فصلنامه بین المللی ژئوپلیتیک
سال شانزدهم شماره 1 (پیاپی 57، بهار 1399)

Intrduction: 

During these decades, some concepts like “strategic alliance”, “strategic coalition”, “strategic participation” and “strategic competition” have been used in media and diplomatic literature that all of them are defined in the framework of “strategic relations”. This research is intended to expound strategic relations at the first step and to investigate the relation between this concept and the four above mentioned concepts and also to extract geopolitical factors of strategic relations at the second step. 

Methoddology :

The research method adopted here is based on induction and its tactics like library findings,interview with specialists and inferential analysis are used regarding the requirements.

Competition and cooperation in the geopolitical theories: from geopolitical point of view, competition is a kind of group conflict in international system which requires the existence of the states, powers or organizations which are similar to the states and are taken different forms based on the situations of the historical evolution. Geopolitical point of view toward competition roots is close to realist school in international relations. During the history reaching national interest is known as jumping-off place in the competition of powers in international relations arena, and regarding that reaching geopolitical goals are among the most objective and tangible interests of a state interests, the way of reaching these interests passes from geopolitical competitions path. Strategic relations as relations which are based on cooperation and competition (etymology): the literature review and interview results show that strategic relation is: an spectrum of bi-or-multi faceted relations which can have a cooperation-based or competition-based nature or both of these natures and includes different political, military, economic and military areas and are seen vital due to some causes like “including strategic action”, “activism of strategic actors”, “having strategic consequences” and “occurring in strategic domains”. The word “relation” can include both positive (good) and negative (bad) relations. Hence, the concept of strategic relation includes any interaction which comprise of relations ranging from good to bad based on competition or cooperation provided that it is in connection with national interest or security.

 Analysis: 

International relations and interactions may be evaluated as strategic due to the following reasons: these relations are strategic, because they follow vital goals; being strategic is the result of interaction in the domain of the interests which are in connection with national security; relations and interactions between the units are seen strategic due to the ability of actors to affect the system. The actors can have strategic weight due to having high level of national power, strategic geographic location, resources or monopoly of a goods, historical, cultural and civilization values. For some decades, strategic relations had been seen as strategic alliance, namely the word “relation” was only correspond with cooperative relations. Hence, when it was claimed that the actors have strategic relations, it was meant the alliance between the two actors, and the definitions did not go far from this concept. This means that the nature of the relation and competition was absent as a reality in the interaction in the scientific literature. As it is expounded in this research, strategic relation is a relation that the element of the competition is active in it. Competition is a kind of relation and institutionalized issue in the structure and nature of the international system.

Concluding:

Strategic relation has a geopolitical nature in both cooperative and competitive natures and the roots of cooperation and competition is expounded by geopolitics, but in other level and more accurately in the definition of indexes of strategic relation, strategic geopolitics of the states are determinant. The use of geopolitics in this stage is that the actors define their foreign relations based on the perceptions of interests, priorities and geopolitical lines of national security. Namely, geopolitics forms the formation of politicians’ perceptions towards national interests of the state in relation with surrounding area, and it is natural that it forms orientation of foreign policy of the actors that one of these orientations is having strategic relations with the actors.

Intrduction:

 Recent geopolitical revolution in the Middle East called Arab spring; especially the start of Syrian geopolitical crisis in 2011 has led to another conflict and crisis in Levant security subsystem in the Middle East. In addition to being an internal crisis as a result of the special situation of this country and its conflicts between the governance and its opponents as the internal role players, the crisis in Syria has become a geopolitical crisis and a context of geopolitical relations between the regional and trans-regional powers. The purpose of the present study is to identify the reasons for forming a competitive-intervening relations model of the geopolitical relations between Iran as a supporter of Assad's governance and Turkey, Saudi Arabia, and Israel as supporters of the opposition group. For this reason, we intend to find the most important geographical and geopolitical categories in forming the competitive-intervening relations model of regional powers in this crisis based on the significance and relations of these categories with each other. To this end, we proceed with the following hypothesis the formation basis of which will be elaborated in the methodology section. It seems that the competitive-intervening relations of Iran with Turkey, Saudi Arabia, and Israel as the regional powers present in the geopolitical crisis of Syria has been formed under the influence of geographical factors, ideological factors, geopolitical codes, geostrategic factors, geo-economic factors, regional geopolitical system conditions, and world geopolitical system conditions.

