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Informationen zum Autor Beáta Paragi is Associate Professor at the Corvinus University of Budapest, Hungary. Vorwort Presents an alternative interpretation of foreign aid and examines the relationship between donors and recipient countries in the Middle East Zusammenfassung What do we mean by ‘gifts’ in International Relations? Can foreign aid be conceptualized as a gift? Most foreign aid transactions are unilateral and financially unreciprocated, yet donors expect to benefit from them.Previous research dealing with foreign aid has analyzed the main donor motives and interests in providing financial support. This book offers an in-depth analysis of the invisible political or social ‘exchange’ taking place between recipient countries and donors when a grant agreement is signed.Focusing on Egypt, Jordan, Palestine and Israel - the main beneficiaries of Western foreign aid – the book uses gift theories and theories of social exchange to show how international social bonds are shaped by foreign aid and in what ways recipient countries are obliged to return the ‘gift’ they receive. Foreign aid is a means of buying ‘stability’ or ‘democracy’ in the region but Beata Paragi is interested here to understand the actual feasibility of Western assistance. Looking at the context of the Arab Spring, the book examines how aid impacts on a recipient country’s domestic political events such as war, the quest for self-determination, the struggle against occupation and the fight for dignity. An original contribution to Middle East Studies and International Relations, the research presents an alternative interpretation of foreign aid and show how external funds interact with local developments and realities. Inhaltsverzeichnis AcknowledgementsList of Abbreviations and AcronymsContemporary gifts. An introductionChapter 1. The market, the society and the giftExchange theories in a nutshellSocial exchangeGift exchangeThe modern gift: from Christmas presents to global solidarityChapter 2. The contemporary giftForeign aid in international relationsCritique of foreign aidApplying the gift exchange framework to foreign aid relationsSocieties comparedMain features of the international gift: object and relationship in contemporary IROn the diversity of actors in aid implementationThe relationship and the objects: contemporary gifts and return giftsThe merits of the gift: stabilizing order, substituting warsGift-giving, reciprocity and indebtedness at the level of theoriesReciprocity and indebtedness in IRThe role of contemporary gifts: managing orderThe ‘spiritual essence’: values, norms and identities conveyed by foreign aidInsights from the philosophy of the giftImpossibility and sacrificeConditionality in foreign aid relationsChapter 3. Traditional, religious and contemporary gifts in the Middle EastGifts in premodern societies and generosity in the Middle EastFeatures of contemporary foreign aid in the Middle EastThe origins and background of Western donor presence in the Middle EastArms trade and the politics of exceptionalismGifts, reciprocity and return gifts – in the contemporary Middle Eastern relationsThe Arab Spring and the conflicting objectives of foreign aidBattles for external legitimacy: ccompeting for contemporary giftsLegitimacy in the Middle EastContest for external legitimacy in the Middle East and its domestic impactsChapter 4. In Search of Peace, Stability and Democracy in the Middle EastU.S. aid for regional stability and Israeli securityEU assistance for regional stability by supporting the peace processEuropean reactions to the Arab SpringThe European public opinion behind donor policiesSimply saying: The U.S. set the rules, the EU paid the billAid for managing order (keeping stability and peace)Aid for (missing) political and economic reformsAid for supporting politically conscious actors in the civil societyAid for (the lack of) stability. The c...
