UPA Strategic Affairs Vol. 4 No: 2 (September 2023) (Special edition on Türkiye)
TABLE OF CONTENTS
1. Title: İstihbarat Başarısızlığı ve İdeolojik Dış Politika: Türkiye’nin Arap Baharı Sürecinde Beşar Esad’ı Devirme Politikası (PDF)
Author: Hasan Mesut ÖNDER & Timuçin KODAMAN
Article Category: International Relations / Intelligence Studies
Pages: 4-30
Summary: İstihbarat, devlet düzeyinde politika yapılırken, bir sorunun veya tehdidin karar verici tarafından anlaşılmasını sağlayan en önemli araçlardan bir tanesidir. Ancak literatür detaylı olarak incelendiğinde, istihbaratın çoğu zaman karar vericileri yeterince uyaramadığı ve başarısız olduğu görülmektedir. İstihbarat başarısızlığının birçok boyutunun bulunduğu ve her bir boyutunun başarısızlığa etki ettiği somut bir vaka olarak karşımızda durmaktadır. İstihbarat başarısızlığının analizden ve toplamadan kaynaklı nedenleri üzerinde birçok çalışma bulunmaktadır. Ancak ideolojik dış politika ile istihbarat başarısızlığı arasında nasıl bir ilişki olduğu ve bunların birbirini nasıl tetiklediğine dair yeterli düzeyde çalışma bulunmamaktadır. Bu çalışmada, ideolojik dış politikanın ve istihbarat başarısızlığının ne olduğu ve bu iki unsurun birbirini nasıl etkilediğinin çerçevesi çizilerek, bu bağlamda Türkiye’nin Arap Baharı sürecinde Suriye Devlet Başkanı Beşar Esad’ı devirme politikası incelenecektir.
Keywords: İstihbarat başarısızlığı, İdeolojik dış politika, Türkiye’nin Suriye politikası, Beşar Esad, Ahmet Davutoğlu.
Date of Submission: 05.08.2023
Date of Acceptance: 10.08.2023
2. Title: Momentary Partners: The Limitations of the Greek-Turkish Disaster Diplomacy in 2023 (PDF)
Author: Nikolaos STELGIAS
Article Category: International Relations
Pages: 31-55
Summary: In February 2023, major earthquakes struck the southern part of Türkiye, while significant tensions in the Aegean and Eastern Mediterranean dominated the Greek-Turkish relations. A few weeks later, dozens of civilians were killed when a train overturned in Tempe, Greece. Greece was among the first countries to aid Türkiye after the earthquakes and Türkiye reciprocated by expressing its condolences to Greece for the great train accident. Thus, 24 years after the 1999 earthquakes in Greece and Türkiye, which triggered the first wave of disaster diplomacy between the two countries, a new opportunity for dialogue and cooperation emerged in 2023. This paper intents to review two waves of Greek-Turkish disaster diplomacy in 1999 and 2023 with the aim of establishing their correspondence to the theory of disaster diplomacy. It also intends to compare two waves and point out similarities and differences. Moreover, the paper intends to argue that disaster itself does not lead to new diplomatic initiatives. As it is evident in the case of Greek-Turkish relations after the two waves of disaster diplomacy, cooperation can help build trust and goodwill between countries. Nevertheless, if disaster diplomacy does not develop into something more than a tactical diplomatic move and if the countries do not rush to instrumentalize the brief window of opportunity offered by the disasters, then the accumulated problems are expected to overshadow the attempts of building a long-lasting cooperation once again.
Keywords: Türkiye, Greece, Disaster diplomacy, Dialogue, Cooperation.
Date of Submission: 10.06.2023
Date of Acceptance: 10.08.2023
3. Title: Approche des principaux partis politiques sur la question kurde en Turquie (PDF)
Author: Ozan ÖRMECİ
Article Category: Political Science
Pages: 56-71
Summary: Il ne fait aucun doute que « le problème kurde », « le conflit turco-kurde » ou « la question kurde » est l’un des principaux problèmes politiques à résoudre dans la politique turque. En raison du problème kurde, le terrorisme du PKK a causé la mort de plus de 40 000 citoyens en Turquie depuis les années 1980. En tant que pays orienté vers l’Occident, s’efforçant de préserver et de renforcer son système démocratique, la Turquie a mis en œuvre diverses politiques dans le but de contrer la menace terroriste posée par le PKK, y compris des mesures antiterroristes sévères, la politisation du problème en permettant aux partis politiques pro-kurdes d’entrer au parlement turc ainsi que des pourparlers de paix avec les terroristes. Cependant, ces efforts n’ont pas mis fin au terrorisme du PKK jusqu’à présent. Au contraire, en raison de la guerre civile en Syrie, des organisations dérivées du PKK telles que le PYD et les YPG ont gagné du terrain en Syrie et ont obtenu le soutien politique, économique et militaire des pays occidentaux. En ce sens, la question kurde est encore très critique pour l’avenir du régime en Turquie. Cet article vise à analyser l’approche des principaux partis politiques turcs face à la question kurde en analysant leurs programmes et bulletins électoraux.
