Gulf Cooperation Council, The Operating Mechanism And The Integration Process

GCC is one of the regional organizations which have made great progress integration in Middle-East and the world. As the result, many scholars are now paying more and more attention to the decision-making mechanism of GCC and the principles of its procedure. This paper analyzes its background, the powers, responsibilities as well as its functions. For the very first, this paper studies its mechanism, the procedures and its principles of decision-making. Then a feature will be followed as the conclusion. Meanwhile, this paper makes an analysis of the defect of the mechanism, researches development of GCC and finally studies the process of its decision-making mechanism. Therefore, this will be helpful for China and Arab countries to make further cooperation.This Master thesis uses the theory of international relations, and other research methods, making the general overview of the GCC from the five aspects:the birth of the GCC; construction and mechanisms; practice of regional integration; foreign relations and the overall evaluation and prospects.First, I introduce the birth of the GCC by tracing the history in the first chapter, focusing on the external factors and internal factors before the GCC establishment. I explain the moment when six Gulf countries confronted the 1979 Islamic revolution and the Iran-Iraq war, how urgent they were.Second, I interpret the GCC's construction and operation mechanism, the focus is on the process of the GCC's decision-making and the approach of the GCC's internal coordination and decision-making.The third part is the core of this thesis, focusing on the practice of regional integration in the Gulf. The first section describes the GCC security cooperation, mainly the formation of the GCC collective security, the practice and evaluation; the second part describes the GCC economic integration, mainly oil policy, monetary and customs union and the common market.Again, I use three section to introduction GCC's foreign relations, described the GCC and regional powers relations-Iran and Iraq and the United States and China relation. I just research the foreign policy of the GCC with the global view.The last part is the evaluation and the prospects of the GCC. I talk about the success and sho tcomings of GCC, and the challenges and future prospects. So finally I make an objective evaluation on the GCC generally.