Galia Press-Barnathan

• PhD
• Hebrew University of Jerusalem

TV shows and movies, as dominant forms of modern popular culture, often trigger domestic discussions, especially when dealing with sensitive and thorny issues in society. But what happens when these domestically-created cultural productions are globally circulated and consumed? In recent years, especially following the streaming revolution, there h...

What is the political role of cultural mega-events in the context of ongoing war? The article examines the interaction between cultural mega-events and militarization processes in the shadow of war. It addresses two main gaps: the lack of attention to the politics of such events during war, and the specific understanding of militarization usually a...

This article joins the growing body of literature that perceives balance of power as a social construct containing shared understandings that comprise states’ repertoire of balancing practices. Distinct repertoires of balancing have prevailed in different international orders. We build on this work and focus on a less explored, though important, po...

This chapter explores the roles that popular culture plays in shaping and understanding security-related processes. It explains the different ways in which popular culture is conceived by different IR scholars and consequently how it impacts politics, and security issues more specifically. The chapter then focuses on the role of pop culture in mana...

Cultural boycotts of mega-events often receive high media profile, but their effectiveness remains questioned. This effectiveness is influenced by their ability to generate ontological insecurity within the target state. However, measuring the impact of such threats is challenging in light of the evasive nature of the concept of ontological insecur...

The paper explores the political narratives produced in English-language Israeli cookbooks. We examine an understudied, yet central component of everyday international relations, everyday nationalism, and identity contestations as practiced through gastronomy, and highlight the dilemma between the different political uses of popular culture in the...

With the rapid rise of China and the relative decline of the United States, the topic of power transition conflicts is back in popular and scholarly attention. The discipline of International Relations offers much on why violent power transition conflicts occur, yet very few substantive treatments exist on why and how peaceful changes happen in wor...

This article uses the 2019 Eurovision Song Contest (ESC) that took place in Tel Aviv to explore how cultural mega-events serve both as political arenas and as tools for identity construction, negotiation and contestation. These processes of identity politics are all conducted across national–subnational–international–transnational levels. The hosti...

This article examines the intriguing decision of the Israeli government in the aftermath of the 1967 War to embark on a national television project that would be dominated by broadcasts in Arabic. Since actual broadcasts quickly ended up switching to Hebrew, this initial rationale has received little academic attention. Based on primary research, t...

The goal of this paper is to present a broad yet systematic framework for thinking about the role of popular culture (PC) in international conflict management and resolution, from an International Relations perspective. Protracted conflicts often involve a non-material dimension, as they become central elements in the rival states’ sense of identit...

This paper examines American policy regarding regional security arrangements (RSAs) in Asia. It argues that it is American perceptions of regional interest in such RSAs and of the compatibility of the goals of regional partners with those of the United States, which eventually shape American policy. After discussing the potential value and cost of...

Much attention has focused on the ongoing role of economics in the prevention of armed conflict and the deterioration of relations. Galia Press-Barnathan focuses on the importance of economics in initiating and sustaining peaceful relations after conflict. Press-Barnathan provides in-depth case studies of several key relationships in the post-World...

The shift to unipolarity has introduced new dilemmas for America's allies. Their level of strategic uncertainty has increased, largely because under unipolarity, allies' threat perceptions are more likely to diverge across time or issue areas and are not shaped as much by structural systemic factors. Although they want to maintain the pre-existing...

This article examines the role of economic factors in facilitating the transition to peace between former enemies. It examines a less developed angle of the commercial liberalism approach, namely, when and how economic incentives can play a positive role in the process of building peace, rather than the standard focus on how economic interaction ca...

In this article I argue that the systemic shift to unipolarity has created an incentive to invest in security regionalization, both on the part of the American hegemon and on the part of the regional states. After defining what I mean by 'security regionalization', I examine the hegemonic incentives for encouraging the building of regional security...

This essay has two goals: (1) to examine US foreign policy leading to the war in Iraq through the lens of Bull's (1977) classic book, The Anarchical Society, and (2) to explore in a unipolar, hegemonic system the relevance and power of the institutional mechanisms that are supposed to preserve international society according to Bull. It also addres...

This book offers a conceptual framework that explains when and why a great power would choose to cooperate with smaller states via regional cooperation forums rather than in a bilateral setting.

Thesis (Ph. D.)--Columbia University, 1998. Includes bibliographical references (leaves 532-552). Department: Political Science.

Thesis (Ph. D.)--Columbia University, 1998. Includes bibliographical references (leaves 532-552). Department: Political Science. Microfilm.