Keywords: La question kurde, l’AKP, CHP, MHP, Les Kurdes en Turquie.
Date of Submission: 07.08.2023
Date of Acceptance: 15.08.2023
4. Title: Trading State or Machiavellian State? Re-evaluating the Political Economy of Turkish Foreign Policy under Erdoğan (PDF)
Author: Oğuzhan GÖKSEL
Article Category: International Relations
Pages: 72-107
Summary: In 2009, Kemal Kirişçi penned one of the most widely cited articles on the interplay between economic factors and Turkish Foreign Policy – at a time when Turkey was still experiencing the early years of the AK Parti (Justice and Development Party) rule. Kirişçi adopted the concept of “trading state” – originally developed by Richard Rosecrance –and argued that Turkey’s consolidating democratization, rising trade with neighbors and soft power diplomacy could fully transform Turkey into a trading state that would base its foreign economic policy on a peace-seeking, pro-democratic, and free-trade oriented vision. The main research question I tackle with in this article is that if we prepare a report card on the foreign policy performance of the AK Parti, could we realistically evaluate contemporary Turkey as a trading state? As Turkey moved away from a supposedly democratizing polity in the 2000s to an increasingly illiberal regime with by 2023, the Turkish foreign economic policy strategy has assumed a “Machiavellian character”. It will be argued that the vision of the AK Parti administration is not shaped by a liberal outlook, but by a nationalist and party-based understanding of economic benefits. As the AK Parti’s rule has proved durable over the years, we have seen an economistic understanding of foreign policy making but not in ways envisaged by Liberal scholars such as Rosecrance and Kirişçi, and instead in the Neo-Realist – Machiavellian – ways illiberal polities (e.g. China) commonly formulate foreign economic policy.
Keywords: Political economy of Turkish Foreign Policy, Trading state, Democratic backsliding, Machiavellian theory of foreign economic policy, Regime survival strategy.
Date of Submission: 12.08.2023
Date of Acceptance: 29.08.2023
5. Title: The Global Success Story of Japan’s Soft Power: Debating ‘Cool Japan’ as a Model for Turkish Soft Power Projection (PDF)
Author: Natavan HUSEYNOVA
Article Category: International Relations
Pages: 108-141
Summary: There is an ever-growing scholarly literature on various aspects of the soft power of Turkey as this subject has been among the most popular and widely studied aspects of Turkish Foreign Policy in the early 21st century. Yet, comparative works examining the effectiveness of Turkish soft power versus other notable soft powers are still relatively hard to find. Moreover, there is an even more notable gap in the literature in terms of discussing what exactly enables the strategies of “established soft powers” (e.g. U.S., UK, France, Germany, and Japan) to be more successful than that of Turkey, and to discuss what Turkish policy-makers could possibly learn from these tried and tested methods. In the centennial anniversary of the Republic of Turkey in 2023, the time may have come for the Turkish intelligentsia and government to acknowledge the notable rise of Turkish soft power since the 1990s, but also re-think of the ways in which the current vision could be substantially improved in light of valuable lessons drawn from global soft power success stories such as Japan. In this article, I will argue that the case of Japan proves that soft power is not just a natural outcome of a country’s vast hard power reserves (e.g. economic power in the manner of Gross Domestic Product), but is a phenomenon that could be “designed” – to a large extent – by a government. Furthermore, Japan’s various successful policies such as the ‘Cool Japan’ program and Tokyo’s systematic cultural and economic diplomacy offers valuable blueprints for Turkish soft power to be re-designed in our time.
Keywords: Japanese soft power, Cultural diplomacy, Cool Japan, Turkish soft power, Turkish Foreign Policy.
Date of Submission: 16.08.2023
Date of Acceptance: 23.08.2023
6. Title: Turkish Foreign Policy Practices Against Irregular Migration in the Aegean Sea and Its Impacts on International Security in the Context of Normative Theory (PDF)
Author: Tuba TAŞLICALI KOÇ
Article Category: International Relations
Pages: 142-170
Summary: In today’s world, important developments are taking place in the agenda of international politics and scholars are trying to understand and explain these developments in the context of certain theories. In this study, by examining how the Normative Theory is perceived by scholars of International Relations discipline and by using the ethical questions of the Normative Theory, Türkiye’s foreign policy practices towards irregular migration incidents in the Aegean Sea and the effects of these practices on international security are examined. In this context, the main factors that play a role in the development process of the Normative Theory are explained in the introduction part while having been briefly examined the basic questions that fall into the field of study in the context of the development process and the arguments of the Normative Theory in the first chapter. In the second chapter, legal aspects of irregular immigration are defined. As the main subject of the article is the effects of Turkish Foreign Policy practices on the problem of irregular immigrants in the Aegean Sea on international security, the third chapter analyzes the foreign policy practices of Türkiye in terms of Normative Theory.
