relations between Turkey and Afghanistan have a historical background dating back to the Ottoman, but the geopolitical and geostrategic position of Afghanistan has doubled its significance for Turkish politicians during the NeoOttomanism, the situation which has emerged in Turkish politics, especially its cultural diplomacy over Afghanistan Since the rise to power of the AKP. So, in this article, the main question is, what are the objectives and tools of Turkish cultural diplomacy in Afghanistan during the AKP era? In response to this question, the main hypothesis is that Turkey's cultural diplomacy during the AKP era was based on the use of shared linguistic, ethnic and religious values to strengthen Turkey's soft power in Afghanistan as well as the hegemony of Turkey in the region.

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 study of civilizations of South and Southeast Asia seem meaningless without an insight on Hinduism and Buddhism that exerted an enormous influence in the region before the arrival of Islam. The two beliefs, though originated in India, but contributed greatly to the development of socio-cultural relations among countries as far as Afghanistan in the west and China, Japan, and Indonesia in the east. About the beginning of the Common Era, Indian merchants may have settled there, bringing Hindu and Buddhist priests with them. These religious men were patronized by rulers who converted to Hinduism or Buddhism. The earliest material evidence of Hinduism in Southeast Asia comes from Borneo, where late 4th-century Sanskrit inscriptions testify to the performance of Vedic sacrifices at the behest of local chiefs. Chinese chronicles attest an Indianized kingdom in Vietnam two centuries earlier. The dominant form of Hinduism exported to Southeast Asia was Shaivism, though some Vaishnavism was also known there. The current study tries to explain how Hinduism and Buddhism could influence Socio-Cultural Relations between Pre-Islamic India and Afghanistan taking into account of historical records and inscriptions.

China is actively engaged in Afghanistan, especially with the Neo-Taliban, which indicates significant changes in China's foreign policy. The Chinese government invited the Neo-Taliban delegations several times and tried to expand their role in their country. The present study examines the impact of China's active engagement with the Neo-Taliban, using Ibn Khaldun's Social Theory and Discourse Analysis. Questioning the nature of the active engagement of China with Neo- Taliban, we hypothesized an increase in insecurity overflow from Afghanistan to China, as well as an increase in insecurity complications in Afghanistan against China’s interests. It became clear that the Neo-Taliban's increasing interaction with China was to the detriment of Taliban and ultimately China. The Doha Peace Agreement requested the control and restriction of foreign fighters residing in Afghanistan, which for the foreign fighters, including the Uighurs, were a reminder of the restrictions imposed on them before the fall of the Islamic Emirate. However, Mullah Omar did not openly engage with China. This will delegitimize the Afghan Neo-Taliban and ultimately create a disperse Neo-Taliban with a fragile legitimacy, whose fragility does not seem to collapse, but will not serve China's interests either.

Afghanistan is confronting the complexity of security and development challenges for the last several years, and that is affecting the Afghan’s lives and livelihood. Over the past years, it has continuously increased, and due to lack of security as well as the country has faced several incidents after 2014. The war created several problems, and there are major challenges by the Taliban, ISIS, and other critical terrorisation. The study aims to define a system approach that how a fragile system operates and functions. Afghanistan emerges as an example of a fragile state which can be explained through the concept of system approach. The article also looks at the concept of system approach and method takes the case study of Afghanistan to demonstrate the perils of a fragile state since 2014 following international military drawdown. Besides, it also looks at how the EU is responding to these challenges as part of its security and development strategy towards Afghanistan. Concluding remarks observed that a fragile system lacks developments and economic growth which consequences in displacement, emigration and instability in the country consequential in the community or the case of Afghanistan tribal warfare. In past overs years, the EU contributes its development and humanitarian aid to Afghanistan, which is bringing a significant change.

Correct and effective budgeting for country is essential to its economic development and progress. The budget is a crucial tool used by modern governments to control the economic financial policies of the nation. The budget of those nations has altered the rate of economic growth in terms of job creation, price stability, and the balance of international trade policies so that the interests of the society are more in mind, and it plays a crucial role in lowering income disparities between various segments of society. Program-based budgeting was implemented in Afghanistan in 2006 to connect the standard and development budgets of the ministries and link its strategic goals and policy priorities with the annual budget. Organizational budgeting is a specialist undertaking that plays a crucial function. The Afghan budgeting system requires fundamental reforms; a gap exists between the budgeting of government units and the responsibility of responding in the executive bodies of the government as a result of a lack of financial discipline, weak accountability, lack of transparency in the budget arrangement process, ignoring the facts in the budget arrangement, and ignoring the criteria for prioritizing allocations in the budget. The budgeting procedures of the Ministry of Finance may be established using the lessons learned from the experiences of the nations (England, Australia, Chile, and Egypt) that have training and capacity-building programs.

