Enduring Hostility: The Making of America's Iran Policy - Softcover

Kaye, Dalia Dassa

Softcover

ISBN 10: 1503644596 ISBN 13: 9781503644595

Publisher: Stanford University Press, 2025

Synopsis

American policy toward Iran has remained remarkably consistent since the earliest years of the Reagan administration. US–Iran hostility has endured for longer than the Cold War. Momentous geopolitical shifts, changing leaderships, and evolving domestic priorities have not fundamentally altered this antagonistic relationship. Standard explanations pin the blame for this enduring hostility on Iran and its leaders' revolutionary ideology and policies at odds with the United States and the West. While Iran bears significant blame for a deeply adversarial relationship—the country often engages in dangerous and repressive activities—this book demonstrates that "it's them, not us" accounts cannot alone explain America's posture toward this complicated but critically important country. Drawing on original interviews with former government officials, oral histories, memoirs, congressional hearings, archival material, and the author's own participation in dozens of Iran-related track two meetings, Dalia Dassa Kaye deftly explores how America's Iran policy is made, the people who make it, and the underlying ideas and perceptions that inform it. Dassa Kaye looks back at US policy toward Iran over the past four decades to help us look ahead, offering wider lessons for understanding American foreign policymaking.

About this title

About the Author

Dalia Dassa Kaye is a Senior Fellow at the UCLA Burkle Center for International Relations and former Senior Political Scientist and Director of the RAND Center for Middle East Public Policy. A recent Fulbright Schuman Scholar, she speaks and publishes widely on US and Middle East policy.

Edition details

• Publisher: Stanford University Press
• Publication date: 2025
• Language: English
• ISBN 10: 1503644596
• ISBN 13: 9781503644595
• Binding: Paperback
• Number of pages: 224