The concept of this unit revolves around the state and political issues that surround the world today. The main reason for this unit was to give a distinction between the liberal and realist views as they are being applied today in the world politics. In this unit one is able to differentiate realism and liberalism as the two are clearly defined.
Realism is seen as expecting a conflict situation, chaos, and games to bring about some balance of power whereas liberalism is seen to emphasize on the ability to encourage cooperation and bringing some sort of order within the global politics. Background:
The nuclear program in Iran has been ongoing for a good number of years considering that it started way back in the 1950s following the purchase of a research reactor from the United States in 1959. During the time of Shah, there was an ambitious program to build over twenty nuclear power reactors by the year 1990. This was considered as an ostentatious project but never did it occur to the minds of many that this mission could form the backdoor for the dreaded nuclear weapons program. During that time, Iran never showed any signs that it could enrich and/or reprocess fuel for the ambitious nuclear program.
The Iran nuclear program could be every far by now but this was thwarted during the decade that saw the emergence of the Iranian Revolution and the Iran-Iraq war. This not withstanding, Iran has embarked on the ambitious nuclear program and has envisioned that by the year 1925, it has to have constructed seven nuclear power plants (Squassoni, para 1). Iran is disguising its nuclear program as a peaceful project aimed at addressing the rising challenges in regarding energy shortages in the country as the oil is for export to earn foreign currency. A statement from the Iranian government spokesman, Mr.
Gholam Hussein Elham in July 2006, asserted that, “ we consider the acquiring, development, and use of nuclear weapons inhuman, immoral, illegal, and against our basic principles. They have no place in Iran’s defense doctrine” (Squassoni, para 2). Iran has looked determined to carry on its nuclear program despite the international concern. Summary of the article: The Iranian nuclear program has presented a new security concern in the world today. The United Nations has been on several occasions engaged in placing restrictions and sanctions on Iran in an effort to persuade her to abandon her nuclear program.
Despite various attempts, Iran looked determined to achieve its nuclear ambitions. This article elaborates on the latest sanctions that have been directed towards Iran to stop her from the nuclear program. According to the author of the article, the new sanctions are believed to be strong enough to lame the progress of the nuclear program (Pomeroy and Mostafavi, para 1). Despite having dismissed the impacts of the sanctions when they were mentioned, Iran has recognized for the first time ever that the new sanctions would impede on the progress of their program.
The sanctions involve an expanded embargo on the arms, banks suspected to be connected to the nuclear or the missile program among other measures (Pomeroy and Mostafavi, para 10). The concept of state and the liberalism theory is very essential in the understanding of this media report which concerns the sanctions by the United Nations on Iran. The UN is implementing the sanctions so as force Iran to abandon its nuclear program which is deemed to be a security threat and therefore able to disrupt the world order.
In my opinion, this theoretical attribute is not convincing in the sense that as much as the sanctions might impede on the progress of the Iranian nuclear program, it does not guarantee the disbandment of the program. Some countries for instance may continue to cooperate with Iran and disregard the UN sanctions. Maybe some other realistic way of dealing with the issue could bear fruits. This leads us to ask about the consensus that was reached when agreeing to the sanctions, were all member countries in agreement with the sanctions? Work Cited: Pomeroy, Robin and Ramin, Mostafavi.
Iran says sanctions might slow nuclear program. 2010. Retrieved on 8th July 2010 from; http://www. dailystar. com. lb/article. asp? edition_id= 10&categ_id= 2&article_id= 116856#axzz0tEFnO7tE Squassoni, Sharon. Iran’s Nuclear Program: Recent Developments. 2006. Retrieved on 8th July 2010 from; http://docs. google. com/viewer? a= v; q= cache: k_oZnuIe5ZsJ: www. fas. org/sgp/crs/nuke/RS21592. pdf+Iran+Nuclear+Program; hl= en; gl= ke; pid= bl; srcid= ADGEESgV0YaLC1qX7AbvrL2uUbVp4cpZR90cY1cYuJ0tbbHTbJ7ktBbfO6FKy50QAO3S9BTcFXBdpwxf_aO0MPXwLrPH4CZsOgfnjQeh0fFt2L_Y4DxPjK6ZDYCm4CERYE0qKA3jbnbV; sig= AHIEtbSG3SEfMAoZ34-4TW