Keywords: Normative Theory, Irregular migration, Turkish Foreign Policy, Aegean Sea, International security.
Date of Submission: 10.07.2023
Date of Acceptance: 21.08.2023
7. Title: Energy Security Policies of the Republic of Türkiye in the 21st Century: Can the Target of Relative Energy Independence Be Achievable? (PDF)
Author: Sina KISACIK
Article Category: International Relations / Energy Politics
Pages: 171-203
Summary: Türkiye possessing sui generis characteristic features, its pursuing of domestic as well as foreign/security policies closely followed not only by its neighbours, but also by outer regional countries and international organizations, is trying to safeguard of its energy security policies. Because of the provision of political stability in the 2000s, the gradual economic growth annually has obviously caused the practise of great increases on residential and industrial/commercial energy consumption forming the foremost components of Turkish economic system. Türkiye, insufficient on oil and gas, is importing these resources with high dependence to close this gap in this field as well as to continue its sustainable development. That dependency happens at more than 90 % in these energy resources. Also, Ankara has been increasing efforts to discover hydrocarbons within its territories. So, to decrease its high dependence on energy imports in the 2000s, Türkiye has been attaching unique diversification efforts to reach a balanced energy mix by making huge investments into renewable energy resources as well as nuclear energy. In the 2030s and 2040s, Türkiye targets to become a less hydrocarbon-dependent country and have more clean energy systems via renewable energy (RE). Whether or not this target is accomplishable will be determined by conjunctural developments in the international energy world and Ankara’s determinedness on reaching net zero carbon economics.
Keywords: Türkiye, Oil, Natural gas, Nuclear energy, Renewable energy.
Date of Submission: 05.08.2023
Date of Acceptance: 22.08.2023
8. Title: Birinci ve İkinci Karabağ Savaşlarında Türkiye-Azerbaycan İlişkileri (PDF)
Author: Nail ALKAN & Mahsa MEHDİZADEHYOUSHANLOUEİ
Article Category: International Relations
Pages: 204-227
Summary: Azerbaycan Cumhuriyeti 1918’de Azerbaycan tarihi topraklarının kuzey bölgesinde kurulmuştur, ancak 1920’de Ruslar tarafından işgal edilmiş ve 1991’e kadar SSCB’nin terkibinde kalmıştır. SSCB’nin dağılmasıyla birlikte Azerbaycan bağımsızlığını kazanmıştır, ancak SSCB döneminin eseri olan Karabağ’ın Ermenistan tarafından işgal edilmesi Azerbaycan için iki büyük savaşı beraberinde getirmiştir. 1991 sonrası ikinci kere bağımsızlığını kazanmış ve yeniden kurulmuş bir devlet olarak, Azerbaycan, Sovyetler Birliği döneminin yıkıcı izleri ile birlikte iç sorunlarla da savaşırken, Ermenistan’ın saldırı ve işgal politikasıyla da karşı karşıya kalmıştır. Birleşmiş Milletler Güvenlik Konseyi’nin 822, 853, 874 ve 884 sayılı kararlarına dayanarak işgal edilmiş Azerbaycan topraklarından askeri birliklerin derhal çekilmesi istenmiş, ancak bu kararlara dair herhangi bir uygulama ve yaptırım olmadığı gibi, Ermenistan söz konusu kararlara uymayarak Azerbaycan topraklarını işgal etmeye devam etmiştir. Türkiye için Azerbaycan’ın toprak bütünlüğünün korunması büyük öneme sahiptir. Azerbaycan’ın işgal edilmiş topraklarını kurtarmak için verdiği savaşlarda Türkiye’nin tutum ve hareketleri önemli bir faktör olarak sayılmaktadır.
Keywords: Azerbaycan, Türkiye, Karabağ, Ermenistan.
Date of Submission: 10.08.2023
Date of Acceptance: 28.08.2023
9. Title: Kitap İncelemesi: Türk Dış Politikası: Aktörler, Krizler, Tercihler, Çözümler (PDF)
Author: Seda Gözde TOKATLI
Article Category: International Relations
Pages: 228-243
Date of Submission: 13.08.2023
Date of Acceptance: 18.08.2023
