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51. Turkey and the Arab Spring: Between Ethics and Self-Interest

Author:
Ziya Öniş
Publication Date:
08-2012
Content Type:
Journal Article
Journal:
Insight Turkey
Institution:
SETA Foundation for Political, Economic and Social Research
Abstract:
Turkey redefined its geographical security environment over the last decade by deepening its engagement with neighboring regions, especially with the Middle East. The Arab spring, however, challenged not only the authoritarian regimes in the region but also Turkish foreign policy strategy. This strategy was based on cooperation with the existing regimes and did not prioritize the democracy promotion dimension of the issue. The upheavals in the Arab world, therefore, created a dilemma between ethics and self-interest in Turkish foreign policy. Amid the flux of geopolitical shifts in one of the world's most unstable regions, Turkish foreign policy-making elites are attempting to reformulate their strategies to overcome this inherent dilemma. The central argument of the present paper is that Turkey could make a bigger and more constructive impact in the region by trying to take a more detached stand and through controlled activism. Thus, Turkey could take action through the formation of coalitions and in close alignments with the United States and Europe rather than basing its policies on a self-attributed unilateral pro-activism.
Political Geography:
United States, Europe, Turkey, and Middle East

52. The EU's "Rhetorical Entrapment" in Enlargement Reconsidered: Why Hasn't It Worked for Turkey?

Author:
BEKEN Saatçioğlu
Publication Date:
08-2012
Content Type:
Journal Article
Journal:
Insight Turkey
Institution:
SETA Foundation for Political, Economic and Social Research
Abstract:
This article analyzes the EU's December 2004 Brussels decision regarding membership talks with Turkey. While the Brussels Council launched accession negotiations with Turkey, the adopted Framework for Negotiations formulated exceptionally stringent membership terms. This is a puzzle for normative institutionalism because prior to Brussels, Turkey had sufficiently complied with the EU's liberal democratic membership criteria and systematically engaged in “rhetorical action” to “entrap” the EU in its liberal, inclusionary enlargement discourse. It is argued that the puzzle is explained by how the EU member states' enlargement preferences played out in an intergovernmental bargaining context when it came to the inclusion of Turkey.
Political Geography:
Europe and Turkey

53. The Geopolitics of Support for Turkey's EU Accession: A View from Lithuania

Author:
Azuolas Bagdonas
Publication Date:
08-2012
Content Type:
Journal Article
Journal:
Insight Turkey
Institution:
SETA Foundation for Political, Economic and Social Research
Abstract:
Why does Lithuania support Turkey's accession to the European Union? The article analyzes some of the key domestic factors and the strategic thinking behind Lithuania'a continuous support. Domestically, the political culture of the foreign policy elite and the permissiveness of public opinion allow treating Turkey's accession as a foreign policy issue, subject to cost-benefit calculations. Short-term calculations involve mutually advantageous deals between Turkey and Lithuania. Long-term assessments focus on how Turkey's membership would affect global, regional, and intra- European dynamics of power relations. The article suggests that, in the context of lasting foreign policy objectives and concerns, Turkey is attractive to Lithuania primarily due to its geopolitical roles: its traditional transatlantic alignment, its function as a transit hub for energy supplies to Europe, and its potential to become a great power, engaging in regional competition with Russia.
Topic:
Foreign Policy
Political Geography:
Russia, Europe, and Turkey

54. Representations and Othering in Discourse: The Construction of Turkey in the EU Context

Author:
Bill Park
Publication Date:
08-2012
Content Type:
Journal Article
Journal:
Insight Turkey
Institution:
SETA Foundation for Political, Economic and Social Research
Abstract:
Notwithstanding its somewhat misleading title, this book focuses exclusively on the representations of Turkey in the French debate about Turkey's EU accession bid. Part I of the book focuses on the historical dimension and context of the French debate. Part II goes on to apply Critical Discourse Analysis (CDA) to this debate. CDA is concerned with “the relationship of language to other elements of social processes and power” (p.15), and draws on the contents of speeches, debates, media reports, and the like. The book adds to the growing literature on the role of identity in politics, and on how these are constructed. In particular, it explores the relationship between Self and Other in the French political discourse on Turkey.
Political Geography:
Europe and Turkey

55. Democracy in Turkey: The Impact of EU Political Conditionality

Author:
William Hale
Publication Date:
08-2012
Content Type:
Journal Article
Journal:
Insight Turkey
Institution:
SETA Foundation for Political, Economic and Social Research
Abstract:
In the ever-increasing stream of academic studies of Turkey's foreign policy, no aspect is better covered than Turkey's relations with the European Union. In fact, this reviewer counted no less than twelve books on this subject published in the last five years, excluding this one! Furthermore, there are more books on Turkey- EU relations than all the other books on Turkish foreign policy all together. To justify another addition to an already long inventory, the author must believe he has something new to say, or at least is covering aspects not addressed by others. While Dr Usul's book offers a useful summary of the literature on the role of external actors on democratisation in general, and the emerging policies of the EU in creating democratic conditionality for candidate states, his coverage of the Turkish experience adds little to the existing body of literature, and is out of date.
Political Geography:
Europe and Turkey

