نشریه مطالعات اقتصاد سیاسی بین الملل
سال پنجم شماره 2 (پاییز و زمستان 1401)

Since the 1990s, a political turn called "political economy" has been visible in development studies. The main purpose of this turning was to pay attention to the political components and specific characteristics of each society. Over time, however, it becomes clear that this new approach has not been successful. In particular, this turning does not address the issue of change and how it is realized and continued as the most important issue of development. So many questions in this regard has remained unanswered. Accordingly, this article seeks to answer the reasons for this failure and how to complete this political turn by examining the theories and literature in this field in a qualitative manner. Our hypothesis in response to this question is that "the focus of the political economy approach on the proper design of institutions and incentives stems from a technical approach that ignores the difficult political process of their regulation. Emphasizing the role of the agent, power, ideas, and generally a deeper political analysis to explain change can provide the theoretical framework needed to pay attention to developmental leadership and complete this turn." The findings of this study showed that the use of new theories in the form of the third phase of institutionalism in development studies can provide the necessary contexts and tools to consider the role of political variables in development, especially the role of agency, institutional and political work.

Cooperation among Brazil, Russia, India, China and South Africa (BRICS) has been increasing since the first BRICS meeting (Brazil, Russia, India and China) in 2006, and this group has gradually gained a more important position in the field of international economic issues. In the BRICS group, despite being limited, the members along with China have tried to counter the global hegemonic financial institutions by establishing new financial institutions in the frame of BRICS, One-Belt-One-Road. This study attempts to examine the role of growing China in BRICS and how to change the governance of the global economy and the potential of its independent initiatives for the impact of BRICS on the global economy. On the other hand, China is considered an emerging power that is rapidly improving its position in the international economic order. In such a way that it is likely that this country will become the future hegemonic power of this area. his article tries to answer the question: How did China use BRICS to transform the world economic order in 2009-2020? This paper will show that the diversity of BRICS members limits the use of their potential to change the governance structure of the global economy. It is important to note that the economic policies and internal interests of China, India, and other members of the BRICS are </strong>different, and this makes them have different preferences and positions in the international system.

Examining the relationship between the oil-based economy and politics and the emergence of public dissatisfaction leading to protest movements can reveal significant points in identifying recent revolutions in the Middle East. One of the main elements that facilitate the world economic development is energy. The threat of the world has paved the way for the development of instability and imbalances in energy supply and demand. Thus, energy resources have a fundamental problem that requires an urgent approach for the nations of the world. A country's energy has become a resource that determines a country's ability to influence the world economic trends, outlines, geopolitics, and international relations. The main question that this research seeks to answer is what effect has the Islamic Awakening had on the flow of energy in the world? The findings showed that so far the Islamic Awakening has caused the least disruption to the oil market because the producers of the Persian Gulf and mainly Saudi Arabia have compensated the losses caused by the oil supply. Economically, the disruptions have been largely limited to the countries involved in Islamic Awakening events and have rarely challenged the energy system of the world. The negative consequences of the Middle East Arab governments dependence on oil revenues and foreign aid have played a major role in the emergence of protest movements leading to the Islamic Awakening. The method used in this research is analytical-descriptive, and the main problem of the research has been investigated in the framework of Gilpin's theory of political economy. Also, the data have been collected based on reliable secondary library and internet document sources.

The high consumption and the increasing need of the European Union to import energy, especially from Russia, as the largest owner of gas resources in the world, has caused Moscow to use energy resources as a strategic lever to rebuild its empire and advance the Kremlin's policies towards Brussels. This has caused the security of sources and energy supply routes to be of great importance for Europe. In this regard, Europe has tried to reduce its vulnerability in this issue by diversifying these sources and routes, which has caused Europe to pay special attention to the South Caucasus region. Thus, the present study aims to analyze Europe's concerns about Russia's instrumental use of energy based on the components and indicators of energy security. This study will seek to answer the main question, what is Europe's concern about Russia's instrumental use of energy? The research hypothesis is that the European Union's concern about Russia's monopoly on the energy resources of Central Asia and the Caucasus; and on the one hand, the Kremlin's use of energy as a powerful weapon to advance its political and economic goals towards Europe, has a strategic impact on energy security. and the possibility of jeopardizing the national security of the Union; Therefore, in order to get rid of the crippling dependence on Russian energy sources and ensure high energy security, the Brussels authorities are trying to replace and diversify the imported oil and gas baskets </span>isolating Moscow in the energy market, increasing the bargaining power and helping European to act in regional and international equations. The results showed that Pursuing the policy of diversification and reducing Russia's monopoly on the energy market of the region will lead to greater independence of Europe in energy decisions and policies and the promotion of Europe's power and international status while reducing threats to energy security. The method used in this article is descriptive-analytical.

