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291. Turkey between Qatar and Saudi Arabia: Changing Regional and Bilateral Relations

Author:
Birol Baskan
Publication Date:
08-2019
Content Type:
Journal Article
Journal:
Uluslararasi Iliskiler
Institution:
International Relations Council of Turkey (UİK-IRCT)
Abstract:
This paper discusses how Turkey’s bilateral relations with Saudi Arabia and Qatar have changed after the Arab Spring erupted and assesses how the Syrian conflict affected them. The paper argues that Turkey had developed excellent relations with Saudi Arabia and Qatar in the 2000s, but eventually fell out with Saudi Arabia and strengthened its relations with Qatar as the Arab Spring unfolded. The Syrian conflict, in which the three countries colluded to overthrow the Assad regime, has alleviated the deleterious impact of the differences between Saudi Arabia and Turkey on the bilateral relations or, to put it in another way, slowed down the deterioration of Turkey-Saudi Arabia relations. The paper also argues that the geopolitical landscape that pushed Turkey and Saudi Arabia apart also pushed Turkey and Qatar closer.
Topic:
International Relations, Regional Cooperation, Bilateral Relations, and Geopolitics
Political Geography:
Turkey, Middle East, Saudi Arabia, Syria, and Qatar

292. Russian and Turkish Foreign Policy Activism in the Syrian Theater

Author:
Inan Rüma and Mitat Çelikpala
Publication Date:
08-2019
Content Type:
Journal Article
Journal:
Uluslararasi Iliskiler
Institution:
International Relations Council of Turkey (UİK-IRCT)
Abstract:
Russia and Turkey have been involved in remarkable redefinitions of their foreign policies while navigating through turbulent times in the Post-Cold War era. This has manifested in a search of being recognized as a great power. The tragic civil war in Syria has been the theatre of these ambitions of these two states in highly controversial ways. They have been on the opposite sides until recently on the essential question of the regime change in that country. The risk of a direct fight has even been observed when Turkish air force got a Russian jet down. However, a rapid rapprochement started due to Turkish priority shift from the regime change to the prevention of Kurdish autonomy and the alienation from US; and Russian enthusiasm to get the cooperation of an ardent anti-regime NATO member like Turkey. It can be said that Russia and Turkey have been more process-oriented than result-oriented because they have been compelled to see the limits of their power and influence. As a result, they seem to prefer to focus on the process since they seem to reach their primary objective of showing their salience. All in all, one can only hope for a peaceful and democratic life for Syrians whom tremendously suffered also as a result of an imbroglio of all these global and regional powers’ policies.
Topic:
Foreign Policy, Bilateral Relations, Political Activism, and Kurds
Political Geography:
Russia, Eurasia, Turkey, Middle East, and Syria

293. The EU’s Approach to the Syrian Crisis: Turkey as a Partner?

Author:
Çiğdem Nas
Publication Date:
08-2019
Content Type:
Journal Article
Journal:
Uluslararasi Iliskiler
Institution:
International Relations Council of Turkey (UİK-IRCT)
Abstract:
The article aims to analyze the European Union (EU)’s approach to the Syrian crisis and to evaluate the role it attributes to Turkey. The EU’s approach staggered between supporting transition in Syria to a post-Assad regime and the need to protect itself against spill-over effects of the conflict. Two issues emerged as urgent priorities that determined the EU’s approach to the conflict. One of them was to control the outpouring of refugees fleeing war and oppression in Syria and the other was to deal with the growing threat of terrorism, mainly the ISIL threat. The influx of Syrian refugees through the Aegean and Balkan route to the EU surged in the summer of 2015 leading to practical and political problems for EU countries. In the meantime, ISIL related terror attacks in the EU created a major security problem and led several Member States to bring back border controls in the Schengen area. The EU turned to Turkey and sought Turkey’s cooperation in controlling the refugee flow and also keeping away the ISIL threat. The article looks at cooperation between Turkey and the EU and also points of contention that created hurdles in this cooperation.
Topic:
Foreign Policy, Bilateral Relations, European Union, Refugee Crisis, Syrian War, and Borders
Political Geography:
Europe, Turkey, Middle East, and Syria