56. Rise of Think Tanks: Foreign Policy and National Security Culture in Turkey

Author:
Mehmet Yegin
Publication Date:
08-2012
Content Type:
Journal Article
Journal:
Insight Turkey
Institution:
SETA Foundation for Political, Economic and Social Research
Abstract:
In the recent decade, the number of think thanks in Turkey skyrocketed. Those numbers should not cause overexcitement since along with the serious think tanks many others consist solely of a catchy name and an internet website. Indeed, the think tank sector is a fledgling one in Turkey. The position of think tanks in the policymaking process has not yet been consolidated. They do not have billion dollar budgets as their counterparts in Europe and the Americas. Thus, they mostly do not have the ability to recruit fulltime researchers that allocate their priorities according to their research agenda. Along with these problems, their reputation is not as well established. Since the think tank culture is new in Turkey, some people are questioning their value and influence, while others are more cynical about their purpose and international links.
Political Geography:
Europe and Turkey

57. Global Salafism: Islam's New Religious Movement

Author:
Ermin Sinanović
Publication Date:
08-2012
Content Type:
Journal Article
Journal:
Insight Turkey
Institution:
SETA Foundation for Political, Economic and Social Research
Abstract:
This volume is a compilation of essays on various aspects of Salafism, written by leading scholars and experts, mostly European based, on this global phenomenon. Unlike many books written in the aftermath of the 9/11 terrorist attacks, this contribution does not directly dwell on the “why do they hate us” type of questions, nor is it primarily concerned with such issues as terrorism, radicalization, or counter-insurgency. Instead, it offers an in- depth study and understanding of global Salafism from both the macro and micro perspectives, which are aimed at arriving at a (g)rounded awareness of this particular strand of contemporary Islam.
Political Geography:
Europe

58. Islam in Europa: Religiöses Leben heute. Ein Portrait ausgewählter islamischer Gruppen und Institutionen. (Islam in Europe. Religious Life Today: A Portrayal of Select Islamic Groups and Institutions)

Author:
Bülent Uçar
Publication Date:
08-2012
Content Type:
Journal Article
Journal:
Insight Turkey
Institution:
SETA Foundation for Political, Economic and Social Research
Abstract:
This book presents the results of the collaborative research project “Muslims in Europe and their Societies of Origin in Asia and Africa” which was funded by the German Federal Ministry of Education and Research as part of the “Social sciences in societal dialogue” initiative. The project, which received a total of €1.3 million in funding over a three-year period, was concluded in 2009. The book, which was edited by senior researcher Dietrich Reetz, summarizes the results of a series of subprojects that were presented to the public during the conference “Living Islam in Europe: Muslim Traditions in European Contexts” which took place be- tween May 5 and 7, 2009, in Berlin. Some of the most important results of these sub- projects were subsequently published in a single volume by the Waxmann publishing house. Numerous academics from the Centre for Modern Oriental Studies (ZMA) in Berlin, Hamburg University, the Europa-University Viadrina, and the Martin-Luther University Halle-Wittenberg actively participated in the project. The subprojects investigated a) Muslim groups with roots in Asia and Africa in Europe, and b) the role of Islamic educational institutions in European countries.
Political Geography:
Africa, Europe, Asia, and Berlin

59. Turkey's "Demonstrative Effect" and the Transformation of the Middle East

Author:
Kemal Kirisci
Publication Date:
04-2011
Content Type:
Journal Article
Journal:
Insight Turkey
Institution:
SETA Foundation for Political, Economic and Social Research
Abstract:
A string of uprisings in Tunisia and Egypt followed by those in other countries have rekindled the issue of Turkey constituting a model for reform and democratization in the Arab world, a point raised by many Western and Arab commentators. Independent of this debate, what is lacking in the literature is an analysis of how come there is a “demand” for the Turkish model. This article develops the concept of a “demonstrative effect” and argues that it is this “effect” that makes the Turkish model of interest to the Middle East and that this “effect” is a function of three developments: the rise of the “trading state”, the diffusion of Turkey's democratization experience as a “work in progress”, and the positive image of Turkey's “new” foreign policy. The concluding part of the article discusses several challenges Turkey has to meet so that its “demonstrative effect” can have a positive impact.
Topic:
Cold War
Political Geography:
Europe, Turkey, Middle East, Asia, Latin America, and Hiroshima

60. Nevra Necipoglu, Byzantium Between the Ottomans and the Latins: Politics and Society in the Late Empire

Author:
John Haldon
Publication Date:
04-2011
Content Type:
Journal Article
Journal:
Insight Turkey
Institution:
SETA Foundation for Political, Economic and Social Research
Abstract:
This volume is a welcome contribution to the study of the last centuries of the existence of the Byzantine state, the 'empire' that until its demise in 1453 had dominated the Bosphorus and the link between Europe and Asia Minor, even though its political authority was minimal from the early years of the 14th century. Yet authority and legitimacy aside (for the Byzantines always saw themselves as the legitimate heirs to the Roman empire) it exercised both a fascination for those around it as well as an having an importance and, until quite late on, an influence far in excess of its actual military or economic power. Necipoğlu's book focuses on the politics of the empire, more particularly on the ways in which different groups within the empire adopted, fought for, or abandoned particular views of their situation within Byzantine society and in the wider world, and more particularly in the context of the influence, cultural, military and economic, of the regional powers around it. The empire's Latin neighbors in the southern Balkans on the one hand, along with the central Balkan powers of Serbia and Bulgaria (albeit minimally for the period in question), and the rising Ottoman power in Asia Minor and then Thrace on the other hand, frame this portrait, and the chronology is set by the last almost-century of the empire's existence, from the 1360s and 1370s to the 1450s. But the author's real interest is not foreign relations or military events, but rather the ideological, one might even say psychological, make-up of the various groups and factions within Byzantium, especially in Constantinople, Thessaloniki and in the southern Peloponnese, which can be detected in the sources of the period.
Political Geography:
Europe, Asia, Serbia, Bulgaria, and Balkans