1st Edition

Geopolitics of the New Middle East Perspectives from Inside and Outside

Edited By Şaban Kardaş, Bülent Aras Copyright 2024

    This edited book takes a critical look at the geopolitics of the broader Middle East and North Africa (MENA) region. It scrutinizes some of the perennial issues shaping the regional security agenda, as well as the emerging geopolitical trends in the wake of a decade of turmoil triggered by the demands for political and economic reforms. The contributors explore the geopolitical implications of the structural transformation process in the MENA region and beyond, which has unleashed destabilizing forces and multifaceted conflicts, with the involvement of many local, regional and global actors. They also look at how some of the regional actors have reacted to the risks and security challenges produced by the wave of instability and conflicts, and conducted their foreign policy in this volatile period of fluid alliances. Other contributors explore the roles and perspectives of major extra-regional actors, delving deeper into how they have adjusted their policies towards the emergence of a new order and reshuffling of alignments. This book will be of interest to researchers and advanced students of politics, international relations, and political geography. It was originally published as a special issue of the Journal of Balkan and Near Eastern Studies.

    Introduction—Geopolitics of the New Middle East: Perspectives from Inside and Outside

    Bülent Aras and Şaban Kardaş

    1. Europe and the ‘New’ Middle East: Geopolitical Shifts and Strategic Choices

    Silvia Colombo and Eduard Soler i Lecha

    2. Russia and the New Middle East

    Leonid Issaev

    3. China and New Middle East

    Bingbing Wu

    4. Iran and the New Geopolitics of the Middle East: In Search of Equilibrium

    Hassan Ahmadian

    5. The Second Succession in the Islamic Republic of Iran: Change or Continuity?

    Mahjoob Zweiri and Aljohara AlObaidan

    6. Revisionism and Resecuritization of Turkey's Middle East Policy: A Neoclassical Realist Explanation

    Şaban Kardaş

    7. The Unbridgeable Gulf: Applying Bennett’s Model of Analysis to the 2017 Gulf Crisis

    Majed Mohammed Hassan Al-Ansari

    8. Has the Arab Spring Spread to the Caucasus and Central Asia? Explaining Regional Diffusion and Authoritarian Resistance

    Bülent Aras and Lacin Idil Oztig

    Biography

    Şaban Kardaş is Research Professor at Gulf Studies Center, Qatar University, currently on leave from the Department of Political Science and International Relations at TOBB ETU.

    Bülent Aras is Adjunct Professor at Gulf Studies Center, Qatar University, Research Director at Center for International Policy Research.