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1. Lessons Learned from the Development of Turkish IR: A View from Greece

Author:
Kyriakos Mikelis
Publication Date:
01-2023
Content Type:
Journal Article
Journal:
All Azimuth: A Journal of Foreign Policy and Peace
Institution:
Center for Foreign Policy and Peace Research
Abstract:
The essay addresses an outsider's perception of the characteristics and dynamics of the IR field/discipline in Turkey. How may this country serve as a role model or, at the very least, as a source of inspiration, reflection, or evaluation of the field's development in other local/national settings? In this respect, Greece is chosen as a case study. Βy addressing and assessing Turkish self-reflection and the search for disciplinary identity within Turkish IR scholarship, what can be learned, on behalf of Greek IR scholarship, regarding both Greece's and Turkey's social scientific development regarding foreign affairs/policy? A major theme discovered is the acknowledgement of the limitations of the dependency/vulnerability-centered explanations for the development of IR.
Topic:
International Relations, Development, Academia, and Social Science
Political Geography:
Europe, Turkey, Middle East, and Greece

2. Iranian Scholars and Theorizing International Relations: Achievements and Challenges

Author:
Homeira Moshirzadeh
Publication Date:
01-2018
Content Type:
Journal Article
Journal:
All Azimuth: A Journal of Foreign Policy and Peace
Institution:
Center for Foreign Policy and Peace Research
Abstract:
Since the emergence of the Islamic Republic in Iran, social scientists, including international relations (IR) scholars, have been called to develop endogenous/ indigenous theories to reflect Iranian/Islamic points of view. This theorizing has led some Iranian scholars to develop ideas about international life on the basis of Islamic texts and teachings. Furthermore, due to an increasing awareness of the Eurocentric nature of IR theories over the last few years, the international community of IR scholars has become open to non-Western IR theories. This opening has made homegrown theorizing more attractive to Iranian IR scholars, and debates about it have become more vivid. This article seeks to examine the attempts by the Iranian IR community to conceptualize and theorize IR from Iranian/Islamic points of view and to show how contextual factors have limited such attempts. The first part of the article reviews the IR scholarship in Iran to give a portrait of Iranians’ achievements in this regard. The second part examines contextual factors that may have affected homegrown theorizing in Iran, including international agency, sources of inspiration, the dynamism of the IR community, the relationship between academia and government, and intellectual autonomy. An evaluation of this structural context suggests that even if theorizing IR from an Iranian point of view is both possible and preferable, this cannot be done unless certain structural constraints are overcome.
Topic:
International Relations, International Relations Theory, Academia, and Social Science
Political Geography:
Iran and Middle East