Understanding the Islamic State Insurgency : the origins of the organization and the role of the U.S. policy of exporting democracy

Abstract

Despite the vast research accomplished by scholars and international media, little is known about the interconnectivity among the events believed to have given momentum to the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant. Studies developed on this issue have predominantly focused their efforts on finding explanations only in the post-American invasion in Iraq (2003). This study upholds, on the contrary, that the U.S. presence in the region is just half of the explanation. The other part of the answer lies on both countries‘ domestic variables. Iraq and Syria, ISIL‘s birthplaces, share a complex ethno-religious mosaic as well as political similarities that, according to this paper, are significant aspects to comprehend ISIL‘s upsurge. Thus, the chief aim of this dissertation is to couple both domestic and external variables in order to find why the American intervention was so critical to these countries and how it ignited ISIL. For this assignment, it is going to be privileged the literature of Foreign-Imposed Regime Change (FIRC) and the literature on the American Foreign Policy. These are two valuable theoretical assets to understand the U.S. position towards exporting democracy abroad as well as the American interventionist path in the post-Cold War era. At first, this dissertation introduces a discussion on the intervention in Iraq and the outcomes that resulted from it. Then, it proceeds to an analysis of the Islamic State itself and the Iraqi and Syrian dictatorial past. The findings of this work stress that the type of government presented in both countries, the Ba‘athist, generated numerous social, economic and political disruptions within Iraqi and Syrian societies. Those aspects caused the American FIRC to fail and, like a ―perfect storm‖, created a propitious environment for the rise of the Islamic State.