GEOPOLITICS QUARTERLY
Year:2008 | Volume:4 | Issue:1 (11)|Papers Count:11

The US declared goals for its military attack on Afghanistan and Iraq are in consistent with deployment of power tools to resolve the challenges and to produce geopolitical balance in the region, although the US practical measures implied different signs.  In reaction to military measures, different factions criticized this strategy and policy, for they have posed various threats to the US. Joseph Nai and Collin maintain that application of hard power not only does not lead to stability and security, but also intensify regional crises. They believe that there is a bilateral relationship between Geopolitics of Balance and Soft Balance. It means the more application of military power the more regional imbalance which will prepare the grounds for spread of public crisis. The theoretical framework of this paper is based on the neoliberal approaches of Joseph Nai, The hypothesis of this paper is: the more application of unilateral hard power by the US, more grounds will be prepared for regional conflict. contradiction and challenge generate in the region , therefore multilateralism and confidence-building are prerequisite to regional balance. The Persian Gulf region which involves geopolitical implications in international politics can enjoy regional balance and stability only if it is controlled through soft patterns on the other hand and if measures like preemptive wars are not deployed. On the contrary the deployment of patterns like organization of regional security, confidence-building regime and regional coalitions to confront external threats will be useful.

Water is a crucial element which is vital for production of foodstuff, growth of economy and animal breeding. Although 71% of the surface of globe is covered by water, only 0.86 % of available water body is accessible for man’s use. Nowadays such issues like baby boom, improvement of standards of life and health, urban development, expansion of industries, agriculture and other sectors have tremendously increased water consumption so that water consumption compared to early years of the 20th century has increased 17 times while the figure compared to three centuries ago is 45 times. The Middle East is located in the dry belt region and enjoys only 1% of available potable water while 5% of world population reside in this area. This amount of water is mainly utilized jointly while more that 50% of the said population live in common basin. This situation has created serious challenges for utilization of these scarce resources. The current paper is an attempt to review the case of hydro-politics in the Middle East in 2025 in the areas of Tigris and Euphrates Basins, Jordan and Nile Rivers. The findings and conclusions of this research demonstrated that the high rate of baby boom and fresh water decrement in the region besides hydro resource constraints shall produce challenges and competitions specifically in the Jordan River banks.

Question about integration and alliance in foreign policy is considered as one of the most important questions in international studies. From this point of view many of the studies in international relations is based on the effort to realize why and how some of the states unite with each other. Despite different studies in various paradigms in international relations, it seems that most of the international relations theories build a consensus on the matter that alliance is the reaction to domestic or foreign threats. According to these theories alliance can be considered as formal or informal cooperation among two or several states which allied states commit to take coordinated position in political, economy and security areas. Meanwhile and from the other hand the Chinese leadership gradually gives more emphasis to its international responsibility. As a matter of fact, Chinese President Hu Jintao has in 2008 on many occasions stated that after thirty years of reform, the relationship between China and the world has changed profoundly. China has become an important member of the international society, and China is willing to fulfill its international responsibilities. Gradual increase in economical and political power of People Republic of China has caused some Iranian decision makers to think that they can illustrate and experience strategic relations with PRC. Although there are still different perspectives about China’s position in international system, but the common aspect of all these perspectives is that if China can continue evolving with it’s current rate, until 2020 it will transform into a complete superpower. From this point of view it is obvious that the alliance between Islamic .Republic of Iran and People Republic of China can grant great achievement for Iran. The core question of this paper is: If both countries I.R.I and P.R.C can enter strategic alliance together or not? Paper assumes that China and the Iran’s preferences and interests in developing their bilateral relations are driven by the concerns of political strategy and economic gains. In order to explain how and why these countries came to have particular preferences, this paper used the approaches called ‘realism’ and ‘liberalism’, two of the dominant theories of International Relations. The reason to choose these two theories is that we study both political and economic aspects and these two theoretical perspectives deal with these aspects in different ways. Realism and Neo-realism puts an emphasis on politics and liberalism and neo-liberalism stresses economy. Finally the paper will show that according integration and alliance theories in realism and liberalism approach Iran and China do not have the essential quality to enter a strategic alliance.

