This thesis focuses on the factors that led to the military intervention of France and the United Kingdom in Libya in 2011. Both actors were at the forefront of discussions regarding how the...Show moreThis thesis focuses on the factors that led to the military intervention of France and the United Kingdom in Libya in 2011. Both actors were at the forefront of discussions regarding how the international community should answer to the threat to civilians posed by the Gaddafi regime, and remained prominently engaged throughout the process leading to the UN-mandated and NATO-led intervention. This research applies the multiple-stream framework as developed by John Kingdon (1984), to identify factors within the problem, policy and political streams defined by the theory. This allowed for several factors and actors crucial to the process to be identified, and for a comparison between the cases of France and the United Kingdom to be established. The multiple-stream framework analysis offers valuable insights into the processes at different levels of analysis, although the qualitative nature of this research hinders possibilities for generalizability.Show less
This thesis analyzes the motives behind the hesitation of the American military interference in Syria to overthrow President Bashar al Assad. It provides a close focus on the role of global and...Show moreThis thesis analyzes the motives behind the hesitation of the American military interference in Syria to overthrow President Bashar al Assad. It provides a close focus on the role of global and regional actors in Syria. The research question of this paper is: What explains the hesitancy of the US involvement in the Syrian War? The research is focused on the red-line speech of President Obama to intervene in Syria and the following chemical weapon attack in Damascus. This study provides significant insight into the political relations between the US and Syria as well as the Syrian civil war. Many academic pieces of literature have been examined to combine valuable information about the power dynamics in the Middle East and their impact on the Syrian civil war. As a result, it is concluded that there are multiple causes behind the hesitancy of the US military intervention in Syria. These are listed as, the vetoes of Russia and China in the UN Security Council, the concern of non-ending regional war, the economic, political and humanitarian costs of the war, the emergence of the radical groups and the absence of strong secular opposition, the concern of state of chaos after the intervention, minor factors like difficult geography, population and the advanced air defense of SyriaShow less
The topic of this study is the employment of PMSCs by the UN in both military and peacekeeping operations. The question that this study seeks to answer is whether the legal principles of IHL and...Show moreThe topic of this study is the employment of PMSCs by the UN in both military and peacekeeping operations. The question that this study seeks to answer is whether the legal principles of IHL and the regime on international responsibility are able to regulate the use of PMSCs. The findings of this study are that these systems are not able to do so, due to the misalignment between international law and international reality. Whereas the applicability of the principles of IHL can be extended to PMSCs, there is a clear accountability gap, as the current regime on international responsibility is not able to adequately regulate the use of PMSCs. Therefore, this study offers a new regime, in accordance to which PMSCs are granted international legal personality. Indeed, the principles of international law reflect out-dated, state centric assumptions about the international system, which do not reflect the twenty-first century and the rise of PMSCs.Show less
