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Begin New Search Political Geography Turkey Publication Year within 25 Years

1021. Globalization and the Crisis of Authoritarian Modernization in Turkey

Author:
Hasan Kösebalaban
Publication Date:
10-2009
Content Type:
Journal Article
Journal:
Insight Turkey
Institution:
SETA Foundation for Political, Economic and Social Research
Abstract:
Conventional models developed through the conceptual lenses of modernization theory dating back to the 1960s, are no longer applicable to Turkish politics; they fall short of grasping the changes that Turkish ideologies experienced in recent decades. In the face of Turkey's growing democratization and societal modernization, Turkish secularists have lost their status as agents of reform and gradually emerged as defenders of the status quo in the face of the rapid mobilization of Anatolian-based conservative society. However, no factor was more responsible for this transformation than the comprehensive external and internal structural changes that Turkey experienced in the post-Cold War era, leading to the emergence of a globalist conservative ideology in large parts of Anatolia. This paper examines the question of why those who are commonly associated in Western scholarly discourse with progress and modernity, have fallen behind the Muslim conservatives in pursuit of democratization and further integration of the country with the West. The paper argues that at the root of the present conflict lies the tension between two modernization routes: a bureaucratic top-down modernization that has allowed the allocation of privileges to the secularist/nationalist elites, and the grassroots socio-economic mobilization of conservative societal elements benefiting from international integration and globalization.
Topic:
Cold War and Democratization
Political Geography:
Turkey

1022. The Rise and Decline of the Turkish "Deep State": The Ergenekon Case

Author:
Serdar Kaya
Publication Date:
10-2009
Content Type:
Journal Article
Journal:
Insight Turkey
Institution:
SETA Foundation for Political, Economic and Social Research
Abstract:
This article tests Mancur Olson's theory of distributional coalitions against the case of the Turkish "deep state." Olson's theory holds that rent-seeking (or specialinterest) groups tend to be exclusive by nature and pursue only the interests of their own members. Since their members account to a very small minority, these groups present their interests as being the interests of larger communities. The article argues that the Turkish case confirms the fundamental assumptions of the theory of distributional coalitions. An analysis of the historical process of the newly-exposed Turkish deep state reveals that, when put in proper context, its clandestine activities manifest a pattern which involves systematic efforts of an exclusive circle of group members (1) to impact the workings of Turkish society, and more recently, (2) to reverse the country's democratization process in an effort to sustain the network's dominating influence.
Political Geography:
Turkey

1023. Turkey in the UN Security Council: Its Elections and Performance

Author:
Berdal Aral
Publication Date:
10-2009
Content Type:
Journal Article
Journal:
Insight Turkey
Institution:
SETA Foundation for Political, Economic and Social Research
Abstract:
Turkey successfully gained provisional membership of the United Nations Security Council by receiving support from 151 states in the UN General Assembly. Turkey is serving in the SC for the period between January 1, 2009 and December 31, 2010. This historic achievement was the end product of arduous efforts on the part of the ErdoÄŸan government which has braced itself for membership of the Security Council since 2003. Membership no doubt brings Turkey plenty of benefits, like enhancing Turkey's international political weight and prestige. However, it also poses challenges to the credibility of Turkey's multi-dimensional and assertive foreign policy with its strong tinge of fairness. Turkey ought now to take principled stances on many key issues relevant to international peace and security even at the cost of disappointing its long list of friends.
Topic:
Foreign Policy and United Nations
Political Geography:
Turkey

1024. Sadık Ünay, Neo-liberal Globalization and Institutional Reform: The Political Economy of Development Planning in Turkey

Author:
Ziya Öniş
Publication Date:
10-2009
Content Type:
Journal Article
Journal:
Insight Turkey
Institution:
SETA Foundation for Political, Economic and Social Research
Abstract:
New York: Nova Science Publishers, Inc., 2006, 221 pp., ISBN. 978-1600210709. Ziya ÖniÅŸ, p. 177Insight Turkey, Vol. 11, No.4, 2009, p. 177
Topic:
Development and Reform
Political Geography:
New York and Turkey

1025. Between Ethnic-Nationalism, Civic-Nationalism and Cosmopolitanism: Discourses on the Identity of the EU and the Debates on Turkey's Accession

Author:
Sara Kahn-Nisser
Publication Date:
06-2009
Content Type:
Journal Article
Journal:
Alternatives: Turkish Journal of International Relations
Institution:
Center for International Conflict Resolution at Yalova University
Abstract:
This paper seeks to contribute to our understanding of the issue of collective identity in the EU, and its relation to the process of enlargement. Through an analysis of the European Parliament's (EP) debates on the accession of Turkey, I will show that the issue of European collective identity is essential for understanding the EP's position towards Turkey. I will explicate the view on inclusion and diversity in the EU, implicit in speeches made in the EP. My analysis will show that there is a complex, two-way relation between the members of the European parliament's (MEP) views on inclusion and diversity in the EU, and their position towards Turkey. Another conclusion has to do with the relation between state nationalism and European integration. My findings suggest that the EP is quite indifferent towards state-national identities and cultures, and does not see them as assets to be preserved.
Political Geography:
Europe and Turkey

