State and System Levels of Analysis of the Middle East
Foreign policy scholarship attempts to understand states in terms of the individual, state, an system levels of analysis. The individual level is often time used to understand specific decisions that leaders make, while the state and system levels are often used to explain the behavior of states more generally. Begin by explaining the system and state levels of analysis and the factors that they focus on in explaining state behavior. Second, discuss the behavior of states in the Middle East. Is this behavior best explained by the state or the system level factors? Explain.