After the fall of the republic in Afghanistan and the raising of the Taliban flag on the presidential palace, many thought that Afghanistan would GO back in time and return to the years before 2001. There WERE serious concerns about endangering the rights of women, the rights of ethnic-religious minorities, as well as the reappearance of foreign terrorist groups, especially Al-Qaeda, in Afghanistan. Considering these elements, many researchers question whether the Taliban has changed its principles, and whether or not the world is facing neo-Talibans. This study aimed to analyze the intellectual tradition of the Taliban with the framework of Laclau and Mouffe's theory, along with discourse methodology. The research examines the central signifiers of the Taliban discourse and their effect on the right of women, ethnic-religious, and foreign terrorist groups. The results indicate that the intellectual tradition of the Taliban is influenced by the powerful Pashtun culture of the governorate, which follows the three principles of honor, superiority, and hospitality, and affects the right of women, ethnic-religious, and foreign terrorist groups, along with the teachings of the Deobandy school.

The stock market, as a symbol of the capital market, is one of the most important sectors of the economy of any country and, unlike the money market, is responsible for the long-term financing of corporate capital. The capital market collects funds from surplus sectors and channels them to institutions that need financing. This study investigates the feasibility of establishing a market for the Kabul Stock Exchange. It is a survey in terms of nature and descriptive method and is applied in relation to the purpose. For the feasibility study of the present study, six platforms were identified using Delphi method. Non-random and purposive sampling was used, and according to Morgan’s table, 180 people were selected from three groups of university professors, experts from the ministries of Finance, Economy, Trade and Industry, the Central Bank and a number of people in Kabul. The validity and reliability of the questionnaire was confirmed by Delphi method and Cronbach’s alpha test. SPSS statistical software was used to analyze the data. From the results of one-sample t-test, it can be seen that all H1’s sub-hypotheses were confirmed in relation to the six platforms, which means that in the current situation, Kabul city is not in a favorable situation in terms of infrastructure and requirements for legal, economic, technical and technological, cultural, social and human capital platforms for the establishment of the stock market, and the conditions for the establishment of Kabul Stock Exchange do not exist. The Friedman test showed that the degree of readiness for the establishment of Kabul Stock Exchange depended on the human capital, economic, legal, cultural, technical and technological or social platforms.

Purpose: The immigrants in the destination communities always face many challenges in cultural and social fields and they must coordinate and adapt themselves to cultural and social influences. Therefore, the current research was conducted with the aim of sociological investigating of cultural-social influence of Afghanistan immigrant families from Iran. Methodology: In a qualitative, applied and cross-sectional research, 16 parents and children of Afghanistan immigrant families referring to the one of Tehran's helper clinics were examined in terms of cultural-social influence. The research tool was included semi-structured interviews with parents and children of Afghanistan immigrant families. For data analysis was used thematic analysis method according to grounded theory. Findings: The findings of the sociological investigating of cultural-social influence of Afghanistan immigrant families from Iran showed that 20 concepts in 7 categories of insecurity in Afghanistan (with 3 concepts of life insecurity, economic insecurity and financial insecurity), better living conditions in Iran (with 4 concepts better health, food preparation and food hygiene, better environmental conditions of people and better moral feedback in the society), better economic conditions in Iran (with 2 concepts of providing social life basic facilities and more economic situations), problems of social life in Iran (with 3 concept of racial mentality of Iranians in dealing with Afghans, financial and economic discrimination against Afghans and humiliation of native culture of Afghans), preservation of Afghan traditions and cultural values in Iran (with 2 concepts of holding traditional ceremonies of Afghans and connection of young Afghans with traditional ceremonies of Afghans), problems of educating Afghans in Iran (with 2 concepts of structural problems against the education of Afghans and negative cultural and racial attitudes from some Iranians) and accepting the values and norms of Iranian society (with 4 concepts of accepting and carrying out common traditions, understanding and accepting some aspects of culture daily social life of Iranians, participation in friendly gatherings of Iranians and family relationship and marriage with Iranians) were identified. The analyzes according to the grounded theory showed that in the causal conditions of the social structures of the acceptance of immigrants there are four categories of social trust, institutionalization of the principles of social education, development of structures that support the acceptance of immigrants and creation of equal conditions for the social life of immigrants, in the central phenomenon of security, health and better living conditions in Iran three are three category of lack of security in Afghanistan, better living conditions in Iran and better economic conditions in Iran, in the basic conditions of infrastructure there are two categories of financial resources and human resources, in the interfering conditions of social life challenges of Afghan immigrants there are one category of individual-social life problems in Iran, in the proposal solutions for the acceptance and participation of immigrants in Iranian society there are two categories of solving structural problems in the social presence of Afghans and cultural education of Iranians for better acceptance of Afghan immigrants and in the consequences of the life outcome

Economic exchanges have long exerted great influence on the relations between nations and nations in various political, social and cultural dimensions, and these effects are increasing in current international relations. Given that the countries of Iran and India are opponents of terrorist and takfiri groups in the region and the country of Afghanistan is one of the main headquarters of the terrorists in the region, it is one of the prerequisites for full and coherent use for security in the economic exchanges of the region.Regarding what has been mentioned, the main question of the paper is about the effect of Indian presence in Afghanistan regarding security and economy?  And the main hypothesis of this paper is that the presence of India in Afghanistan has increased the economic interactions between Iran, Afghanistan and India, and, in addition to the establishment of security cooperation, the internal context of creating insecurity in the region is reduced. The research method used in this article is descriptive-analytical and has used library studies to compare the results of economic exchanges on security creation.First of all, interdependence views have been used to designate India's economic presence in Afghanistan;  and the results of this paper can point to a rise in the economic ties between Iran, India and Afghanistan, leading to an increase in the interests of the three countries, a new balance, the more emphasize and importance of Asian markets Middle and more security in Afghanistan.