1026. Turkey's New Activism in Asia

Author:
Bülent Aras, Kenan Dağcı, and M. Efe Çaman
Publication Date:
06-2009
Content Type:
Journal Article
Journal:
Alternatives: Turkish Journal of International Relations
Institution:
Center for International Conflict Resolution at Yalova University
Abstract:
This article aims to analyse Turkey's foreign policy towards Asia, which is part of Turkey's emerging universal foreign policy vision. The notion of geographic imagination is provided to theorize Turkey's emerging policy attitudes and behaviors. Turkey's involvement in Asia will focus on the development of economic relations, security cooperation, supporting Asian political schemes for a multilateral world order and playing a facilitator role in Asia's encounter with the West. This new foreign policy orientation links the reform and change in the domestic landscape and Turkey's new activism in Asia, which has opened new horizons in its relations with Asian states and has encouraged policy-makers in their search for a central role in a number of regions ranging from Africa to Asia.
Political Geography:
Africa, Turkey, and Asia

1027. Language, Identity and Politics in Turkey: Nationalist Discourse on Creating a Common Turkic Language

Author:
Yilmaz Bingol
Publication Date:
06-2009
Content Type:
Journal Article
Journal:
Alternatives: Turkish Journal of International Relations
Institution:
Center for International Conflict Resolution at Yalova University
Abstract:
This paper aims to analyze ever growing trend among Turkish nationalist toward creation of a common literary language for all Turkic peoples. The issue is not indeed new. It may trace back to the nineteenth century, but got a great acceleration during the establishment of Turkish Republic in the first quarter of the twentieth century. Although the modernization movement led by Mustafa Kemal Ataturk and his comrades had a different agenda excluding and/or ignoring Turkic elements of Central Asia, this policy faced severe resistance from traditionalists, that is, from both Turkist-nationalists and Islamists since the very beginning of the modernist reform movement.
Political Geography:
Central Asia and Turkey

1028. Harmonizing Foreign Policy: Turkey, the EU and the Middle East (Mesut Ozcan)

Author:
Kutbettin Kilic
Publication Date:
09-2009
Content Type:
Journal Article
Journal:
Alternatives: Turkish Journal of International Relations
Institution:
Center for International Conflict Resolution at Yalova University
Abstract:
Turkish foreign policy has made a remarkable achievement in recent years, raising the influence of Turkey in surrounding critical regions, extending from the Balkans to the Middle East and as well as in international politics. With Harmonizing Foreign Policy: Turkey, the EU and the Middle East, Mesut Ozcan sets about to explicate a part of this picture, that is, the shift in Turkish foreign policy towards the Middle East, which, the author argues, becomes more visible in policies towards Iraq and the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. 1999 is the beginning of the aforementioned shift, according to Ozcan, a year in which the EU gave Turkey a candidature status and Abdullah Ocalan, the leader and founder of the PKK, was arrested. This was also a year that provided Turkish decision makers with a democratic opening in foreign policy—a shift from security-oriented foreign policy to a democracy-oriented one. From that time onwards, Turkey, according to Ozcan, has been exposed to the process of Europeanization of foreign policy, a process that has taken Turkey away from a foreign policy under American influence.
Political Geography:
America, Europe, Turkey, and Middle East

1029. Winning Turkey: How America, Europe and Turkey Can Revive a Fading Partnership

Author:
Ali Sarihan
Publication Date:
12-2009
Content Type:
Journal Article
Journal:
Alternatives: Turkish Journal of International Relations
Institution:
Center for International Conflict Resolution at Yalova University
Abstract:
Partnership between Turkey, America and Europe has been fading gradually. During the Cold War, Turkey was a vital player for America and Europe. However, the falling of the USSR and some significant events in the last decades, such as Iraq War and Luxemburg Conference, have led decreasing relations between Turkey, America and Europe. Winning Turkey is flashing on the partnership's problems, and probable solutions for the problems.
Political Geography:
America, Europe, and Turkey

1030. Identities in Migrant Cinema: The Aesthetics of European Integration

Author:
Jalene Betts
Publication Date:
01-2009
Content Type:
Journal Article
Journal:
Macalester International
Institution:
Macalester College
Abstract:
Although much progress was made in Europe over the last half century with regard to the integration of markets and the near-vaporization of national borders, recent years show that, contrary to the illusion of an “enlightened” continent free from the racism of the past, ethnicity continues to play a role in European culture. As demonstrated by disputes in the Balkan region over Kosovo's independence, debates on the acceptance of new member states into the European Union (in particular Turkey's application for admittance), and growing concerns over immigration in the Netherlands and France, ethnicity seems to prove itself as a thing of the present, not the past. Media coverage of the “problems” of Islam—unemployed “Arab” youths roaming the streets, young girls forced to wear head-coverings by their “sexist” relatives—is a reality, whether or not the claims made by such representations are valid.
Political Geography:
Europe, Turkey, France, and Netherlands