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Vaughn P. Shannon argues that US foreign policy toward the Arab-Israeli conflict has been determined at three levels of analysis: that of systemic strategic context, that of domestic politics, and that of individual decision-makers. In this book he explores the role of each level of influence, as well as the implications for the posture which the US has chosen. Reflecting changing circumstances, the volume examines the Cold War, the Gulf War and the new 'War on Terror' and how they have each placed differing pressures on US policymakers as they strive to maintain the ultimate strategic goal of preserving regional oil from becoming dominated by hostile forces. It is suitable for courses on American foreign policy, world politics and politics of the Middle East.

Role-play simulation can both enhance knowledge and favorably affect perceptions of others in global politics. This article tests these hypotheses in two quasi-experimental pretest/post-test surveys of student perceptions of Muslims, Arabs, and the countries of the Middle East. Students engaging in Model UN and Model Arab League simulations representing Arab and Muslim countries demonstrated improved knowledge of the countries they represented and, more importantly, positive changes in perceptions of Muslims and the Muslim countries they represented. A control group demonstrated no such change in images of the Muslims, Arabs, and countries of the Middle East. This preliminary study shows the potential importance of role-play simulations in fostering cross-national and cross-cultural understanding in the fraught relationship between the Middle East and the West.

Constructivist IR scholars study the ways in which international norms, culture, and identities-all intersubjective phenomena-inform foreign policy and affect the reaction to and outcomes of international events. Political psychologists similarly investigate divergent national self-conceptions as well as the individual cognitive and emotional propensities that shape ideology and policy. Given their mutual interest in human subjectivity and identity politics, a dialogue and synthesis between constructivism and political psychology is long overdue. The contributors to this volume discuss both theoretical and empirical issues of complementarity and critique, with an emphasis on the potential for integrating the viewpoints within a progressive ideational paradigm. Moreover, they make a self-conscious effort to interrogate, rather than gloss over, their differences in the hope that such disagreements will prove particularly rich sources of analytical and empirical insight