Farzan Sabet | Graduate Institute of International and Development Studies (IHEID), Geneva (original) (raw)

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Papers by Farzan Sabet

Middle Power in the Middle East

Routledge Handbook of International Relations in the Middle East, 2019

The Islamic Republic of Iran has been the central regional backer of the Bashar al-Assad regime s... more The Islamic Republic of Iran has been the central regional backer of the Bashar al-Assad regime since the outbreak of the Syrian civil war in March 2011. Despite the importance of Iran in the drama unfolding in Syria, including any possible resolution to the conflict, the Iranian political elite’s perceptions of the Syrian civil war are arguably not well understood. This report attempts to uncover these perceptions by analyzing the Iranian print news media and highlighting the dominant narratives. As one of the first systematic studies of Iranian media narratives on the Syrian civil war, this report can be an aid to policymakers, academics, journalists and others in understanding the Iranian political elite’s thinking on this issue.

Soft war is ubiquitous today with the way the Islamic Republic of Iran characterizes its relation... more Soft war is ubiquitous today with the way the Islamic Republic of Iran characterizes its relationship with the West, and is a key concern of Iranian national security policy. Few, however, have seriously undertaken the task of defining what soft war is in concrete terms. This analysis proposes a definition of soft war grounded in Joseph Nye’s concept of ‘soft power’ and the history of Iran’s encounter with the West, particularly the United States. In this framework, soft war is the exercise of soft power by the United States on Iran, creating security challenges for the Islamic Republic and forcing the Republic to respond. This analysis not only explores the genealogy of this conflict and how it has unfolded under the Islamic Republic, but also attempts to assess the regime’s strategy in the soft war. This work can be an aid to policymakers, scholars, and others in better understanding soft war and its implications for Iran’s domestic politics and foreign affairs, in addition to U.S.-

The International History Review, 2017

ABSTRACT Iran under Mohammad Reza Pahlavi embarked on one of the most ambitious nuclear programme... more ABSTRACT Iran under Mohammad Reza Pahlavi embarked on one of the most ambitious nuclear programmes of any state in the 1970s. This decision was in part motivated by the zeitgeist surrounding nuclear energy in the 1970s that envisioned the transition from a petroleum- to plutonium-based economy. This decision, however, was soon followed by the Indian ‘Smiling Buddha’ peaceful nuclear explosion. This led the United States and other nuclear suppliers to strengthen restraints on nuclear exports. Many nuclear recipients, particularly in the Third World, objected to US-led changes to the nuclear non-proliferation regime, including the creation of the London Club (later renamed the Nuclear Suppliers Group). To address perceived shortcomings of nuclear suppliers in cooperation on the peaceful uses of nuclear technology, the Iranian nuclear leadership organized the Iran Conference on the Transfer of Nuclear Technology in April 1977. The Persepolis conference, as it came to be known, saw many nuclear suppliers, recipients and industry rally in opposition to US non-proliferation policy under President Jimmy Carter. However, following the Iranian Revolution of 1979, Iran ceased to function as the lynchpin of this opposition to US policy, with the result that the coalition created at the Persepolis conference dissipated.

Middle East Journal, 2010

... 26. Parisa Hafezi, Iran Candidate Says Prisoners Tortured to Death, Reuters, August 13, 200... more ... 26. Parisa Hafezi, Iran Candidate Says Prisoners Tortured to Death, Reuters, August 13, 2009, http://www.reuters.com/article/topNews/idUSHAF23304820090813. Page 10. 552 M MIDDLE EAST JOURNAL ... Full Ahmadinejad - Mousavi Debate, IRIB 3, June 3, 2009, http://www ...

Global Governance: A Review of Multilateralism and International Organizations

Since the late 1990s, targeted sanctions and general humanitarian sanctions exemptions have aimed... more Since the late 1990s, targeted sanctions and general humanitarian sanctions exemptions have aimed at avoiding the disastrous humanitarian consequences of comprehensive sanctions. In parallel, global banks in charge of administering the international trade of vital goods (food and medicine) have received guidance on how to implement risk-based approaches to avoid completely blockading sanctioned jurisdictions. But these efforts have failed. This article asks: Why has the governance of sanctions and sanctions exemption failed, and what can be done to fix the problem? It argues that a hybrid form of governance in the field of sanctions is responsible for current humanitarian problems. Based on more than eighty interviews with treasury officials, sanctions experts, compliance officers, and others, and taking the international trade of vital goods in Iran as an example, this article assesses various fixes to the governance failures and solutions to address the payment problems that expor...

Iran under Mohammad Reza Pahlavi embarked on one of the most ambitious nuclear programmes of any ... more Iran under Mohammad Reza Pahlavi embarked on one of the most ambitious nuclear programmes of any state in the 1970s. This decision was in part motivated by the zeitgeist surrounding nuclear energy in the 1970s that envisioned the transition from a petroleum- to plutonium-based economy. This decision, however, was soon followed by the Indian ‘Smiling Buddha’ peaceful nuclear explosion. This led the United States and other nuclear suppliers to strengthen restraints on nuclear exports. Many nuclear recipients, particularly in the Third World, objected to US-led changes to the nuclear non-proliferation regime, including the creation of the London Club (later renamed the Nuclear Suppliers Group). To address perceived shortcomings of nuclear suppliers in cooperation on the peaceful uses of nuclear technology, the Iranian nuclear leadership organized the Iran Conference on the Transfer of Nuclear Technology in April 1977. The Persepolis conference, as it came to be known, saw many nuclear suppliers, recipients and industry rally in opposition to US non-proliferation policy under President Jimmy Carter. However, following the Iranian Revolution of 1979, Iran ceased to function as the lynchpin of this opposition to US policy, with the result that the coalition created at the Persepolis conference dissipated.

