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1. The Trajectory of International Relations Dissertations in Turkish Academia Between 2000 and 2020

Author:
Özge Özkoç and Çağlayan. Pınar
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:
Dissertations are among the most important elements of academic production, along with scientific research articles and books. They not only reveal an academic’s field of research, but also provide clues as to what research methods and tools scholars will employ in postdoctoral studies. Moreover, and crucial to this paper, they are important indicators of the trajectory of research fields, as well as their general roles in the academic world. This study aims to reveal general trends/indicators in Turkish International Relations (hereafter IR) dissertations through an analysis of IR dissertations written in various Turkish universities between 2000 and 2020. There is a rather widespread claim among IR academics in Turkey that this particular community largely contributes to the Western-oriented discipline of IR as local or regional experts, dealing mainly with Turkish foreign policy and regional problems rather than with theoretical concerns in IR. A further aim of this study is to test whether this claim remains valid with the analysis of recent IR dissertations produced in Turkish universities.
Topic:
International Relations, Diplomacy, International Law, Academia, and Dissertations
Political Geography:
Turkey and Middle East

2. Turkish IR Journals through a Bibliometric Lens

Author:
Hakan Mehmetcik and Hasan Hakses
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:
This article aims at evaluating three International Relations (IR) journals in Turkey, namely, All Azimuth, Insight Turkey, and Uluslararası İlişkiler Dergisi. The scholarly contributions of these three journals to Turkish IR is worthy of exploration since together they constitute ‘the mainstream’ of Turkish IR journals. To this end, this article applies a bibliometric analysis in surveying all three journals' publication records in order to provide a general picture of the field in the last decade. When we consider an evaluation of the Turkish IR community, these three journals are also important and represent different sub-groups and interests among Turkish IR scholars. The field orientations and organization of the IR discipline in a given country may be understood by studying the leading journals of the field in that country. With this assumption in mind, this paper attempts to distinguish certain characteristic differences and similarities among these three journals by surveying their materials and authorships using comparative bibliometric analysis. While there are several articles in the literature that discuss the contents of these publications, no comparative bibliometric analysis has ever been conducted on them.
Topic:
International Relations, Academia, and Meta-analysis
Political Geography:
Turkey and Middle East

3. Non-Western Theories in International Relations Education and Research: The Case of Turkey/Turkish Academia FacebookLinkedInTwitterMendeleyEmail

Author:
Mehmet Akif Okur and Cavit Emre Aytekin
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:
This study examines the usage of non-Western theories in research and education by International Relations (IR) scholars in Turkey. Our primary purpose is to understand the level of engagement with the non-Western IR debate, with its prospects and variations, in Turkish academia, and to evaluate the familiarity of Turkish IR scholars from different schools with non-Western IR theories. Relevant data were obtained from a questionnaire with 47 items designed to let participants, consisting of 116 academicians at IR departments from 57 Turkish Universities, provide their teaching experiences, views, and perceptions concerning non-Western IR Theory. While our findings based on this data confirm the literature on the scarcity of non-Western theories in Turkish IR scholarship, we have also furthered it with many details. Firstly, according to the findings, respondents who study and teach IR Theory at Turkish universities think that the IR theories of Western origin dominating the literature are not universal or objective in terms of their function as interpreters of IR issues. But interestingly, those considerations direct scholars to Western critical IR Theory schools rather than non-Western theories. The other key conclusion of this study confirms our expectations. The thoughts, concepts and theories emanating from the Turkish-Islamic world have much more recognition than other non-Western IR theories among Turkish IR scholars.
Topic:
International Relations, Research, International Relations Theory, Academia, and Survey
Political Geography:
Turkey and Middle East

4. Sea Blindness in Turkish International Relations Literature

Author:
Levent Kırval and Arda Özkan
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 oceans and seas cover 72% of the Earth’s surface, and 85% of global trade is done by maritime transportation. Moreover, 40% of the world’s population lives on or near coastlines. Also, the oceans play a crucial role in Earth’s biosphere. Recently, by desalination techniques, the seas have become a potable water resource. Therefore, one can say that the oceans and seas are indispensable for mankind. However, international disputes and collaboration efforts between states regarding the seas are not widely studied by scholars of international relations (IR). This can be referred to as sea blindness, and it may be defined as an inability to appreciate the importance of seas and naval power, particularly with regards to strategic security and economic prosperity. A country with sea blindness is not aware of maritime supremacy as an important foreign policy tool. Similarly, IR scholars mostly focus on land conflicts and not on sea issues when they study international politics. This is particularly true in Turkish IR literature as issues on land are again the focus areas for Turkish scholars. In this context, this article makes an analysis of the articles in peer-reviewed journals and books published by well-known publishers in Turkey, providing statistics about the issues covered. Also, for comparison, major political science and IR journals published abroad are analysed with regards to publications related to the seas. This statistical analysis elucidates whether there is sea blindness in Turkish IR literature. The number of articles and books that cover the seas as crucial study areas of IR in Turkey, as well as their broad focus areas and perspectives, are revealed by this study.
Topic:
International Relations, Maritime, Oceans and Seas, and Disputes
Political Geography:
Turkey and Middle East

