Document Type : Research Paper

Abstract

The three South Caucasus countries of Georgia, Azerbaijan and Armenia are located in a complex and volatile region at crossroad of Europe, Asia, and Middle East. These countries share a deep common historical trauma rooted in the Soviet era and suffer from a disserviceexperience. Economic mismanagement, corruption, social hardship, weak institutions, conflicting tendencies toward authoritarianism and reformism, ethnic discords, border unrests and several silent crises in the region are the Soviet legacy for the three countries. The article seeks to examine the security problems of South Caucasus (Georgia, Azerbaijan, and Armenia), trans-regional powers' views (United States, EU, NATO) toward the security of South Caucasus and perspective of the regional powers (Turkey, Russian Federation, the Islamic Republic of Iran) visa-a-vis the region. The theoretical framework of this study is based on the concept of "regional security complexes" initiated by Barry Buzan, but will be integrated with his new theory of inter-subjective securitization to propose a layout beyond the classic theory of security complexes.

Keywords