2016-2017 Graduate Research Awards for Disarmament, Arms Control and Non-Proliferation

Explanations of the Islamic Republic of Iran's decision to come to the negotiation table and conc... more Explanations of the Islamic Republic of Iran's decision to come to the negotiation table and conclude a nuclear deal often Explanations of the Islamic Republic of Iran's decision to come to the negotiation table and conclude a nuclear deal often emphasize the will of Iranian voters and the election of Hassan Rouhani as president. These explanations ignore two emphasize the will of Iranian voters and the election of Hassan Rouhani as president. These explanations ignore two equally important factors behind both Rouhani's election and the decision to negotiate: Disunity among Iranian equally important factors behind both Rouhani's election and the decision to negotiate: Disunity among Iranian conservatives and intra-factional consensus politics in Iran. Understanding these factors is crucial to making sense of conservatives and intra-factional consensus politics in Iran. Understanding these factors is crucial to making sense of

Middle Power in the Middle East

Routledge Handbook of International Relations in the Middle East, 2019

The International History Review, 2017

Middle East Journal, 2010

Global Governance: A Review of Multilateralism and International Organizations

2016-2017 Graduate Research Awards for Disarmament, Arms Control and Non-Proliferation

Book Project: The Iranian Nuclear Program, U.S. Policy, and Contestation of the Non-Proliferation... more Book Project: The Iranian Nuclear Program, U.S. Policy, and Contestation of the Non-Proliferation Regime in the 1970s.

Scholars have painstakingly debated U.S. policy to reinforce the nuclear nonproliferation regime following the 1974 Indian “Smiling Buddha” peaceful nuclear explosion and contemporaneous decisions by nuclear suppliers like France and West Germany to export sensitive nuclear technologies to states like Pakistan and Brazil. In emphasizing the risk of proliferation, they have often missed the broader international debate provoked by the 1973 oil crisis that framed nuclear technology not only as a risk, but also an opportunity to meet burgeoning global energy demand. My book project explores this debate through the prism of the Iranian nuclear program, U.S. policy, and nonproliferation regime in the 1970s.

The first part of the book manuscript looks the decision by Iran under Mohammad Reza Pahlavi to launch one of the most ambitious nuclear programs of the 1970s. The existing historiography has alternatively emphasized security or prestige as motivations behind the program. I demonstrate that the program primarily sought to transform the Iranian economy through nuclear technology in line with demands by the global south for a New International Economic Order that created a more equitable relationship with the north. I also marshal new evidence to show that the secondary goal of the program was to create a nuclear weapon option. The second part of the manuscript examines how the United States under presidents Gerald Ford and Jimmy Carter used nuclear cooperation negotiations with the shah as a centerpiece of its efforts to stop proliferation. The U.S.-Iran nuclear cooperation agreement reached in 1978 was to be a model agreement for other suppliers and recipients. But it was ultimately never signed for a variety of reasons, including U.S. suspicions about Iranian motives.

The third and final part of the manuscript demonstrates how Iran under the Shah became the lynchpin of a coalition of transnational nuclear elites that contested U.S.nonproliferation policy. This contestation came to a head at the April 1977 Persepolis Conference on the Transfer of Nuclear Technology, which the trade press at the time characterized as a "revolt" against U.S. policy. Nuclear proliferation in the 1970s - as with the energy crisis, arms control, and human rights - thus became a zone of both U.S.-Iran cooperation and contestation. These finding suggest greater continuity between pre- and post-revolution Iran due to changes in the structure of international system than the scholarship has previously held. The manuscript draws on U.S., British, French, and Iranian archival documents and oral interviews and is strongly informed by both the scholarship on the global Cold War, international nuclear history, and security studies.

Worker communism has been an influential yet little examined political trend in Iran's postrevolu... more Worker communism has been an influential yet little examined political trend in Iran's postrevolution secularleft. With roots in the Islamic Revolution of 1979, its emergence represented a paradigm shift in the Iranian left which at that time was losing ground to the ascendent Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini's political Islam. At least three factors helped distinguish worker communism from the main trends of the Iranian left preceding it and facilitated its rise. First, while the Iranian left saw the struggle against imperialist forces as the primary mission, legitimising an alliance with the national bourgeoisie, worker communism rejected this as a grave error and saw the struggle against all capitalist forces, including the national bourgeoisie, as being central. Second, the worker communist current was able to utilise the ethnic and geopolitics of Iranian Kurdistan to survive revolutionary violence and implement key aspects of its paradigm inside Iran and even export it abroad. Third, worker communism overcame the ideological crisis of the Iranian left brought on by the collapse of the Soviet Union relatively unscathed because it had been founded on a fundamental critique of Soviet communism. Despite being influential in the left inside and outside Iran, worker communism faced a crisis while formulating a response to the rise of the reform movement in the late1990s. This response fell short as a result of doctrinal inconsistencies, which created internal fragmentation, and political radicalism, which was incompatible with the realities of Iranian society.