This thesis explores the third parties involvement process in conflicts, particularly in the example of the Conference on Security and Cooperation in Europe (CSCE)’s involvement process in the Nagorno-Karabakh conflict. The collapse of the bipolar system and demise of the Soviet Union opened a space to the regional arrangements. In this new environment, the CSCE embarked on new efforts of the mediation of the Nagorno-Karabakh conflict. This is because the bloody conflict between Armenians and Azerbaijanis was threatening the stability and security in the European region and the CSCE was the most appropriate mediator due to its role between East-West dialogues.
The chapters of this study evaluate (1) the situation between Armenians and Azerbaijanis on the ground and their arguments on this conflict, (2) the changing international system, particularly the increasing discourse on the region, regionalism and regional arrangements/organizations ideas in the 1980s and 1990s and the institutional evolution of the Conference on Security and Cooperation in Europe (CSCE) from a conference to a regional organization, especially in the area of hard options such as peacekeeping forces deployment or military tasks, (3) the legal framework of the regional organizations’ mediation efforts in the conflicts, the origin of their mandate and legitimacy, and (4) the first case of CSCE’s peacekeeping forces deployment in the Nagorno-Karabakh conflict and the approaches of Azerbaijan and Armenia as well as Russia and the United States to this deployment.
The institutional evolution of the CSCE and the Nagorno-Karabakh conflict coincided, especially between 1988- 1994. I argue that the organization was not mature enough to deal with this conflict because it lacked of necessary hard options to deploy peacekeeping forces and force Armenia and Azerbaijan to consent its decisions
