Issue 11:3

Miloš Balabán

From the End of History to the Post-American World: Global Politics, Economy and Security at the Turn of the Epoch

The author analyses a number of major works by American scholars (Fukuyama, Huntington, Zakaria, Nye, Haass, Mearsheimer, Brzezinski, Jentleson, Wright, Ikenberry, Jones) that examine the global power shifts, especially with regard to the changing position and role of the US as the leading Western power. The United States is coming to terms with the end of the unipolar moment and adapting to new political, economic and security realities ushered in by the rise of non-Western powers. The above…

Issue 11:3

Federico Donelli

Features, Aims and Limits of Turkey’s Humanitarian Diplomacy

Several scholars agree that Turkey applied humanitarian diplomacy as part of its global opening, a consequence of which is that it became a medium global player. However, it is still not clear – and thus still under research – what does Turkey’s experience teach us regarding humanitarian diplomacy? For the literature what is unique in Turkey’s application? In order to provide an empirically backed response to such research questions, this paper initially studies What Turkey did with…

Issue 11:3

Michal Prokop

The Alawites and the Labyrinthine Routes of Peace in Syria

For the past six years, Syria has been trapped in a deep political turmoil, which has had a grave impact on peace and stability in the Middle East. Amid the rising atrocities committed on the Syrian population by the Syrian government, the rebels and the Islamic state, the Russian Federation decided in September 2015 to provide a military solution while supporting one side of the conflict. The increased use of force in Syria by foreign powers like the US, the UK, France and Turkey as well as…

Issue 11:3

Ksenia Muratshina

Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank and post-Soviet Central Asia: New Multilateral Bank Formation in the Context of China’s Economic Interaction with post-Soviet Central Asian Countries

This paper analyses what consequences the Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank’s (AIIB) formation brings to partnerships between the People’s Republic of China and the post-Soviet states of Central Asia—the Republics of Kazakhstan, Tajikistan, and Uzbekistan and the Kyrgyz Republic. Given that Beijing initiated this new multilateral bank’s formation and controls its activity to a great extent, the AIIB’s concept and activity are examined in the context of China’s global and regional objectives.…

Issue 11:3

Iva Sojková

The Beijing Consensus: Characteristics of China’s Official Development Finance in Ghana, 2000–2013

Chinese development financial flows provided to African recipients have gained a lot of attention for their volume and nature representing an alternative approach to development. It is the aim of the article to examine the observance of principles of the Chinese development model, the Beijing Consensus, through Official Development Finance (ODF) delivered to Ghana between 2000 and 2013. Due to the lack of information published on development finance by Chinese government, the author uses…

Editor's Desk

Mitchell Belfer

Rein in Qatar. Gulf unity is at stake

Analysts of the Arab Gulf region have, for the past week or so, been obsessing over the deterioration of relations within the Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC). And for good reason. Qatar stands accused of pursuing some very damaging policies—policies that undermine GCC international projects, generate suspicion of the Arab Gulf internationally and are greeted with outright hostility in other parts of the Arab world. Consider that Saudi Arabia, Bahrain, Egypt, the United Arab Emirates, Yemen, and…

Issue 11:2

Miron Lakomy

Polish-Ukrainian Relations, Euromaidan and the Donbass Conflict: The Challenges for Warsaw

This article contributes to the discussion about the multidimensional consequences of the crisis and conflict in Ukraine. It focuses on the rarely discussed subject of the implications of the events in this country since 2013 for Polish-Ukrainian relations from Warsaw's perspective. This article has three major goals: firstly, to present the historical determinants influencing contemporary Polish-Ukrainian relations; secondly, to characterize the reaction of Poland to the events in Ukraine…

Issue 11:2

Aneta Hlavsová

Involved in The Middle East – George W. Bush versus Barack Obama

This article evaluates the different foreign policy approaches of the United States Administration under the 43rd and 44th presidents, George W. Bush and Barack Obama, towards the Middle East. They each projected a completely different style of conflict resolution strategy. While George Bush is known as “war president”, Obama utilised a Wilsonian approach in his foreign policy attitudes, especially towards the countries of the Middle East. While in office, Obama managed to overcome the…

Issue 11:2

Lucie Švejdová

Iran’s Regional Ambitions: The Rising Power of Azerbaijan’s Neighbour

Bilateral relations between Azerbaijan and Iran are complex and filled with escalating tensions, demographic and territorial challenges, as well as mutually beneficial cooperation. With economic sanctions lifted (at the time of this writing) as a result of the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action, Iran has embarked on a path towards economic recovery, a window of opportunity for reaching the status of regional power is opening. Whether the future scenario of post-sanctions Iran generates…

Issue 11:2

Jiří Jelínek

International Terrorism - Current Challenges and Legal Means of Protection in the Czech Republic

The article analyses two current issues relating to the contemporary international terrorism. Firstly, it is the ingrowth or merging of international terrorism with organised crime, as a criminological or sociological problem. Secondly, it is the threat posed by the growing number of persons referred to as “foreign terrorist fighters,” i.e. persons leaving the countries of their origin and travelling to the world conflict areas with the intent to support and promote terrorist criminal offences,…

Issue 11:2

Mats Braun, Adisa Avdic, Anna Gromilova and Gabriela Ozel Volfova

The EU’s Normative Impact on its Neighbourhood

The paper examines the relevance of Ian Manners’ ‘normative power Europe’ concept and argues that the concept benefits from its closer integration into the general norm diffusion literature in international relations. The paper emphasises that the European Union’s capability of having an impact on what is considered to be the normal thing to do in states closest to its borders is linked to how the EU itself and the norms that it promotes are perceived in these countries. The European Union,…

2018 - Volume 12, Issue 3

Schengen in Crisis? Why Subjective Critique Matters

Recently, predictions about the potential end of Schengen cooperation have multiplied. The extraordinary number of refugees coming into the EU is generally understood as the root of the problems within Schengen because the external borders were not prepared to manage such a strain. At the same time…

Recalibration of Turkish Foreign Policy During AKP Era

Since the Justice and Development Party came to power, Turkey has taken another direction in the international scene, based primarily on the ideas of Ahmet Davutoglu, architect of Turkish foreign policy. Different from Turkey's conduct during the Cold War, Davutoglu developed a new foreign policy…

Identifying the Continuity Patterns in the Contemporary U.S.…

The article is aimed at analysing the U.S. contemporary defence and military planning from the Revolution in Military Affairs (RMA), developed in the 1990s and consolidated during the War on Terror, to the Third Offset Strategy that will guide the Pentagon’s efforts until 2030. It will be argued…

Central Europe on Russia-Ukraine Conflict: Positions and…

The article analyses the positions of the Visegrad Group and the Baltic countries on the Russia-Ukraine conflict that erupted in 2014. The public discourse about the Russian-Ukrainian conflict is affected by the following main factors in these countries: historical heritage, concern for their own…

The IS and Attacks on the Oil and Gas Sector in Iraq

Attacks on energy sectors are an important part of the strategy of Islamist militant and terrorist organisations such as Al Qaeda and its offshoots or the Taliban. In connection with this, this article focuses on the attitude of the global Islamist terrorist group the Islamic State (IS) with regard…

For the World, for Me or for Us? The European Development Aid…

Whereas poverty eradication is the primary official purpose of development aid disbursed by the EU, an analysis of official development assistance (ODA) flows between 1995 and 2014 suggests that recipients’ needs are even less salient for aid by the EU than for the bilateral aid dispersed by its…