Metodology: 

The present study is a mixed methods approach with an exploratory purpose using a model formation and taxonomy approach. The Grounded theory was used for the qualitative part of the study. As to the quantitative part, the study used Structural Equation Modeling in addition to Smart PLS software in order to strengthen the findings.

Geographical factors,As identified in the examined model of the study, geographical factors with a path coefficient of 0.830 has the most impact on the competitive-intervening model between Iran, Saudi Arabia, and Israel in the geopolitical crisis in Syria and these factors are ethnical, borderline and regional, emigrational, hydro political, and environmental categories. Geostrategic factors, Geostrategic factors with a path coefficient of 0.819 in the examined model of the study are the second influential factors in the competitive-intervening geopolitical relations model of regional powers in the geopolitical crisis of Syria. This includes the two categories of geographical situation of Syria and partial situation of this country. Geopolitical codes, Geopolitical codes with a path coefficient Of 0.812 in the examined model of the study are the third factors to influence the competitive-intervening geopolitical relations model of regional powers in the geopolitical crisis. This factor, in the qualitative model of the study, includes the two categories of internal and foreign policies. Ideological factors, According to the examined model of the study, the fourth influential variable in competitive-intervening geopolitical relations model in the Syrian crisis is the ideological factors with a path coefficient of 0.794 embracing religious categories, sacred places, and discourse categories. World geopolitical system, The fifth factor influencing the competitive-intervening geopolitical relations model in the Syrian crisis is the world geopolitical system conditions with a path coefficient of 0.773 including the categories of world powers’ interventions in the crisis, and the wolrd powers’ relations with the regional powers in geopolitical crisis of Syria. Regional geopolitical system, Regional geopolitical system with a path coefficient 0.743 is the sixth influential factor in the competitive-intervening geopolitical relations model in the Syrian crisis. It includes the two concepts of regional competition of the powers present in the geopolitical crisis of Syria and partial equality of power levels of these countries in this crisis. Geo economic factors, According to the examined model of the study, geo economic factors with a path coefficient of 0.719 are the last influential factors on the competitive-intervening geopolitical relations model in the Syrian crisis. These factors include energy resource categories and economic interests.

At the level of regional powers, the crisis in Syria is influenced by the relations between Iran as the most important regional ally of Bashar al-Assad's governance, and Turkey, Saudi Arabia, and Israel as the regional opposition of Assad’s governance. These relations are in place in a competitive-intervening way and are under the influence of different geographical and geopolitical categories. The study of the impact of each of these categories on the regional power relations in the Syrian geopolitical crisis cannot provide a complete understanding of the relations between these powers in the Syrian geopolitical crisis. Therefore, explanation of the regional powers’ relations in this crisis must be provided concerning the relation of these categories as well as their importance and in the framework of a single structural model. Influential categories in regional powers relation’s model in the Syrian geopolitical crisis are geographic and geopolitical stable factors that are directly related to national and long-term national interests as well as the national life of these countries. Each of the Syrian crisis regional parties seeks to excel in its geographical and geopolitical factors and to prevent the dominance of their rivals over these factors; therefore, none of the regional parties involved in the current crisis come into terms from their positions regarding the geopolitical crisis in Syria. This situation has led to the formation of a competitive-intervening model in the Syrian geopolitical crisis as to Iran's relations with Turkey, Saudi Arabia and Israel. This has complicated the situation in Syria and led to the continuation of the crisis thereby making the efforts and negotiations to resolve the crisis and the end of the conflict pointless and unavailing.

Intrduction:

 During these decades, some concepts like “strategic alliance”, “strategic coalition”, “strategic participation” and “strategic competition” have been used in media and diplomatic literature that all of them are defined in the framework of “strategic relations”. This research is intended to expound strategic relations at the first step and to investigate the relation between this concept and the four above mentioned concepts and also to extract geopolitical factors of strategic relations at the second step.

 Methoddology :

The research method adopted here is based on induction and its tactics like library findings,interview with specialists and inferential analysis are used regarding the requirements.

