ISIS and Sectarianism as a Result of a Meltdown of the Regional Orders in the Middle East

This paper aims to analyze the background of the emergence of＂Islamic State＂ and prevailing sectarian strife in the Middle East from the aspect of international relations, considering it as the result of the failure and mistakes, accumulated not only since the Iraq War and the Syrian Civil War but also from the post-WWI period when the territorial-state system was introduced in this area. This paper emphasizes the importance of the norms and ideas that provide the basis of regional order, and focuses on conflicts between norm-based regional order and interest-based regional alliance. The former has been pursued by the actors that underline supra- or sub-state identity as cores for regional solidarity, while the latter has been introduced by external actors, or established by conservatives to maintain the status quo to react to revolutionary/revisionist movements. The situation became complicated when regional actors faced three different cataclysmic transformations in 1979. Although each incident necessitated a different re-arrangement of their relations, a shorthand patchwork-like formation of alliances was applied, in which the US and Saudi Arabia played key roles. In the post-1979 regime, rivalry became dominant between the interest-based pro-US regional alliances vs. the challengers that justified their own interests with norm-based regional order, manipulating supra-state identity. Once the influence of the US declined after 2011, pro-US state actors found neither interest-based regional alliance nor norm-based regional order supported their own interests. Here, sectarian identity has emerged as a kind of norm to cover their collective interest. Thus sectarianism is the result of necessity for the regional actors to legitimize their interest-based actions and to secure partners for collective action. ＂Islamic State＂ was born in this circumstance, where sectarian identity became an ostensible factor for new regional order in the Middle East in the absence of the US-led regional alliance.

Regional differences of urbanization in China and its driving factors

After more than 30 years of rapid urbanization, the overall urbanization rate of China reached 56.1% in 2015.However, despite China's rapid increase in its overall rate of urbanization, clear regional differences can be observed. Furthermore, inadequate research has been devoted to in-depth exploration of the regional differences in China's urbanization from a national perspective, as well as the internal factors that drive these differences. Using prefecture-level administrative units in China as the main research subject, this study illustrates the regional differences in urbanization by categorizing the divisions into four types based on their urbanization ratio and speed(high level: low speed; high level: high speed; low level: high speed; and low level: low speed). Next, we selected seven economic and geographic indicators and applied an ordered logit model to explore the driving factors of the regional differences in urbanization. A multiple linear regression model was then adopted to analyze the different impacts of these driving factors on regions with different urbanization types. The results showed that the regional differences in urbanization were significantly correlated to per capita GDP, industry location quotients, urban-rural income ratio,and time distance to major centers. In addition, with each type of urbanization, these factors were found to have a different driving effect. Specifically, the driving effect of per capita GDP and industry location quotients presented a marginally decreasing trend, while main road density appeared to have a more significant impact on cities with lower urbanization rates.