Following the events of September 11, 2001, the name of the al-Qaeda organization, as the terrorist group leading to attacks, quickly spread all around the world, and this group and its leaders and activists were prosecuted. The organization, rooted in Salafi and fundamentalist extremist thoughts, has always been supported by the West and the United States during the Cold War because of his struggle against the Red Army in Afghanistan. But the end of the Cold War and the spread of al-Qaeda’s thoughts to other Islamic countries, as well as the meaning crisis of the end of the Cold War, gradually led to the introduction of this group and similar organizations as enemies and fighting against radicalization of Western policy in the region. However, the war in Afghanistan caused the country to become insecure for al-Qaeda, and they scattered more than before in other countries of the region. The Iraq war also conducted part of these forces to Iraq to fight the Americans. Al-Qaeda has been struggling to rebuild itself all around the world, including western countries, since September 11, taking its flexible network structure into account and has put new tactics on its agenda. The present article examines the ideology and structure of this organization and the changes and continuity of its behavioral pattern and its operation.

In the intricate geopolitical landscape of Afghanistan, attaining sustainable security remains an evolving challenge fraught with complex dynamics and critical transitions. This study utilizes Fuzzy Analytic Hierarchy Process techniques to systematically elucidate the myriad determinants shaping Afghanistan's security paradigm. Our meticulous examination foregrounds political and social factors as paramount in this multifaceted terrain. Politically, fostering greater regional cooperation, strategic international relations policies, and consolidating the political will of ruling elites emerge as pivotal. Economically, priority rests on catalyzing poverty alleviation and spurring intense developmental drive depicted as ‘economic jihad’. Socially, augmenting solidarity across ethnic and religious divides and encouraging public participation in security are indispensable. Culturally, amplifying educational standards and nurturing trust in governance prove critical. The Taliban takeover marked a profound shift, necessitating reevaluating security paradigms and amplifying Iran’s strategic role in diplomatic engagement and humanitarian aid to moderate Taliban policies and support Afghan stability. By unraveling the complex interplay of factors spanning political, economic, social and cultural dimensions, this study provides invaluable insights to inform context-specific policies and strategies to advance Afghanistan’s multifaceted peacebuilding needs within a holistic framework prioritizing political stability, economic upliftment, social cohesion and regional cooperation underpinned by human rights and inclusive governance.

This paper investigates the intricacies of crafting historical narratives within secondary school textbooks in Afghanistan throughout the past century. Employing critical discourse analysis, the study scrutinizes five compelling examples illuminating the complex interplay between historiography, political ideologies, and artistic subjectivity in shaping students’ conception of national identity. The first case centers on the invention of fictional historical figures like Amir Kror that link Afghan lineage to powerful dynasties, but lack scholarly rigor and threaten social cohesion. Second, the analysis explores identity distortions woven into textbook images that portray figures like Genghis Khan with distinctly Afghan features, blurring historical accuracy. Third, it highlights methodological limitations and potential regional biases that cloud academic debates on the origins of dynasties like the Kartids. Fourth, the construction of demographic averages regarding ethnicity and religion without empirical basis raises concerns about perpetuating damaging stereotypes. Finally, the ubiquitous name “Afghanistan” itself reveals imbalanced emphases on particular eras, shaping modern conceptions of nationhood. Collectively, these five examples underscore the need for responsible scholarship and factual precision in history education to foster authentic engagement with Afghanistan’s rich and diverse heritage. As the curriculum shapes students’ notions of identity and selfhood, commitment to academic accountability and balanced historiography becomes essential to nurturing inclusive discourse and national cohesion.

Tourism is one of the most important sectors of the world economy. Yet, despite having promising touristic attractions, such as pristine nature and ancient historical monuments, Afghanistan lacks a proper plan and infrastructure for tourism development. Although political issues have been the most significant barriers to developing tourism, the lack of correct understanding and introduction of Afghanistan's potentials has also played an important role in the backlog of the tourism sector. This study attempts to introduce the cities that have the potential to attract international tourists. First, the influential factors in attracting international tourists were discussed using library research. In the next step, the prioritization of Afghanistan's historical cities was carried out with the aim of attracting international tourists using expert assessment and the VIKOR technique. According to the findings of this study, the criteria for attracting international tourists are classified into four groups: a) socio-cultural factors, b) natural conditions, c) accommodation and equipment infrastructures, and d) communication and information infrastructures. The top seven cities in Afghanistan are Herat, Kabul, Mazar-i-Sharif, Kandahar, Bamyan, Ghazni, and Jalalabad.