Recent challenges in the relationship between NATO and Russia have led to suspension of political and military cooperation. This thesis assesses the causal relationship between the gradual...Show moreRecent challenges in the relationship between NATO and Russia have led to suspension of political and military cooperation. This thesis assesses the causal relationship between the gradual deterioration of relations and NATO’s expansionism to Eastern Europe. This research uses process tracing of key events and developments to draw a historical pattern of the transformation in the relationship since the ending of the Cold War up until the Ukraine Crisis of 2014. To analyse the relation, this work uses a hybrid model of neorealist and social constructivist theories to understand power relations and motivations that underlie the developments. Overall, NATO’s eastward-enlargement to include former Soviet republics in its membership and its aspirations of creating a European-wide anti-ballistic missile defence system are identified as the main components that fuelled the deterioration in relations with Russia. Responding from a sense of insecurity, Russia has grown more assertive in regional politics to ensure its national interests. Russia has been able to project power in regional politics in aims of regaining its former power status. Russia’s increasingly confrontational stance has eventually manifested in military interventions in Georgia and Ukraine. The current suspension of relations does not constitute a structural new Cold War, but nevertheless is the product of an overall deterioration of relations.Show less
The role of a country like Greece which can guarantee these values is vital and should be underlined in this paper. Research will based on whether Greece has the institutional and foreign policy...Show moreThe role of a country like Greece which can guarantee these values is vital and should be underlined in this paper. Research will based on whether Greece has the institutional and foreign policy capacity and determination to further promote security and development standards within the area. Greece’s foreign policy making in the past has been often associated with the security agenda of the Balkans and this is also the key in examining the future as Greek administrations have been quite stable on their intentions regarding this region. The country’s geographic position on the edge of the Balkans underlines the significantly negative implications that instability may have on Greek security and internal unity. Therefore, officials in the Greek political ranks have been very cautious on on-going developments in the Balkans and thus they have been attempting to establish a further model of cooperation and détente within the Balkan regional context. In this sense, the majority of Greek administrations over the decades have perceived the Balkans as a chess board where Athens’ role is the one of the ‘Queen’Show less
The European Union’s approach towards the OPT on human rights has often been criticised for its conflicting interests, its internal division and coordination. However, simply renouncing the EU’s...Show moreThe European Union’s approach towards the OPT on human rights has often been criticised for its conflicting interests, its internal division and coordination. However, simply renouncing the EU’s effort in human rights promotion in the name of realism, neo-liberalism or Eurocentric imperialism does not offer clarifications why the EU is committed to universal human rights norms and as to why the EU proved to be very weak in projecting its human rights agenda. This thesis suggests a normative power approach to the study of EU human rights policy towards the Occupied Palestinian Territories. Vital to it is the assumption that EU human rights policy and the relation between the EU and Israel has been and should be normative. To analyse this assumption, this thesis draws upon the existing literature in regard to ‘Normative Power Europe’ and adopt Ian Manners tripartite analytical framework in order to assess the EU’s adherence to human rights norms and its external identity, illustrate how the EU diffuses human rights norms, and how the impact of this should be evaluated in the case of the Occupied Palestinian Territories. In doing so, this thesis aims to add to the empirical abundance of NPE literature and applying normative power to the human rights dimensions of EU-Israeli relations. To address these goals, the research shows the inconsistencies between the EU’s rhetoric and the diffusion of norms in Israel’s policy. This thesis will argue that the EU has normative intentions but that this is not a precondition for firm action and the diffusion of human rights norms in Israel. The protection of human rights as core norm of the EU is easily sacrificed when it has to compete with (vital) self-interests such as a collective European identity, security interests and strategic interests. The extent to which the EU pursues a human rights agenda is nevertheless very limited to the detriment of the EU’s normative identity.Show less
This thesis explains the arms export control in EU Member States after the establishment of the European Code of Conduct (ECC)’s criteria, where the need to protect human rights is incorporated as...Show moreThis thesis explains the arms export control in EU Member States after the establishment of the European Code of Conduct (ECC)’s criteria, where the need to protect human rights is incorporated as one of its criteria. This thesis shows that, although EU Member States should only control their arms exports using the ECC’s criteria, the result of the controls on the exports of arms to third countries considered as human rights perpetrators in different Member States is not harmonized. This is because national parliament of each EU Member State might approve the exports of arms in their countries based on different reasons. Parliaments in the Member States that have more respect to human rights, like the Netherlands, can prevent their governments from granting the permits to the exports that carry risk of violation of human rights. The parliaments in the Member States that have less respect on human rights can still allow their governments to grant the permit for such exports because for them export revenues and bilateral relationship might be more important than human rights. This thesis shows that the national parliaments can control the exports of arms in their countries and prevent their governments from granting the permits to the exports that do not satisfy their wishes.Show less
