Social and Behavioral Sciences Commons^™

Cuban Exiles And U.S. Foreign Policy, Caroline Ranawn Mcculloch

FIU Electronic Theses and Dissertations

This dissertation examines the influence of Cuban-American exiles in shaping U.S. foreign policy toward Cuba from the 1980s to the present. The role of Cuban-American interest groups is analyzed within a larger context of U.S. national security objectives, national politics and Cuban politics. Instead of privileging domestic politics or national security politics in explaining Cuban-American influence, as other International Relations theories do, this study argues that Cuban exile politics can best be understood as an expression of subnational interest group power that affects, and is affected by, the shifting dynamics of local, national and global politics. Also, ideological divisions and …

China's Eurasian Foreign Policy: Region-Building Through State-Building Since 1991, Zenel Garcia

FIU Electronic Theses and Dissertations

Since the founding of the People’s Republic of China in 1949, its leaders have been preoccupied with efforts to increase state capacity in order to exercise more effective control over their western frontier by controlling their minority population and generating the conditions for economic development in the area. Although these state-building initiatives have always incorporated an international component, the collapse of the USSR, the transnational characteristics of development, and China’s concern around the challenges of terrorism, separatism, and extremism have necessitated an accompanying region-building project in Eurasia. Using a synthesis of the region-building approach and the concept of regionalization, this …

Dynamics Of Iranian-Saudi Relations In The Persian Gulf Regional Security Complex (1920-1979), Nima Baghdadi

FIU Electronic Theses and Dissertations

This dissertation is an exploration of the dynamics of Iranian-Saudi relations from the earliest days of their encounter in the 1920s through 1979 Islamic Revolution in Iran. This is a period in the relations of the two states that has rarely been the subject of intellectual inquiry in the existing literature. This present research provides an analytical historiography of Iranian-Saudi relations with an aim to examine the elements constituting the dynamics of their relations. This is attained by contextualizing the milestones of Iranian-Saudi relations, triangulating historical accounts to identify the narrative among alternatives that best fits the meaningful causal processes …

Foreign Policy Evaluation And The Utility Of Intervention, Graham Slater

FIU Electronic Theses and Dissertations

This dissertation identifies and explains the factors contributing to the presence and severity of U.S. foreign-policy blunders, or gross errors in strategic judgment resulting in significant harm to the national interest, since the Second World War. It hypothesizes that the grand strategy of preponderance and the overestimation of military power to transform the politics of other states have precipitated U.S. foreign-policy blunders since 1945. Examining the Vietnam War and Iraq War as case studies, it focuses on underlying conditions in the American national identity and the problematic foreign policy decision-making (FPDM) that corresponds to this bifurcated hypothesis, termed the overestimation/preponderance …

Geopolitical Account Of Iran's Ties With Non-State Actors Under The Shah: 1958-1979, Arash Reisinezhad

FIU Electronic Theses and Dissertations

Late in 2004, King Abdullah of Jordan coined a controversial phrase that still dominates the heart of the geopolitics of the Middle East: The Shia Crescent. “If pro-Iran parties or politicians dominate the new Iraqi government, a new ‘crescent’ of dominant Shia movements or governments stretching from Iran into Iraq, Syria, and Lebanon could emerge to alter the traditional balance of power between the two main Islamic sects and pose new challenges to U.S. interests and allies. What the King of Jordan saw as a threat, Iran saw as the bedrock of its newfound regional power. However, what the King …

Us Foreign Policy Toward Azerbaijan, 1991-2015, Galib Bashirov

FIU Electronic Theses and Dissertations

This dissertation aims to investigate the sources of United States (US) foreign policy toward Azerbaijan by examining the relative impact of domestic, geostrategic and structural factors in explaining US foreign policy toward the country. Azerbaijan is one of the newly independent states that emerged after the collapse of the Soviet Union. Despite its small size, the country’s strategic location, vast oil and natural gas reserves, and its conflict with Armenia over the Nagorno- Karabakh region elevated its importance and made Azerbaijan the center of interest for great powers. As the sole superpower after the end of the Cold War, the …

Achieving And Maintaining Food Security In The Prc: The Impact On Foreign Policy, Paul D. Rittenhouse

FIU Electronic Theses and Dissertations

The purpose of this dissertation is to examine how the People’s Republic of China has used domestic and foreign policy to achieve and maintain food security. This is a formidable task for the PRC given that it has 20% of the world’s population and only 7% of its arable land. It has been made more formidable by domestic policy errors and its changing position within the international system.

The PRC has evolved from a Marxist revisionist state to one that mixes state capitalism and free enterprise and has become a combination of revisionist and status quo. Such changes lend …

History, Identity Politics And Securitization: Religion's Role In The Establishment Of Indian-Israeli Diplomatic Relations And Future Prospects For Cooperation, Michael Mclean Bender

FIU Electronic Theses and Dissertations

This dissertation aims to provide an understanding of the historical and contemporary dynamics of India’s foreign policy towards Israel within the context of religious identity from 1947 to 2015. A historical analysis of the relationship between India and Israel exhibits the ways that religious identity has served as a primary factor impeding as well as facilitating relations between the two nations.

The analysis was done within the context of the historical Hindu-Muslim relationship in India and how the legacy of this relationship, in India’s effort to maintain positive relations with the Arab-Muslim world, worked to inhibit relations with Israel prior …

The World Of The United States Foreign Policy Elite: A Case Study Of The U.S. Foreign Policy Think Tanks' Debates In The General Elections Of 2004, 2008, And 2012, Seyed Hamidreza Serri

FIU Electronic Theses and Dissertations

American foreign policy think tanks are an important part of the American foreign policy elite. By gathering data, publishing research, and reaching out to the public and government, think tanks help set the public debate agenda. The question I asked was whether these American foreign policy think tanks exhibited a shared worldview during the past three election cycles. I analyzed 7,000 documents (half a million verbs) published by the seven American foreign policy think tanks active in the three general elections of 2004, 2008, and 2012: the American Enterprise Institute, the Brookings Institution, the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, the …

Identity, Ideology, And Cinema: Making Sense Of Japan's Foreign And Security Policies In The 1950s And 2000s, Yukari Ito

FIU Electronic Theses and Dissertations

Japan is an important ally of the United States–the world’s third biggest economy, and one of the regional great powers in Asia. Making sense of Japan’s foreign and security policies is crucial for the future of peace and stability in Northeast Asia, where the possible sources of conflict such as territorial disputes or the disputes over Japan’s war legacy issues are observed.

This dissertation explored Japan’s foreign and security policies based on Japan’s identities and unconscious ideologies. It employed an analysis of selected Japanese films from the late 1940s to the late 1950s, as well as from the late 1990s …