As Syria enters its seventh year of bloodshed and conflict that has seen numerous
resolutions and foreign interventions, there is still no sign of it ending any time soon.
In International Relations (IR), explanations from the perspective of Realism often
emerge for the behavior and patterns of interaction among states during war and
conflict. Therefore, this dissertation explores why Syria behaved the way it did during
the first five years of the crisis—starting from the 2011 uprising—through the key
assumptions of Realism. This study is motivated by two research questions: (1) How
does Realism explain war and conflict? and (2) How does Realism and its key
assumptions explain the behavior of Syria as a nation state during the first five years
of the Syrian Conflict? The research questions are answered through in-depth content
analysis as well as in-depth interviews with experienced IR personnel. Findings of the
study show that the key assumptions of Realism are highly correlated with the state’s
behavior during conflict. This study aims to enhance further understanding of Realism
and its key assumptions as an analytical tool to explore crucial events happening in
international politics particularly on understanding the conflict in Syria. However,
dependence on key assumptions only is not enough to analyze the behavior of Syria as
a state. Adding a few other key concepts to the study could allow for further research
in the future.
