Italy's Foreign Policy and the Islamic Republic of Iran: The Case of the Nuclear Dossier

Italy has been, throughout history, a descent trade partner for Iran. However, the political relations of the two countries have never been as deep and expanded as the economic ones. During the years of the nuclear stand-off, as the most significant issue in Iran foreign policy, one everpresent question was why Italy is not a negotiating partner with Iran? In this paper, the most important paradigms of Italian foreign policy and those factors affecting its relations with Iran are dealt with. The paper argues that, the two paradigms of Eurocentrism and Atlanticism have taken terms to dominate Italian foreign policy. With changes within the Italian governments, one of these paradigms gains precedence, accordingly Italian foreign policy changed toward Iran. The current paper makes use of the neoclassical realism in which both internal and external factors impacting foreign policy are taken into consideration. The paper argues that being or not being a party to negotiation with Iran was not a matter of consensus among Italian governments. The shifts in the governments with rise and fall of left and right parties brings about paradigm shifts which in turn lead to change in policies with respect to Iran.