I wrote this book for three reasons. First, I wanted to know how the Asad regime survived after so many experts had predicted its downfall. I thought it was on its way out too. After all, it looked inevitable at one point, although as one of my undergraduate tutors liked to tell us, there is no such thing as “inevitable” in political science. I had a hunch how it had survived, but that drew on analysis dating back from my PhD days when Hafez Asad was president, so I wanted to test that out. Second, I wanted to offer undergraduates of international relations, political science, psychology and other social science disciplines an explanation grounded in realism and one that focused more on the system than Asad's personality. Equally, I wanted to offer students a cold hard look at the factors that enabled the regime to survive. Yes, everyone down from President Barack Obama to the cabbie driver in London's St James's Square wanted Asad gone, there was no question over that; but wishful thinking was not enough to dislodge him. There were too many factors that enabled the regime to continue, and I wanted students to think about those instead of simply stopping and wondering why someone had not assassinated the Syrian president; a question to which I never had an answer.

This book does not offer a comprehensive account of the Syrian war; there have already been many excellent books published about the war since 2011. It is not a book about political theory, either. It is much more a handbook about seeing international relations theory in practice. As such, it focuses on aspects of the conflict and uses light-touch theory and familiar concepts to help students not only account for the regime's survival but also use the same theories and concepts to understand other conflicts, contemporary and historical. After all, history does repeat itself.

I did hesitate over writing the book. I questioned whether I am qualified to write it. I am neither Syrian nor personally involved in the conflict, though I have had a long association with the country and care about my Syrian friends and colleagues, many of whom I have known for over 30 years.