Competition and cooperation in the geopolitical theories: from geopolitical point of view, competition is a kind of group conflict in international system which requires the existence of the states, powers or organizations which are similar to the states and are taken different forms based on the situations of the historical evolution. Geopolitical point of view toward competition roots is close to realist school in international relations. During the history reaching national interest is known as jumping-off place in the competition of powers in international relations arena, and regarding that reaching geopolitical goals are among the most objective and tangible interests of a state interests, the way of reaching these interests passes from geopolitical competitions path. Strategic relations as relations which are based on cooperation and competition (etymology): the literature review and interview results show that strategic relation is: an spectrum of bi-or-multi faceted relations which can have a cooperation-based or competition-based nature or both of these natures and includes different political, military, economic and military areas and are seen vital due to some causes like “including strategic action”, “activism of strategic actors”, “having strategic consequences” and “occurring in strategic domains”. The word “relation” can include both positive (good) and negative (bad) relations. Hence, the concept of strategic relation includes any interaction which comprise of relations ranging from good to bad based on competition or cooperation provided that it is in connection with national interest or security.

Today, considering the growing importance of the global cities and achieving the status of the global city have become a major issue in the struggle of big cities. Countries need global cities to participate in the global economic scene and to attract capital and resources in the highly competitive world to play an active role in the global network of cities. The global cities are strategic places that play the role as the global economic knot and are considered to be very important places to show political and economic power. Considering the role of the global cities in countries' development identifying the cities that have the potential to become a global city is of great importance. The entry of new cities into the world of global acting and playing a role in the international arena needs to move in certain ways and means, therefore, at the global level, any big city does not become a global city in terms of population or economy. Few studies have been conducted on the theoretical foundations of the issue and in particular the role of capitalist economics and the flow of space in the emergence of global cities. This research explains the theoretical role of the capitalist economy and the space of flows in the formation of global cities, and seeks to answer this question: on what space and grounds do global cities find emerging and role-playing opportunity?

In terms of its objectives the present study is a basic research type and in terms of its nature and methodology it is a descriptive-analytic. The data are gathered through library resources. Qualitative analysis method is employed for analyzing the findings. The qualitative method also is used to final conclusion.

The transformations in the context of capitalism that have taken place in the global economy in the last three decades are accompanied with a shift to services and financing. This transformation has brought renewed importance to the major cities as the place of some of the special activities and functions. At the current stage, the world economy is precisely the blend of global dispersion of economic activity and global integration under the conditions of continued ownership and economic control, which has contributed to the strategic role of some of the major cities. These cities are the core of advanced services and distant communication technologies and are essential for the implementation and management of global economic operations. Global cities are inherently tied up by building technology infrastructure that forms the basis of what Manuel Castells calls "space of flows." Global cities are important nets that twist part of the material infrastructure of these flows. They are like places and physical points that link the space of flows to the material world. They provide a unique and irreplaceable place that enables the social infrastructure and technology to form the cornerstone of globalization. The linking of global cities with information-based capitalism, as the control and command centers and the location of advanced manufacturing service companies, is necessarily based on the material infrastructure, which facilitates the economy where value is increasingly derived from information. The simultaneous emergence of the network of information and communication technologies has been fundamental in the success of capitalist capital. The combination and entanglement of the capitalist system and the technological infrastructure of the information era provided space for the accumulation of capital. Capital accumulation is in fact the centerpiece of the capitalist system and the contemporary development of capitalism, where global cities are its main place and headquarters.

The transition from Fordism to the post-Fordism and its flexible production has led to the breakdown and distribution of production in a globalized world. In this context, global cities have become the main destination for the command and hosting of the largest multinational companies manufacturing and advanced global services. The globalization of the economy and the formation of a global free market have created a vast and interconnected network of international trade exchanges that cover the world. The space of flows is shaped and formed in the context of the numerous links of the global economy, relations and connections that have been built along space and parallel to the information-based economy. In general, cities are considered as the national subsystem of the countries and cannot independently enter the global and transnational scale. For being globalized, cities must first become powerful cities at the national level, and then enter internationally through the mediation and infrastructure that the country's political and geopolitical environment provides. When cities become a global city, on the one hand, their locational space is within the national space of the countries, and on the other hand, they play a role in the form of the space of flows and the global network society as a nodal place in global exchanges and relationships, and become an actor in the world, that are in command of a huge amount of economic and global exchanges. The empowerment of global cities has made them to be a player in the global politics and economy. In such a space, countries are working to bring representatives of them into the network to enjoy the benefits of this massive inter-city and inter-country communication network. Countries seeking globalization and global markets are striving to bring more cities into their world-wide network of cities and thereby gaining geopolitical power and position.