294. A Dance of Entanglement: The US-Turkish Relations in the Context of the Syrian Conflict

Author:
Burcu Sari Karademir
Publication Date:
08-2019
Content Type:
Journal Article
Journal:
Uluslararasi Iliskiler
Institution:
International Relations Council of Turkey (UİK-IRCT)
Abstract:
Alliances under unipolarity operate with different logic than under bipolarity. Unipolarity makes the twin dangers of abandonment and entrapment more likely for the weaker states that need the unipole for the pursuit of their regional security interests. The article takes the US-Turkish relations within the context of Syrian conflict as exemplary and shows how the strategic discrepancies between the US-Turkish positions paved the way for Turkey’s abandonment in Syria. The article concludes that the unipole’s strategic alliance commitments are no longer reliable for regional allies to assume risky regional restructuring roles as they face the risk of abandonment on the halfway.
Topic:
International Relations, Alliance, Syrian War, and Unipolarity
Political Geography:
Turkey, Middle East, Syria, United States of America, and Mediterranean

295. Relations between Turkey and Syria in the 1980’s and 1990’s: Political Islam, Muslim Brotherhood and Intelligence Wars

Author:
Behlül Özkan
Publication Date:
08-2019
Content Type:
Journal Article
Journal:
Uluslararasi Iliskiler
Institution:
International Relations Council of Turkey (UİK-IRCT)
Abstract:
The aim of this study is to examine how continuities and discontinuities over a period of nearly half a century have shaped the AKP government’s relationship with the Syrian Muslim Brotherhood and the Assad regime. From the start of the 1980s until the 2011 Arab Uprisings, relations between Turkey, Turkish Islamists, Syria, and the Syrian Muslim Brotherhood remained highly complex. Based on the information available from open sources and newspaper archives, this study terms the conflict between the Turkish and Syrian intelligence services that broke out in the 1980s as an “intelligence war.” Both countries viewed the PKK and the Muslim Brotherhood – domestic enemies which they were trying to stamp out – as useful actors to be played off against the other party. While the Syrian/PKK part of the equation was frequently alluded to by the Turkish media and Turkish academia, Turkey’s relations with the Muslim Brotherhood were gradually forgotten. Though open support for the Brotherhood was never an element in Ankara’s official foreign policy, Turkey’s intelligence and security forces did establish ties to the Brotherhood in order to strengthen Turkey’s hand against Syria and made use of the organization insofar as it was in their interest to do so.
Topic:
Foreign Policy, Cold War, History, Syrian War, Islamism, and Muslim Brotherhood
Political Geography:
Turkey, Middle East, and Syria

296. North Korea’s Nuclear Program through the Lens of Strategıc Culture

Author:
Emine Akçadağ Alagöz
Publication Date:
08-2019
Content Type:
Journal Article
Journal:
Uluslararasi Iliskiler
Institution:
International Relations Council of Turkey (UİK-IRCT)
Abstract:
This paper presents an application of the concept of strategic culture as a possible way to analyze North Korea’s nuclear program. The goal is to illustrate that the strategic culture approach is a useful method to understand North Korea’s determination to develop nuclear capability, demonstrating the link between culture and behavior through Alastair Johnston’s methodology. The question of the formation of a North Korean strategic culture will be scrutinized through scoring the speeches and written messages of three North Korean leaders in terms of the presence of key cultural assumptions. Then, it will accordingly suggest that North Korea’s strategic culture, affecting the practices of its security policy, leads this country toward an active defense strategy, which implies a credible nuclear deterrence.
Topic:
Defense Policy, Nuclear Weapons, Military Strategy, Nuclear Power, Kim Jong-un, and Strategic Stability
Political Geography:
Asia and North Korea

297. Constructivism, Identity, ‘Manufactured’ Citizens: Russia’s Citizenship Policies in Abkhazia and South Ossetia

Author:
Didem Ekinci
Publication Date:
08-2019
Content Type:
Journal Article
Journal:
Uluslararasi Iliskiler
Institution:
International Relations Council of Turkey (UİK-IRCT)
Abstract:
This paper discusses through a Constructivist perspective that the aim of maintaining influence via great power identity in the Near Abroad which preserved its significance in the post-1991 Russian foreign policy under the statist/pragmatist and civilizationist schools’ influence, is reinforced through citizenship policies due to established collective identities with certain actors. The fact that Russia’s conferral of citizenship to certain peoples through old collective identities via long-time great power identity is not a newly invented and ephemeral policy but that its roots reflect influence-driven subjecthood/citizenship policies since the Tsarist times, strengthens the assumption that the Near Abroad is an irreplaceable region for Russia which may practice similar policies towards other actors in the Near Abroad in the future.
Topic:
Foreign Policy, Territorial Disputes, and Citizenship
Political Geography:
Russia, Eurasia, South Ossetia, and Abkhazia

