فصلنامه مطالعات راهبردی سیاستگذاری عمومی
شماره 0 (پیاپی 44، پاییز 1401)

The foreign policy of the Islamic Republic of Iran is one of the specialized fields that have been favored by researchers in this field in recent years. Nevertheless, a look at the newly published works shows that most of these works are mainly with a descriptive approach and simply with a different format from the previously published works or the translation of existing texts in this field by mostly Iranian authors abroad. Based on this, the importance and necessity of presenting new research, especially focusing on the foreign policy of the Islamic Republic of Iran in the 13th government, by a group of professors, elites and experts in this field in order to understand the discourse governing foreign policy and concepts and categories such as balance in foreign policy, politics The neighborhood, the strategy of looking to the east, scientific diplomacy, etc. caused the compilation of the foreign policy of the 13th government to be put on the agenda. In this framework, out of all the articles sent for publication in this special issue, 10 articles were approved after judging, and their main points are mentioned in this letter.

The coming and going of different governments that emerged after the Islamic revolution shows the reality of changes in foreign policy while maintaining some fixed principles. The coming of the 13th government also carries some new elements or at least new narratives of the aforementioned principles. Based on this, the foreign policy of the 13th government, as a discourse, carries and contains certain elements that distinguish it from the discourses before and after it. The purpose of this article is to examine the most important elements and minutes of the foreign policy of Ebrahim Raisi's government in the framework of the discourse analysis method. The question of the article is how to conceptualize the foreign policy of the 13th government in the form of the discourse system of Ernesto Laclau and Chantal Mouffe? In this regard, “pragmatic revolutionism” or in other words “Justice-oriented multilateralism”, is considered as the focal point (central sign) of the foreign policy discourse of the mentioned government, which is related to its peripheral elements such as: the strategy of neutralizing sanctions and intelligent balancing of foreign economic and political relations through two mechanisms involving the look-to-the-east strategy and the neighborhood policy; the resistance strategy, the establishment of a just international system based on multilateralism, the anti-sanctions strategy through the two mechanisms of simulcasting the neutralization of sanctions (as a strategy) and politics Lifting the embargo (as a tactic) and finally loosening the link between livelihood and national economy gives meaning and meaning to these peripheral elements.

Energy diplomacy displays different functions in regional and international environments. Therefore, regional approaches of governments also have a great impact on its performance. While the Iranian post-revolutionary governments have always sought to improve relations with their neighbors, the lack of a specific mechanism in this field has caused Iran's energy diplomacy to remain underdeveloped and limited. This article, with a comparative study of regionalism in Iranian post-war governments, and with a descriptive-analytical method, seeks to answer the question, what model of regionalism can help to activate the energy diplomacy of the Islamic Republic of Iran? Due to the fact that this article is exploratory, therefore, no hypothesis has been conceived for this research. The findings of the article show that among the integration patterns, the cultural-historical approach of the Raeesi government based on the neighborhood policy had the most alignment and companionship with energy diplomacy, and therefore, by activating the capacities of the neighborhood, it was able to combine the anti-sanctions function for the first time in the Islamic Republic of Iran.

One of the most important aspects of the foreign policy is making a favorable image of the state in international environment. Although this issue has been assumed and performed through public diplomacy from the past, it has become extremely important in the light of the rapid use of virtual space and international media and the competition of narratives in global politics.  In this situation, the Islamic Republic of Iran, which had been faced a phenomenon called "Iranophobia" since the victory of the Islamic Revolution, in the last two decades has been strongly influenced by the global citizenship and netizen, on the one hand, and the dynamics of internal developments on the other hand which has added to the waves of Iran-phobia in the region and in the international system. This article aims to examine the dimensions, evolution and consequences of Iranophobia and tries to answer the main question, what are the most important challenges of Iranophobia in the foreign policy of the Islamic Republic of Iran, focusing on the Raisi administration? The findings of this research, which was carried out in a descriptive-analytical method, show that the representation of Iran's issues and developments in line with Iranophobia, especially towards the Raisi administration, is not only has been aimed at limiting the potential and actual capabilities of Iran's diplomacy and its soft power but also, by fourth wave of Iranophobia with the development of virtual space and the intensification of the activities of foreign media, has been pursued to reduce the social capital of the government.  Therefore, explaining the achievements and strengthening national branding in various fields, especially at the domestic level, and consolidating the neighborhood policy and promoting public diplomacy at the regional and international levels, is a basic necessity and a prerequisite for the effectiveness of the foreign policy of the Islamic Republic of Iran in the Raisi administration.

Many of today's human challenges are international and need international solutions. So we need to define new role for science in diplomacy. The relation between science and diplomacy appears where the benefit of science and the benefit of foreign policy meet and this relationship can also include the field of security. So, the main question of the article is what is the position of scientific diplomacy in the foreign policy of Iran? According to the hypothesis of this article, the foreign policy agenda of Iran is such that scientific diplomacy in all its three meanings has priority. The method of this research is analytical-descriptive. To examine the hypothesis, first, the diplomacy of track II is explained, then, the definition of scientific diplomacy and its historical background are mentioned. In the next section, scientific diplomacy is defined in the foreign policy of Iran. In the following, the problems in scientific diplomacy and suggestions for the 13th government are presented, and the conclusion is mentioned at the end