Historically, the Navy has been one of the pillars of power assessment of countries, and for this reason, the importance of this force has been taken into consideration, whether at applied level by the politicians or at the theoretical level by strategists and thinkers. Therefore, this force has always been one of the main pillars of the exercise of power by the world powers, and geostrategy of many countries is defined on its basis. Iran is one of the oldest countries with naval forces and has used it for its goals. But the Iranian navy has fluctuated and has not had growing on steady process. In the modern era, especially over the past decade, Iran's navy has succeeded in achieving relative success, and if continued, could become one of the most important bases to Exercise of Iran Power. Therefore, in this paper, Iran's Navy has been studied to examine its impact on hard and soft powers and thus its smart power.

Here, the method of data collection is based on library and documentary findings. In this way, information are gathered by referring to real and virtual resources. Then, the collected data are analyzed by qualitative- inferential method. The

The results showed that Iran's navy based on the definition of a new strategy for the development of the navy of Iran, using two principles of military management, namely tactical and strategic force, have affected hard and soft power of Iran, and ultimately, its smart power. IRGCN, as a tactical naval force, with its military and constabulary roles has provided the basis for exercising Iran's hard power in the maritime areas of Iran, and IRIN as a strategic naval force, with its diplomatic role has provided Iran's soft sea power in world seas. The combination of these two types of maritime power has formed the maritime smart power of Iran. On the one hand, given type of weapons, coastal defense, asymmetric warfare and maritime surveillance, it forms exercising IRGCN’s hard power and on the other hand, exercise IRIN’ssoft power by maritime diplomacy, cooperation diplomacy, showing the Flag and deterrence diplomacy and etc. From the combination of these two dimensions of naval power, the maritime smart power of Iran is formed, which can be analyzed on the basis of the following dimensions: Understanding of the importance of maritime theaters, proper Fleet distribution, expand of the maritime territoriality, increase in maritime strategic depth, understanding of the use of dual navy’s equipment, understanding of the geo-economics status of the sea, develop a variety of maritime diplomacy, approach threats to rivals, cognition of geostrategic enemy, protection of marine assets, especially in the Persian Gulf and the Strait of Hormuz, reduce of overlapping of sea area of dual forces, creation of a defense line to prevent threats, delay operations, fight against piracy, Navy management based on the principle of unity in plurality and plurality in unity, reduce of potential vulnerability in battle with the enemy, far defense, knowhow of use of conventional and unconventional naval war, define appropriate military tactic and strategy for the Navy, establishment of new naval bases, maritime safe zone. So in a schematic way we can represent the chain of Iran's use of smart maritime power as follows: understanding the maritime theaters to exercise of power understanding the balance of power between hard and soft Navy solutions and different degree of intensity these can appear understanding the Institutional Framework for the use of smart power on the Navies creating unity and partnership of the two navies implementation of maritime policies and strategies understanding the goals.

Iran, due to its maritime and strategic position, can achieve a highly efficient navy by planning and access to the appropriate equipment and show its maritime power and authority at regional and trans-regional levels. Therefore, recognizing this fact, Iran, by defining a strategic maritime strategy, tries to take advantage of this capability and be more present in the maritime arena. Analyzing the performance of the Iranian Navy, reorganizing and defining a strategic navy indicates Iran's naval ability to increase hard and soft power and ultimately Iran's smart power through tactical and strategic navies. Over the past decade, Iran has been able to use its navy to exercise hard and soft power and ultimately smart power in green and blue waters. The tactical naval and strategic naval, according to their mission areas, respectively, have the task of applying hard and soft power in green and blue water, and their combination have formed the maritime smart power of Iran. Expanding and strengthening the strategic navy can be a way to break and influence the Western-Arab containment (Western-Arab NATO) defined against Iran. By expanding the navy Iran can create a threat and expand the battlefield in several ways and reduce direct pressure on its border. Therefore, this force should consolidate its presence in the maritime arena, especially in the Mediterranean, Red Sea and Gulf of Aden, and seek to develop its maritime smart power. Because Iran needs hard power in green water and soft power in blue water today.