298. One Step Forward, Two Steps Back: Legal Arguments on the Visa–Free Travel of Turkish Citizens to the EU

Author:
A. Aslı Bilgin and Pierluigi Simone
Publication Date:
08-2019
Content Type:
Journal Article
Journal:
Uluslararasi Iliskiler
Institution:
International Relations Council of Turkey (UİK-IRCT)
Abstract:
Within the scope of the Readmission Agreement signed in 2013 between the European Union (EU) and Turkey, the EU will grant visa–free travel for Turkish citizens in exchange for Turkey readmitting the illegally resident of third- country nationals transited through the territory of Turkey to Europe. However, in accordance with the EU–Turkey Association Law and the case–law of the Court of Justice of the European Union (CJEU), visa-free travel could be valid for Turkish citizens who would conduct or plan to conduct economic activity in the EU since the entry into force of the Additional Protocol (AP) of 1970 and Association Council Decision (ACD) No.1/80. This paper examines whether visa–free travel for Turkish citizens is an already-acquired right stemming from the EU–Turkey Association Law or would be a favor given by the EU in exchange for signing the Readmission Agreement, via the interpretation of Article 41 (1) of the AP and Article 13 of ACD 1/80, in light of the case–law of the CJEU.
Topic:
Bilateral Relations, Law, European Union, and Citizenship
Political Geography:
Europe, Turkey, Middle East, and Mediterranean

299. Can International Organisations Be Democratic? A Reassessment

Author:
Dawisson Belém Lopes and Guilherme Casarões
Publication Date:
12-2019
Content Type:
Journal Article
Journal:
Contexto Internacional
Institution:
Institute of International Relations, Pontifical Catholic University of Rio de Janeiro
Abstract:
This article makes the case for viewing international organisations (IOs) as global polyarchies. Our argument is twofold: on a theoretical level, IOs often meet the criterion of philosophical coherence, as they are based on rules of membership and decision-making that are compatible with those found in democratic institutions. On a practical level, we believe the concerns of IOs about pluralism, inclusiveness and efficacy go far beyond rhetoric, and may decisively influence their activities as well as their outcomes. To this end, the first section explores Robert Dahl’s concept of polyarchy and applies this to global institutions. In the subsequent sections, we advance our empirical argument with the UN as a case study. We reach three main conclusions. The first is that, at the bureaucratic level, the UN Secretariat performs some typically democratic functions, such as multilateral representation and the constitution of international regimes, which turns it into an important channel for feasible democracy in international politics. Second, at the multilateral level, the UN General Assembly (UNGA) represents a specific kind of representative polyarchy by allowing the greatest possible number of countries to have an equal say in global affairs. And third, it also serves as a gateway for multilevelled international representation by including a diversity of non-state actors in what has been called the ‘Third United Nations.’
Topic:
Globalization, International Organization, United Nations, and Democracy
Political Geography:
Global Focus

300. Private Standards in the WTO: A Multiple Streams Analysis of Resisting Forces in Multilateral Trade Negotiations

Author:
Yi Shin Tang and Bruno Youssef Yunen Alves de Lima
Publication Date:
12-2019
Content Type:
Journal Article
Journal:
Contexto Internacional
Institution:
Institute of International Relations, Pontifical Catholic University of Rio de Janeiro
Abstract:
The international trade system has been facing a relative decrease in the relevance of tariffs in favour of non-tariff, regulatory requirements (technical, sanitary and phytosanitary standards). The proliferation of these measures, which essentially consist of rules on product labelling and on production processes and methods, may be explained by the growing influence of private agents, such as corporations and business associations. Although these players are willing to develop and enforce a competing regulatory framework such as this on a broader range of topics, this may also generate more fragmented trade rules at both geographic and substantive levels, thus leading to a significant resistance among governments to integrate private standards into the multilateral trade system. Therefore, a mounting debate emerges on the ways in which private standards have been stonewalled in the current negotiation processes of the World Trade Organization (WTO). By relying on Kingdon’s Multiple Streams Framework (MSF), we address this question with a particular focus on the current efforts and struggles within the WTO to incorporate private regulations into the international trade agenda.
Topic:
Globalization, International Cooperation, International Trade and Finance, World Trade Organization, and Free Trade
Political Geography:
Global Focus