In recent decades, the role of economic instruments, including economic aid, has been growing in the foreign policy of major powers. In the post-World War II era, the United States became the largest donor of economic aid, and in order to prevent the spread of communism, it gave economic aid to many countries in different regions of the world. Although,</span> the United States has a long history of providing economic aid to other countries, China is also becoming a major donor in recent years. China tries to promote its status as a major power in granting economic aid. The comparative study of the economic aid policy of China and the United States is significant because these two countries play an important role in the international. In this regard, the main question of this research is what are the differences and similarities between the economic aid policy of China and the United States? The findings of the comparison of the economic aid of China and the United States showed that despite the differences in the methods and structures of aid, China and the United States both use the economic aid to grow their influence and achieve their economic, political and geopolitical goals in the regions. However, the US economic aid policy is more transparent than China in terms of the aid granting mechanism. Also, China legitimizes these aids by using the concepts of aid to the global south, while the economic aid of the United States legitimizes it by using concepts such as supporting market-oriented economies, helping democratic governance, and protecting human rights. The method of data collection is secondary sources – the library sources - and the method of the data analysis is comparative.

Iran plays an important role in West Asia due to its abundant natural resources, especially oil. Also, considering the economic importance of France as one of the powers of the European Union, trade relations with this European country in various dimensions, such as employment, security, and expertise in production. This study aims to investigate the trade relationship between Iran and France in the two cases of the existence of sanctions and without sanctions in the period 1979 to 2020. For this purpose, with an emphasis on the law of gravity, we investigated the factors affecting the bilateral trade between Iran and France. The results of the Johannsen’s Cointegration Test confirmed the existence of a long term equilibrium relationship between the variables of the model in the presence or absence of sanctions in Iran's economy. The results of estimation the model using the Ordinary Least Squares method (OLS) showed that the GDP of both Iran and France has a positive and statistically significant relationship with bilateral exports between the two countries. Also, the population of France has a direct effect, and the population of Iran has a reverse effect on bilateral exports; Althought population growth is important in international trade, it seems that these effects have not been very significant. Also, the estimation results of the model in the presence of sanctions showed an inverse effect of sanctions on the growth of two countries' exports to each other, confirmed in the long term. The presence of sanctions reduces the exports of Iran and France to each other by 0.0133%.

This article seeks to answer the basic question of how the expansion of the material foundations of the modern state in Iran caused Iran's politics and government to be on the path of rationality for the first time. To answer this question, Max Weber's rationalization theory and descriptive-analytical method have been used. This theory indicated four basic components for the rationalization of politics and government. These components include capitalist economy, modern absolutist government, modern bureaucracy and formal legal system. By applying these components, we found that the government system in Iran was irrational until the renewal, and power was exercised by individuals and was not bound by any contract, organization, or hierarchy. In fact, the power was formed based on personal expediency and profitability and emotional norms. The salient point here is that the necessity of rationalizing Iran's politics and government emerged when the process of modernization in Iran was started by elites from within the government system to obtain a new civilization and harmonize with the evolution of the modern world to establish order in the country which was in line with compensating its backwardness compared to the west. According to this fact it can be said the patterns of the rationalization of Iran's politics and government which are also part of the overall process of modernization. According to the mentioned materials, it can be suggested that Iran's politics and government can become rational when it finds the rationalization components of its real formulation in the sphere of Iranian politics and provides the basis for the transition of Iran's politics and government from autocratic and despotic formulation.

The august 19, 1953 coup was one of the most important turning points in Iran’s contemporary history, in which researchers considered its economic and political roots mainly separately. The historical nature of this event has prevented a thorough analysis of the interaction between the economic and political causes of the coup. To compensate for this shortcoming, this article tries to investigate the economic and political causes of the coup in the context of the relation between this phenomenon and the influence of to</span> global powers such as Britain, United States, and Soviet Union. This article uses the theory of patron-client and neo-colonial dependency theory to explain the external economic and political roots of the 19 August 1953 coup in Iran. It begins with assessing the importance of Iran’s oil for Britain’s economy, then focuses on the political motivations of Britain and the United States governments for conducting the coup. The major motivation of Britain was to hinder the downfall of the empire while the United states’ paramount concern was to fetter the Soviet Union’s influence on the Persian Gulf region that the economic importance of Iran’s oil was negligible for the Britain’s economy thus it could not be the sole reason for the coup. In addition, the paper showed that the political motivations of Britain and the United States were based on the economic importance of oil as a strategic good. The innovation of this study is that it discriminates between the political-economic importance of Iran’s oil and the resources of other oil-rich Middle Eastern countries.