  Introduction:

 Water scarcity threatens the well-being of humans all over the world and caused hydropolitical crisis between the countries. A large number of rivers flow from the land area of more than one country which results in some disputes over using water resources among the countries located in the basins of these rivers. Hirmand river in the east of Iran has such a problem within Iran and Afghanistan and this issue is taken as the main problems between the two countries. There have been many disagreements about the division of the water within Hirmand river. In spite of several attempts which have been made in the past years, the problem has remained unsolved and currently the right of Iran does not seem to be in a favorable condition. 

 Methodology:

In the present study, the problem of water division of Hirmand River is investigated and modeled adopting the game theory approach and a crisis bargaining game. In this study, the equilibrium shares of the two countries of Iran and Afghanistan from the water within Hirmand River are computed considering the opportunity costs resulting from economic and political interdependence, employing the game theory, so that it may lead into a stable agreement between the two countries.

 Result and discussion:

 With regard to the calculated equilibrium shares, it can be concluded that one of the reasons that the agreements between the two countries of Iran and Afghanistan on how to divide the water of the Hirmand River, were unstable and not fully implemented, is that the determined shares for the two countries have not been the equilibrium shares and determined without considering the economic and political interdependence. Also the study demonstrates that when the benefits of Afghanistan from the economic and political relationship with Iran increase, the equilibrium share of Iran from Hirmand’s water rises. In addition when the economic and political interdependence of Iran on Afghanistan increases, the equilibrium share of Iran decreases. So all of the aspects of water division and rationing should be considered using a comprehensive approach and employing new scientific methods, otherwise achieving consensus and signing a contract might solve the problem in the short term but cannot solve it forever.

 Introduction:

 Due to Syria crisis after 2011, the Middle East has been affected by the presence of large regional and global powers in this region. Meanwhile, the United States was the first metaphorical actor to enter this area. The US former President Barack Obama supported a pro-oppositions of the central government of Syria. US-backed forces were called the Free Army (al-Jaysh al-Suri al-Bakhr). Because this archeology depended on radical Islam, Washington had to revise its strategy. Since 2014, it was found a new policy of the United States, calling a strategic alliance with the Syrian Kurds and tolerance of the Russian-Iranian axis and the rule of Bashar al-Assad.With the election of Donald Trump as the US president, doubts were raised about the US security strategy toward the Middle East.

 Methodology:

 Due to these interpretations and in response to the current research question, Donald Trump's foreign policy has been analyzed in the Middle East and ultimately, the US foreign policy approach and its impact on the national and regional security of Iran have been raised for the Iranian diplomacy system. 

 Analysis and conclusions:

 The central government of Syria appears to have taken power again, but the present Syria and post-crisis are not like Syria before 2011. Syria was the central axis of Middle East developments alongside Iran, Turkey and Saudi Arabia, but Syria was eliminated by the current transformations and it missed its power cycle in the Middle East. The Trump government is well aware of the erosion of the Syrian government, so it tries to shape the Middle East's security order in the upcoming Syrian regime by isolating Iran as well as using the Kurds that have emerged in Iraq as a new political force in the Middle East since 2003. It is believed that The Trump government is trying to do like the united Iraqi Kurds in Syria to protect the US interests in Syria. Along this, since 2011, Turkey, Iran and Russia have been three main actors in the developments in Syria. The United States is trying to increase its share of the country by creating a balance between Turkey and Syria, but not maximizing its benefits. In sum, Iran plays a major strategic role in the Middle East by pursuing smart diplomacy (a combination of soft and hard power) preventing the implementation of Donald Trump's foreign policy programs in the Middle East centered around the Syrian crisis. In this regard, Iran is in a position to bring Syrian Kurds to Damascus and maintain the Moscow, Tehran and Ankara circles, and reject the Astana Summit, and this is the most important strategy of Tehran that can be taken to counter the security threats of Tramp for the Syrian crisis.