This book offers an original and theoretically rich examination into the dynamics of alliances that great powers and weak states form to defeat threats, such as rebellion or insurgency, within the smaller state’s borders. The author examines contemporary examples of such “internal threat alliances,” including Russia’s collaboration with Syria’s Assad regime to defeat anti-government rebels and U.S. cooperation with Afghanistan’s ruling political elite to combat the Taliban. In each case, t...

Imagine a nation with the highest proportion of women legislators in the world. Imagine a country where a democratically elected president is committed to gender equality and poverty reduction, where urban and rural schools are being wired to the Internet, and where the government is committed to becoming a middle-income country by 2020. Imagine that this country is located in the heart of sub-Saharan Africa and that this progress comes in the wake of one of the 20th century's worst genoci...

This book offers a fresh perspective on the impact of the US intervention in Lebanon in 1982 and the decision-making drivers that led the Reagan Administration into the Lebanese Civil War. Based on newly released archival materials from high level Washington officials such as President Reagan, Secretary of State Shultz and Secretary of Defense Weinberger, it argues that the failure of the Reagan Administration to accurately understand the complex political landscape of the Lebanese Civil W...

This book frames the Armenian-Azerbaijani conflict over Nagorno-Karabakh in the context of European and international security. It is the first book to focus on the politics of the conflict rather than the dispute itself. Since their emergence twenty years ago, this and other “frozen conflicts” of Eurasia have been affected by transformations in European security, and many ways absorbed into an ever fiercer geopolitical struggle for influence. The wars in Georgia and Ukraine brought greate...

Peace support operations are one of the most important tools in the foreign policy of Western democracies. This book is a study of Italian military operations in the last twenty years. Italy's operations are examined through an analysis of parliamentary debates and interviews with leading policy-makers.

This book examines attempts to influence the outcome of the negotiations between Iran and the United States over Iran’s nuclear capabilities. In particular, it focuses on struggles within the United States around public and congressional opinion with regard to the accord. Trying to prevent a successful outcome to the talks became a cottage industry in Washington, with the casino billionaire Sheldon Adelson being just one of those who were pouring millions of dollars into the effort. On the...

This book presents an overview of psycho-social research on the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, presents and analyzes people-to-people activities in the region, and offers new conceptualizations for Israeli-Palestinian co-creation of a grassroots peace and social justice processes.

This book analyzes the origins of conflicts and wars in the Persian Gulf, assesses the common factor(s) that have been their essential fuel, determines their fallout for the political, economic, and human development of the region, and provides insight into how they may be better contained.

This edited volume examines the implications for international development actors of new kinds of terrorism taking place in civil conflicts. The threat from terrorism and violent extremism has never been greater – at least in the global South where the vast majority of violent extremist attacks take place. Some of the most violent extremist groups are also parties to civil conflicts in regions such as the Middle East and the Horn of Africa. But are these groups – especially the violent Isl...

The increased targeting of civilians by militants raises serious and profound questions for policy-makers. Examining conflict in Northern Ireland, Israel and Palestine, this book focuses on ethno-nationalist militant groups and formulates a model to constrain violence against civilians.

This book examines the history of “the Troubles” in Northern Ireland in the 1970s-1990s and compares it with the situation in the Gaza Strip. The book takes as its cue the tragic events in Gaza in July 2014, when Israel launched Operation Protective Edge which began seven weeks of bombardment of Gaza and which led to rocket attacks by the Palestinians on Israel. In all over 2,200 people were killed. The book provides a brief history of the violence in both countries. It then analyzes the N...

Starting with the historical development of constitutional government in Turkey, the author analyzes the basic characteristics of the present Turkish Constitution (that of 1982), the fundamental structure of the state (the legislature, executive, and the judiciary), the special role of the Constitutional Court, and the recent efforts at democratizing constitutional reforms.