Iran and China, two countries that are involved in structural conflicts with the international system, in a process based on convergence, have signed an agreement called "Comprehensive Strategic Partnership Agreement", which is basically aimed at geo-economic goals. This cooperation document can bring opportunities for Iran's economic diplomacy, and its implementation will be accompanied by challenges simultaneously. The main question of this is what opportunities and challenges does the comprehensive strategic partnership agreement bring to strengthen Iran's economic diplomacy? The hypothesis is that this agreement includes economic opportunities for Iran in the fields of facilitating communication and information infrastructure, expanding trade and investment, financial and banking cooperation, participating in the Belt and Road Initiative and reducing sanctions pressure. However, challenges such as different approaches and expectations from the agreement, inconsistency between the two countries in the theoretical and practical areas of policymaking, different business structures, sanctioning of the financial and banking convergence of the two countries, and the lack of Iranian economic and commercial diplomats are hindering Iran's economic diplomacy. The aim of the article is to identify and analyze the points of convergence and divergence between the economic diplomacy of Iran and China according to the 25-year agreement. Achieving this goal is pursued based on the descriptive-analytical method and relying on the conceptual and theoretical frameworks of economic diplomacy. The result indicates that despite the openings for Iran's economic diplomacy in the light of the strategic agreement, it is also overshadowed by the challenges of influence. The most important challenge among these challenges is the heavy shadow of sanctions, which severely limits Iran's maneuverability in benefiting from the economic benefits of this agreement.

In terms of economic and geo-economic potentials, Iran has a privileged status among the countries of different areas such as Central Asia, Indian sub-continent and West Asia. The existence of rich energy and mineral resources are among the most important economic attractions of Iran; and in addition, Iran is geographically located in one of the most unique geo-economic situations in the world. But in recent decades due to the weakness of political organization space and management problems, the corridors have not been developed. The development of corridors, in addition to improving the country's position from an economic, commercial, political and military point of view can also expand the economic diplomacy of the Islamic Republic of Iran. In this context, the present study has investigated the role of the development of Iran's transit corridors to improve the status of economic diplomacy and the relations between Iran and the countries of the region with a descriptive-analytical and survey method. The statistical population consists of all political science experts, whose sample size was determined to be 35 people. The analysis of the findings was also based on economic models of similarity and cosine and SPSS software was used. The results showed that the development of the South-North Corridor can provide the interests of the countries of Central Asia, the Caspian and the Indian sub-continent, and also the development of the corridor can increase the export of oil and energy, as well as strengthen the cooperation and dependencies of the countries of Central Asia, especially China.

In today's Iranian society, potential dangers can be identified; Such as water scarcity crisis, the micro dust crisis, the consequences of cyberspace and many other issues. One of these issues in Iran, which is becoming more and more prominent, is the issue of unemployed university graduates. The unemployed university graduates, as cortical aware of the situation, and sometimes  disappointed, has the potential to fall into the lap of political or religious issues, self-destruct, and even engage in political making flow, because nowadays the unemployed university graduate has introduced himself/herself as a class. This issue cannot be limited to a specific region, because nowadays it has spread across the country, but some provinces experience this issue with a higher percentage, one of which is Kermanshah province. The present study seeks to investigate the issue of unemployed university graduates in Kermanshah province, based on a critical geopolitical approach. To clarify this issue, two quantitative and qualitative methods have been used together to determine to what extent the unemployed university graduate class can be considered a threatening factor in a border province. Therefore, in the qualitative method using the interview technique and in the quantitative method using the questionnaire tool, this issue was investigated. Ten unemployment experts in Kermanshah province were interviewed and a questionnaire was distributed among 406 unemployed graduates in the province, and the collected data were analyzed based on the conceptual framework of "Holes in the state" by Richard Muir. The findings showed that in religious minorities, ethnic and master's and doctoral degrees, components such as weakening national identity, weakening institutional trust, feeling of discrimination or weakening the sense of citizenship, are more represented, which this issue can provide a threat for this topic in the future.

The purpose of this study was to investigate the barriers to economic underdevelopment in Kermanshah from the perspective of the people. For this purpose, a survey and interviews with 784 heads of households were used. In their answers, the respondents mentioned 100 concepts as barriers to economic development, which were finally included in three general categories: economic (40 concepts), socio-cultural (33 concepts), and political and managerial (27 concepts). Nearly 70% of the respondents have imagined the barriers of economic underdevelopment of Kermanshah province in the government-non-government spectrum and 80% have imagined them in the collective-individual continuum. Unemployment, economic poverty, lack of factories (economic categories), poor management and negligence of officials (political categories) and addiction (social categories) are the variables that have had the highest frequency (more than 50 times) as a barrier to economic development of the province. Respondents in all cities considered the economic factor more than political and socio-cultural factors as a barrier to economic development and this ratio was higher in Sarpolzahab city than other cities. In Javanrood city, the respondents mentioned the social factor as a priority hindering economic development more than other cities, and the respondents in Paveh city mentioned the political factor as the first priority more than other cities. Respondents' opinions varied according to the city, activity status, employment status, education and place of residence (rural-urban); hence, it seems necessary to consider this difference in describing and analyzing the reality of economic underdevelopment.