5. 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

6. International Relations in Search of an Antidote

Author:
Ali L. Karaosmanoğlu
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:
This essay is based on the author’s long-time observation of the International Relations discipline and the repeated crises it has experienced. The piece identifies ‘event-drivenness’ as the structural reason behind these crises, in other words, the course of the discipline naturally follows global IR events and, depending on how transformative these events are, when responding to them, is more likely to fall into an existential crisis—with the most recent one being potentially fatal. By discussing in detail the a) science-statecraft relationship; b) scholar-practitioner disconnect; c) distortion of theories by scholars and practitioners; d) paradoxical relationship between rationality and irrationality; and e) theory-practice disconnect, the essay seeks to operationalize these crisisgenerated processes when responding to major events. In order to show these crisis generation processes in detail, it uses the theories of political realism and, to a lesser degree, classical liberalism, as case reflections. As a possible solution to the reciprocal condescension between scholarship (theory-making) and statecraft (practice), the essay proposes a “Clausewitzian” modus vivendi that aims at creating a culture of synthesis between the presumed producers and consumers of IR knowledge.
Topic:
International Relations, Academia, and Knowledge Production
Political Geography:
Global Focus

7. The Monroe Doctrine as the Will and Idea of the United States of America

Author:
Boris Martynov
Publication Date:
01-2023
Content Type:
Journal Article
Journal:
International Affairs: A Russian Journal of World Politics, Diplomacy and International Relations
Institution:
East View Information Services
Abstract:
On February 24, 2022, international relations entered a whole new stage of development affecting, albeit to varying degrees, practically all states, with no end in sight. On September 7, 2022, speaking at the Eastern Economic Forum, Russian President Vladimir Putin said that the world was experiencing “fundamental transformations.” Such transformations generally require several years to be completed. By the middle of the third decade of the 21st century, two highly important signs of a new situation have become absolutely clear: a crisis of the old institutions of global governance and the new rising and developing centers of power. At the same time, the opinion that the new is just the “well-forgotten old” is confirmed. This is especially true of the US and its policies.
Topic:
International Relations, Foreign Policy, History, Governance, Law, Psychology, Identity, and Monroe Doctrine
Political Geography:
Russia, Global Focus, and United States of America

8. Russia’s Aggression Against Ukraine: Concept, Ideology, Objectives, Means, Consequences

Author:
Plamen Pantev
Publication Date:
02-2023
Content Type:
Research Paper
Institution:
Institute for Security and International Studies (ISIS)
Abstract:
The study tries to outline interim conclusions about the concept, the ideology, the objectives and the tools used by the Russian federation in this barbaric war of attrition against Ukraine – a war of a nuclear superpower against a smaller neighbouring country. The study does not aim to analyse the strange way the war is developing – Russians carry on military attacks in both a regular and terrorist manner 7 on the whole territory of Ukraine, while the Ukrainians are deterred to counter-attack the aggressor on the latter’s own territory and to fight with longer-range arms even on their own land. The author understands how many issues from the theoretic fields of international relations, foreign, security and defense studies need to be considered to understand in a holistic way the final result of the interaction of domestic Russian, international, political, economic, governance, psychological and other problems that led to launching an aggressive and devastating war in the European continent by Moscow. The purpose of the study is not to outline the avalanche of mistakes in the policy of the collective West towards a showing for decades signs of revenge imperialist Russia. Neither it aims to point to the multitude of military mistakes by the aggressor in the last year. The aim of the study is to outline and discuss the concept, the ideology, the objectives and the means of the Russian aggression. Revealing the Nazi-like behaviour of the Russian leadership and its armed forces could serve to construct the broader picture of the developing conflict and learn how to prevent a similar invasion by Moscow. The study aims to prove that the legal and moral consequences of the war will be the conviction of the aggressor for the genocide and the war crimes. This would be the only possibility for normalising the life of the Ukrainians and the Russians as well as of the broader international relations system.
Topic:
International Relations, Security, NATO, Imperialism, Sovereignty, European Union, Conflict, Ideology, and Russia-Ukraine War
Political Geography:
Russia, Europe, and Ukraine

9. Beyond European extraterritoriality, for legal intelligence and compliance in the service of sovereignty: A response to the extraterritoriality of foreign laws to safeguard fundamental European values

Author:
Amélie Giuliani
Publication Date:
01-2023
Content Type:
Policy Brief
Institution:
Robert Schuman Foundation (RSF)
Abstract:
In this period of change, companies must anticipate their local legal environment, regional and international regulations and foreign laws with extraterritorial scope on a daily basis.
Topic:
International Relations, Sovereignty, Law, European Union, and Compliance
Political Geography:
Europe

10. PLA Logistics and Sustainment: PLA Conference 2022

Author:
George R. Shatzer, Roger D. Cliff, Kenneth Allen, Joshua Arostegui, and Justin Boggess
Publication Date:
02-2023
Content Type:
Special Report
Institution:
The Strategic Studies Institute of the U.S. Army War College
Abstract:
The US Army War College People’s Liberation Army Conference (PLA) Conference was held March 31 to April 2, 2022, at Carlisle Barracks, Pennsylvania. The conference focused on PLA logistics and sustainment. As the PLA continues to build and modernize its combat forces, it is important to examine if the capabilities meant to support combat operations are also being developed. Specific topics included: 1) China’s national-level logistics, including how China mobilizes national resources for the military and how it provides joint logistics support to the PLA Theater Commands; 2) the logistics capabilities of the different PLA services, especially the Army, Navy, and Air Forces; 3) PLA logistics in China’s remote regions, such as airpower projection in the Western Theater Command along the Indian border; and, 4) the PLA’s ability to sustain overseas operations at its base in Djibouti. Despite notable potential shortfalls and points of friction, the PLA has successfully sustained counterpiracy maritime operations for many years and conducted noncombatant evacuation operations well-distant from China. It is increasingly able to move forces across the vast distances of China and conduct large training exercises. Far more must be known about PLA sustainment and logistics before the hard questions about PLA operational reach and endurance can be answered.
Topic:
International Relations, Defense Policy, Logistics, Mobilization, Military, People's Liberation Army (PLA), and Power Projection
Political Geography:
China and Asia