1 Dr. Mohammed Nuruzzaman Professor of Political Science School of Humanities and Social Sciences North South University Second draft version Original article published in International Journal, vol. 76, no. 2, 2021. DOI: https://doi.org/10.1177/00207020211021566 Does Realism Explain the Arab Spring? Neorealist Alliance Formation Theories and the Syrian Civil War Abstract: Dominant International Relations theories – realism/neorealism, liberalism/neoliberalism or constructivism have so far developed no rigorous theoretical attempts to interpret the Arab Spring, though some marginal efforts have been made to critique the failure of realism to interpret this historical development. This article presents a neorealist interpretation of the Arab Spring focusing on the Syrian civil war where conflicts between the pro and anti-status quo forces have unfolded in alignments and counter-alignments centering around rival domestic and external groups. It employs the neorealist theories of alliance formations – the balance of power and the balance of threat theories respectively articulated by Kenneth Waltz and Stephen Walt to explain the involvements of rival alliances in post-2011 Syrian conflict – the US-Saudi-Israel alliance and the Russia-Iran-Syria alliance. The article shows that the dynamics of alliance formations concerning the Syrian civil war lends more support to Walt’s theory that states balance against threats rather than against power. The complex nature and dynamics of the Syrian war, however, calls for refinements of Walt’s balance of threat theory. Accordingly, the article sheds light on refinements of Walt’s theory to better explain future complex civil wars involving highly polarized domestic and external parties. Introduction The Arab Spring is a phenomenal political development in recent Middle Eastern history. It has, however, received inadequate attention from International Relations (IR) scholars, particularly from mainstream IR theoretical schools. Students of IR, as a result, encounter few rigorous theoretical attempts to interpret this historical development. A special issue of the journal PS: Political Science and Politics published several short articles to explore the linkages between the Arab Spring and IR theory. The articles, as a whole, engage “meta-theoretical questions of