Making Sense of Turkey’s Foreign Policy from the Perspective of Neorealism

Abstract

This study singles out the impact of systemic and external factors on Turkey's foreign policy from the establishment of the Republic until now. Such an exercise accords with a neorealist interpretation of foreign policy, as the key emphasis is on the impact of the anarchical nature of the external environment, and the influence of the distribution of material power capabilities among states at a given time on foreign policy preferences. This in no way suggests that the internal and individual level of factors holds a secondary place in comparison to systemic/external factors. Yet this article simply highlights the importance of systemic factors, for the main reason that neorealism seems to account for foreign policy choices and behaviors of middle powers more convincingly than in the case of great powers.