فصلنامه مطالعات راهبردی
سال یازدهم شماره 4 (پیاپی 42، زمستان 1387)

By searching its historical transformation as concept of nation-state conceptualization of Security in comparisons with tribe security, city security and empire security would be clear and make better perception on national security. Because the state as a whole made for preserving and implementing the security would be the core referent object here. In spite of political process it brings to focus on political structure. Its relative with the state the discussion on security is appearing meaningful, although there are many contested theories in explanation on state. The state by definition made by territory, population, government and sovereignty as a whole, so any threat on these categories would be seen as state''s insecurity. The paper is examining them at any state in historical landscapes for prospecting the horizon on security in future directions.

In spite of the decentralized nature of the international system, the global society benefits from norms and rules which are indicating the appropriate behavior based on its social system. These norms not only have a direct effect on international behaviors of the States, but also have contribution in comprehension and identity of the States and decision makers and hence shape their behaviors. These international rules and norms are social and inter-subjective concepts which are created by interaction between the international actors and when their social background fades away, they gradually vanish too. This paper aims to provide more useful and accurate understanding about international rules and norms in the international relations and also intends to answer the question that how our view through the prism of international norms and rules influences our perception and comprehension of international relations? This issue is explained through illustration of the nature of international rules and norms, the ways and means of their shape and development and the reasons for complying with or breach of these norms and rules by the States.

Although the Iranian security studies have had many ups and downs during its very short history and even now the need to develop it in terms of quantity and quality is undeniable, today these studies have reached to a sophisticated phase which necessitates to note it as an indigenous approach and has lead to many attempts to achieve this important end in Iran. In this paper, while there is a clear distinction between "the Iranian security studies" and "the Security studies inIran" the nature and relationship between these two is discussed and given the relevant characteristics of similar studies in the West, the same discussion takes place afterwards.

The main purpose of this paper is to study the pathology of the ways combating administrative corruption in Iran. There are not many countries like Iranwhich is involved in combating administrative corruption and its politicians pay that amount of attention to this problem. However, despite lots of resources dedicated to this combat in Iran, less result has been achieved. This paper argues that this is because of ignoring or less attention to the effective problems, the most important of which are as follows: ethical approach in combating corruption, generalization of Weberian bureaucracy to the reality, concealment and lack of transparency in combating administrative corruption, neglecting the citizen's demand side of administrative corruption, bureaucratic authority, weak bases of the client and its fragile feature in the bureaucracy, sympathetic attempts in a rentier environment, centralized ownership of mass media and limitations by the governments over the quantity and quality of their reports, deficient use of market-oriented mechanisms, pressure of interest groups to restrain from seriously following the combat administrative corruption and finally lack of trust to the relevant independent institutions.

During the Bush Administration, especially in his second Presidential term, the main element of theUSpolicy towardsIranhas been the Iranian nuclear activities. However, in spite of the various relevant positions of the US officials, either by the executive branch or by the Congress, the US policy towards Iran has been based on non-military sanctions (as multilateral as possible) to change the Iran's behavior according to the US security remarks. Of course, the existing tensions between the two countries, is neither limited to the nuclear issue nor they are the result of the Bush security policy. Nonetheless, the nuclear issue has been a proper bed for more complicatingUSpressure onIran.

During the Ex- USSR, any foreign policy either for or against theUSA, has had a direct effect on the kind of behavior of elites and political groups in theUSSR. This frequent effect has been inevitably transmitted to the postUSSRera and still has similar effect. During the Yeltsin's era given various disorders in this country, this effect appeared in the shape of distinct periods of interaction and antagonism. However, during the Putin's era, especially in his second term of office, theUSAwas introduced as the main obstacle in revival of theRussian Federationand therefore the anti-US policies were escalated to the much possible extent. Thus in the aftermath of experiencing failed convergence with theUSAwithin the framework of pragmatic conservatism and then within the pragmatic offensive framework, the approach of "direct resistance" against theUSAwas adopted. Focusing on the Putin's era, the author of this paper intends to discuss the nature of these trends.