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This study explores the origins of Qatari-US relations, the foundations on which they are based, and the rules that govern them. It begins by examining relations between the two countries from the 1970s up until the Trump era. The paper finds that Qatar's need for US security assurances did not prevent it from adopting independent policies that occasionally contradicted US strategy. Accordingly, the Qatari-US relations have been upended, and exposed to crises due to diverging interests, concerns and challenges. While Qatar has embraced a foreign policy independent of Washington, it has also tried not to alienate it and has established itself as an asset for the US, both in terms of the military facilities it provides and the unique role it plays through maintaining ties with parties that the US cannot communicate with directly. Mutual dependency has enabled Qatari-US relations to overcome all the challenges they have faced over the past three decades, including those that emerged under the Trump administration.

​Qatari foreign policy presents a challenge for students of international relations. Whereas major theories within the field tend to privilege structural factors in explaining the action of states, and particularly small states, in the case of Qatar, the quality of leadership and the strategies that leadership employs to navigate through the structural constraints—primarily geography—are equally important. One of the main findings of this paper is that the strategies adopted by the Qatari elite since 1995 did alleviate many of the structural constraints which the country would otherwise have faced. Moreover, during the short-lived Arab Spring of 2011-2013, Qatar tried to reshape the political landscape in the Middle East to its favor, challenging the two regional hegemons Saudi Arabia and Iran, in Egypt and Syria respectively. Yet, the paper concludes, geopolitical factors and the relative capabilities of states remain instrumental in assuring a state’s sustained capacity to continue playing a key role. This is particularly true in a region where elite thinking continues to be defined by realpolitik.

India-Qatar relations have come a long way since the two nations established diplomatic ties in 1973. Despite a slow start, relations between the two countries have improved significantly in recent years, driven by shared economic interests and increasing cooperation in areas such as energy, defence, and culture. This article examines the trajectory of India-Qatar relations and the factors that have shaped their development. Within the broader theoretical framework of Complex Interdependence, this study analyses the economic and geopolitical factors driving India's engagement with Qatar, as well as the role of cultural and people-to-people ties in strengthening the relationship. It also considers the challenges that have impeded progress in India-Qatar relations, including regional tensions and political differences. Despite the promising growth in India-Qatar relations, this article argues that the relationship remains largely stagnant in the political and strategic domain, with Qatar's independent policymaking contributing to India's inhibitions to pursue a relationship more forcefully beyond economic transactions.

Beginning in 1995, Qatar underwent a major transformation in its foreign policy, adopting an independent and neutral foreign policy as a result of being located in an important vital, geopolitical and economic region, with tensions between the influential regional powers. Given the importance of mediation in resolving disputes and bringing peace to a region raging in conflict, Qatar adopted a foreign policy approach of dialogue, good offices, mediation, and preventive diplomacy, and worked to settle disputes and crises peacefully, remaining impartial and independent, in accordance with the provisions of international law and the Charter of the United Nations. This study explores Qatar policy and experience in mediation and dispute settlement and highlights its active role and contribution over the past twenty years, by clarifying the features of its foreign policy, strategy, and principles, and highlighting case studies of previous Qatari mediation.

This paper examines the rise of modern social sciences that deal with sports phenomena. It begins with the first formula that paved the way for sports science to become an independent scientific field. This is found in European intellectual discourse in the first half of the twentieth century, which linked sport to what was then known as the "crisis of European values." It then deals with the endeavours of the social sciences to make sport a research and knowledge topic, which was devoted to and institutionalised in the 1960s. It investigates the first theoretical paradigms in the field, the first designed by Norbert Elias, and deals with the position of sport in the development of modern European societies. The other, designed by Pierre Bourdieu, is based on viewing sport as an independent social field. Finally, the paper looks at the interest in cultural studies in sports in the late seventies of the twentieth century, which saw it as a field revealing the distinctions on which Western societies are built.

This study explores the use of sports as a diplomatic soft power tool employed by states to achieve foreign policy objectives. It adopts a constructivist framework that highlights the role of symbolic factors in shaping state behaviour. Focusing on Qatar, as a small state lacking traditional power resources, the study examines how its leadership turned to alternative tools, notably sports, as a strategic means of influence. Qatari sports diplomacy relies on four main pillars: investing in global sports clubs, developing infrastructure and hosting major sporting events, investing in sports media, and supporting local sports. This strategic use of sport has contributed to redefining Qatar's role and enhancing its international standing, enabling it to exercise political and economic influence and to support the diversification of its national economy.

This book offers an in-depth examination of Qatar's hosting of the 2022 World Cup through an international relations lens. It explores Qatar's objectives, mostly at the international level, that drove the decision to host the event.

This paper will examine the situation which can be described as the “Blockade of Qatar”, and particularly the legal ramifications of this blockade and the avenues of action available through international law channels and intra-state apparatus. The paper is premised on the argument that the deliberate, multilateral actions taken by Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates, Bahrain and Egypt against Qatar are not only punitive, but also represent a violation of the principles of international law and of the foundations for the relations between states in times of crisis. Given the use of force to enforce the blockade, the political and economic boycott of Qatar by a group of countries in the region could be legally defined as punitive measures. This paper concludes that the actions taken by the group of countries blockading Qatar provide an adequate basis for the activation of international mechanisms for international arbitration. Specifically, the author contends that Qatar would be justified in pursuing political and judicial redress against the group of countries concerned.

Collective Security in the Arab League: Realistic and Structural Theories

This study argues that relying on the United States for of security and defense has led to the neglect of the Arab Gulf states to varying degrees. These countries failed to build an independent regional security capacity or develop broad security relations with third parties besides the United States. Since President Barack Obama took office in 2009-2016, before Donald Trump replaced him, questioning the regional balance of power, this reliance has destabilized the most stable part of the Arab world. This study examines the implications of the unprecedented regional reality regarding the strategic and security relations between the United States and the Gulf in the context of the divergent views of Washington and its local partners on regional security management methods, in particular the role of the GCC in managing peace and security.