Managing Change and Continuity in Turkish foreign policy: A neoclassical realist assessment (original) (raw)
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Turkish Studies, Vol 15, Issue 1, 2014, pp. 117-138
ABSTRACT This article analyses different approaches to Turkish foreign policy (TFP) from a critical realist perspective. It seeks to criticize positivist and post-positivist approaches to TFP, arguing for a non-reductionist, historical materialist approach based on the principles of critical realism. It argues that historical materialist approaches are missing both from the analysis of TFP and from the mainstream foreign-policy analysis in general. In emphasizing the importance of a historical materialist approach, the paper also underlines the importance of acknowledging the structural context of foreign policy-making as a complement to the agent-centric, micro-level analyses that dominate the mainstream TFP analysis. Finally, it advocates a research agenda that focuses on the development of a historical materialist approach to TFP
For decades, change in Turkish foreign policy has remained as " a neglected phenomenon " in the literature while continuity is explained with two main pillars: Westernization and preference for the status quo. The topic started gaining popularity at the end of 2000s when some conflicts of interest emerged between Turkey and its traditional partners. Scholars mainly explained this change as the result of the new Turkish leadership under Recep Tayyip Erdoğan's Justice and Development Party (AKP). While the debate in this period provided extensive literature on the subject, the arguments created could not explain the policy fluctuations during the AKP era. In this article, the change in AKP foreign policy is examined during three time periods that show different characteristics in terms of domestic and international opportunities/constraints. It is argued that while Westernization still remains an important pillar in Turkish foreign policy, the main change seems to be in Turkey's traditional preference for the status quo.
This article explores the divergence between public discourse and Turkish foreign policy practice in the context of Turkey's regional pressures. It argues that divergence occurs because elites rearrange the hierarchy of domestic ideas that connect with foreign policy. This allows them to respond to regional threats appropriately, without undue interference from domestic political forces. Thus, to achieve optimal strategic outcomes, Turkish elites use emotive language around topics less likely to impact the immediate security, such as the USA and Israel, while deemphasizing higher order issues, such as Syria and Iran, which do have considerable security implications.
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Since 2011, the Syrian Civil War has become an arena of international competition between regional and global powers. As a dominant regional actor, Turkey has important interests in this conflict. However, although great importance is given to civil war factors and power balances at the field level, Turkey’s internal conditions play a role as well as these externalities. Therefore, an analysis of Turkey’s foreign policy towards Syria from a local perspective is needed to reveal some negligible dynamics. In this direction, this study aims to analyse Turkey’s foreign policy towards Syria, taking into account the interaction between Turkey’s external and internal dynamics within the framework of neoclassical realist theory. Within this scope, we ask “how do Turkish external and internal dynamics explain its foreign policy in Syria?” as the leading search question and conduct our analysis using the explanatory case study method. Based on our findings, we provide a broad perspective on t...