In the past few years, the discovery and designing of small world and scale free  model of networks has stimulated a great deal of interest in studying complex networks which has led to dramatic advances in this emerging and active field of research. In this regard networks are a way of mapping the interconnectivity of objects. In international relations these objects are regions. Therefore this framework can provide new and more general insight into the evolution of regional studies. In this regard regions are only one of the nodes that are linked to each other by communication and constitute a network. Principally regional study is one of the new issue areas in international relations that incrementally increase its importance. But regional order has been changed by density of communication in new international system. In new era, actors and elements of system are connected to each other by communication. Therefore the central issue is as to how we can analyze region and its processes. The present article addresses regional order in new international system and maintains that traditional paradigms are dysfunctional and should be substituted by network approach. Second section of article  analyzes the network by cyclical theories: including world economy, transition of power, long cycle and hegemonic stability.

With the Cold War winding, the signs of geopolitics have demonstrated that instability and security crisis in the Persian Gulf have increased. The breakout of the Second War in the Persian Gulf (1991), the US war against Afghanistan (2001) and occupation of Iraq (2003) have demonstrated that Saul Cohen’s shatter belt theory can be applied to the region. The countries in the Persian Gulf have faced this situation. These countries need building pluralistic security community, confidence-building regimes and transition from security deconstructions to make a stable regional security. The main question of the present paper is: How can the region pass through the challenges of shatter belt? The hypothesis of the present paper is: The region can pass through the challenges of shatter belt through developing a cooperative security pattern.Besides reviewing the materialization of cooperative security, attempts have been made in the present paper to come up with indicators of shatter belt theory. Hence, it is proposed that multilateral participation of regional actors, increasing the capacity of reciprocation and evaluation of preventive diplomacy should be established among the region.

The probable membership of Turkey in the European Union,  proposed in the form of a geopolitical scenario, will improve Iran’s geopolitical situation. This is the main hypothesis of the present paper which is based on nine variables. These variables analyzed in comparison with the traditional geopolitical indexes of Turkey are as follows: The improvement and enforcement of Islamic world interrelationship, the possibility of improvement of relations between Iran and EU, more security in Iranian borders, increase in economic investment in Iran, easy access to trans-regional markets, increase in importance of energy in Iran, weakening the triangle of the United States, Turkey and Israel; The settlement of the Kurdish crisis; The probability of Iran’s Membership in the EU and the decline of Pan-Turkism. These developments that are the outcome of modern geopolitical scenario are in the direction of creation of geopolitical opportunities for the traditional geopolitics of Turkey that is essentially planned to challenge Iran’s geopolitical situation.

Although political system of every country determines its management system, it is not possible to run a country without dividing it into smaller units. The capital, periphery and boundaries of political-administrative divisions are three effective parameters. The city of Karaj is one of the suburbs of Tehran, with a large population and three districts of Asara, Central Karaj, and Eshtehard. The major chunk of the population is concentrated in the Central Karaj, which can be divided into smaller units for more suitable access of the residents to administrative services. However, the selection of the central unit faces vigorous competition between different units and hence this selection must not lead to social tension. In the present paper attempts have been made to study the feasibility of selection of the most suitable sites for the central district of the new units through using such techniques as GIS. The required data have been collected from satellite photos or remote sensing. Also analysis of access to determination of the central unit in GIS space became possible and finally decision was made for the analysis of the best access in GIS space.  The findings of the present study show that there is possibility of establishing only one district in the region, hence it is necessary to establish only one central district. Analysis of the multivariable scenarios showed that the best decision for give more weight to township is centrality of Mohammad Shahr, while Mahdasht comes next, scoring the highest points.