In March 2021 during the visit of Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi to Tehran and after several months of controversies, Wang and his Iranian then-counterpart Mohammad Javad Zarif finally signed a 25-year bilateral strategic partnership agreement. The agreement promises to expand Iran’s relations with the world's second-largest economy.  It seems that the current developments in the field of international politics and the intensification of competition between China and the United States on the one hand and the experience of the US withdrawal from the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action and the failure of the European parties to adhere to their commitments, on the other hand, had clearly heighten Iran’s eastward foreign policy. In this regard, one of the questions that arises is about the existing strategic relations between China and Saudi Arabia and China's approach toward the geopolitical competition between Riyadh and Tehran. This article tries to explain China's foreign policy in the Persian Gulf region based on economic diplomacy and examines China’s relationship with the two main powers in the Persian Gulf, namely, Iran and Saudi Arabia. Resorting to the strategic hedging strategy, Beijing tries to avoid entering into geopolitical dualities and guarantee its strategic interests by pursuing strategic relations with both great regional powers

After the end of World War II and especially following 9/11 attacks, US played an active role in the middle east in order to advance liberal internationalism strategy. However, US has not been able to continue playing active role by maximum presence of military forces in the region due to various challenges. Therefore, there has always been talk about the evolution of US regional role-playing. Obama's "pivot to Asia" policy can be considered as the turning point of this transformation which implicated increasing focus on confronting China threat and, subsequently, the reduction of physical-military presence in the Middle East. The main question of the research is what influences do domestic and international variables have on the grand strategy of US foreign policy in the Middle East. The authors have seeked to answer the question by adopting descriptive-analytical approach and utilizing library methods, Content analysis method and semi-structured interviews. The findings of the research indicate that the reduction US hard presence in the region, Supporting traditional allies, increasing tendency of US regional allies to act more independently, and the increasing influence of US global competitors in the region would be the most possible persperctive of US role in the Middle East.

The neighborhood policy has been chosen as the approach of the 13th government in the field of foreign policy. To realize this policy, there are different methods and paths, one of these methods is the use of urban diplomacy. Considering that the neighboring countries are the main audience of Iran's neighborhood policy, the category of border diplomacy has been considered as urban diplomacy in order to take advantage of the capacity of border cities and provinces to strengthen the neighborhood policy. Based on this, this article, using Joseph Nye's combined theory of border diplomacy and soft power, emphasizes the use of general and specific capacity of border provinces to play a role in neighborhood policy. Also, this article tries to make policy offers for the use of border diplomacy to realize the neighborhood policy in the 13th government. The most important suggested strategies are: Establishing cultural centrality in the border provinces compared to the regions across the border, Planning to take advantage of the border as an economic opportunity, activating and strengthening border diplomacy in the fields of culture, science and technology, economy, politics and security, health and sports, taking advantage of the tourism capacity of the border provinces, delegating more powers to the provinces in the field of foreign communications, active Becoming the representative office of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs in the border provinces, strengthening the border bazaars, creating the role of neighboring provinces with the countries involved in the takfir crisis in confronting the takfir trend, taking advantage of the huge capacity of the Arbaeen.

The pattern of strategic confrontation and tactical engagement of the United States towards the Islamic Republic of Iran is usually evaluated in the framework of the macro theories of international relations or from the perspective of foreign policy analysis with emphasis on the domestic and international order. However, the examination of the process of formation of the approach of the Obama and Trump governments towards Iran, and specifically the nuclear case, shows that regardless of the roots and causes of the American confrontational strategy, the type of decision-making and the pattern of Iran's behavior towards Washington It has played an important role in decrease or Increase level of the conflict. Understanding this issue through the lens of cognitive theory and analyzing the place of perception of American politicians in their strategic decision-making can play an effective role in adopting a reciprocal and proportionate approach from Iran. Therefore, the main question is how the American perception of Iran's behavior pattern in foreign policy has affected the formation of Washington's strategy towards Tehran? The findings of this research show that the pattern of engagement and confrontation between America and Iran is frequently counterproductive. In other words, according to experience, Iran's engagement and Détente towards the US has led to the escalation of confrontation on the part of Washington, and the approach of active resistance on the part of Iran has led to retreat of the US and its tactical engagement.

Relations between Iran and Europe are more than four centuries old, and the first contacts with political goals go back to the era of Shah Ismail Safavi. Since then, Iran has gradually entered the geopolitical games between the European powers. Although the Islamic Revolution and Iran's ideological foreign policy changed the political relations between this country and the European countries, the economic relations remained largely intact and Iran remained Iran's first trade partner until the European Union joined the US nuclear sanctions in 2012. The purpose of the current research is to examine the ups and downs of the relations between Iran and Europe in the first place and then in the second and more important stage, to analyze the position of the European Union in the foreign policy of the 13th government. Based on this, the main research question is, what position does the European Union have in the foreign policy of the Islamic Republic of Iran, especially the 13th government? In response to this question, the argument of this article is that, the Islamic Republic of Iran's economic and technological need for the European Union and Iran's efforts to prevent the convergence of the European Union with the United States towards this country, always make the expansion of cooperation with this union a strategic priority. Iran has transformed over the past decades. However, the experience of the European Union's inaction towards the withdrawal of the United States from the JCPOA and the increase in the position of the eastern powers in the international system have reduced the motivation of the 13th government in Iran to deepen relations with the European Union

Jordan is a small and poor country but it’s important from geographically aspects in the West Asian region. Jordon’s foreign relations is affected by various regional and global factors. This article shows Jordan's foreign relations toward Iran in a quantitative-qualitative and analytical method and by reviewing the past articles and works, as well as analysis economic statistics and classification of that articles have written. The findings of this article shows that the Jordan foreign policy towards Iran is affected by the global and Arab powers especially Saudi Arabia, the United States and some issues related to the Israel, and Palestine. Finally we come to the conclusion that the acceptance of Jordan's foreign policy from big and regional powers has led to the emergence of a precarious foreign policy towards Iran.