WarCoercion in the MiddleEast

3 Credits · Level: Graduate, Undergraduate

Realism, as an established school of thought, suggests that war is the dominating feature of international politics. The emergence of the contemporary Arab world coincided with the outbreak of the Arab-Israeli conflict. Arab countries produced discourses on the “theory” of war in terms of the Clausewitzean notion on the intersection between the employment of “force” and the “political” objectives. In addition, they produced divergent reactions to the “reputation” and “credibility” of threats signaled by their adversaries. These discourses underpinned the “nature” and “scope” of war and “escalation dynamics” that characterized the gravity and severity of the prevailing security dilemma in the Middle East. Within this context, the course is guided by an International Relations perspective. It undertakes a comprehensive review of the theoretical and empirical literature on interstate war. It will examine the leading theories, their key causal variables, the paths or mechanisms through which those variables lead to war. Therefore, the course applies the foundational literature to investigating the puzzles of war initiation, war termination, and the bargaining and coercion models. In doing so, the course will extensively cite Arab scholarly and primary sources to compare and contrast with the dominant western theories.