Pub Date : 2020-02-01DOI: 10.1177/0304375419898577
I. Baron, Jonathan Havercroft, Isaac Kamola, J. Koomen, A. Prichard
Is it possible to write a publishable, peer-reviewed academic paper in a day? We attempted this task in 2016, motivated by a desire to find new ways of doing academic work in the face of our growing sense of alienation within the neoliberal academy. This article provides our analysis of academic alienation and an auto-ethnography of our experiment. We discuss four lessons learned: (1) knowledge as a social relation, (2) time and the academy, (3) gender and collaborative writing, and (4) the contradictions and possibilities of anarchy and authorship. We also offer practical advice for scholars looking to engage in similar collaborations.
{"title":"Flipping the Academic Conference, or How We Wrote a Peer-Reviewed Journal Article in a Day","authors":"I. Baron, Jonathan Havercroft, Isaac Kamola, J. Koomen, A. Prichard","doi":"10.1177/0304375419898577","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1177/0304375419898577","url":null,"abstract":"Is it possible to write a publishable, peer-reviewed academic paper in a day? We attempted this task in 2016, motivated by a desire to find new ways of doing academic work in the face of our growing sense of alienation within the neoliberal academy. This article provides our analysis of academic alienation and an auto-ethnography of our experiment. We discuss four lessons learned: (1) knowledge as a social relation, (2) time and the academy, (3) gender and collaborative writing, and (4) the contradictions and possibilities of anarchy and authorship. We also offer practical advice for scholars looking to engage in similar collaborations.","PeriodicalId":46677,"journal":{"name":"Alternatives","volume":null,"pages":null},"PeriodicalIF":1.3,"publicationDate":"2020-02-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"https://sci-hub-pdf.com/10.1177/0304375419898577","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"47195518","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":3,"RegionCategory":"社会学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2020-02-01DOI: 10.1177/0304375419901220
G. Sonnert
This article develops the proposal that U.S. Supreme Court Justices should be selected by sortition. The greatest threat to the legitimacy of the Supreme Court emanates from ever more politicized selection contests under the current system. Removing politics from Supreme Court recruitment is therefore crucial, and sortition is argued to be a suitable vehicle for accomplishing this. The proposal is motivated through a wider discussion of sortition and democracy.
{"title":"Give Chance a Chance: An Alternative Process for Selecting U.S. Supreme Court Justices","authors":"G. Sonnert","doi":"10.1177/0304375419901220","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1177/0304375419901220","url":null,"abstract":"This article develops the proposal that U.S. Supreme Court Justices should be selected by sortition. The greatest threat to the legitimacy of the Supreme Court emanates from ever more politicized selection contests under the current system. Removing politics from Supreme Court recruitment is therefore crucial, and sortition is argued to be a suitable vehicle for accomplishing this. The proposal is motivated through a wider discussion of sortition and democracy.","PeriodicalId":46677,"journal":{"name":"Alternatives","volume":null,"pages":null},"PeriodicalIF":1.3,"publicationDate":"2020-02-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"https://sci-hub-pdf.com/10.1177/0304375419901220","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"48035174","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":3,"RegionCategory":"社会学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2019-05-01DOI: 10.1177/0304375419853350
Thierry Ribault
This article is a contribution to the political economy of consent based on the analysis of speeches, declarations, initiatives, and policies implemented in the name of resilience in the context of the Fukushima nuclear disaster. It argues that, in practice as much as in theory, resilience fuels peoples’ submission to an existing reality—in the case of Fukushima, the submission to radioactive contamination—in an attempt to deny this reality as well as its consequences. The political economy of consent to the nuclear, of which resilience is one of the technologies, can be grasped at four interrelated analytical levels adapted to understanding how resilience is encoded in key texts and programs in the wake of the Fukushima Daiichi accident. The first level is technological: consent through and to the nuclear technology. The second level is sociometabolic: consent to nuisance. The third level is political: consent to participation. The fourth level is epistemological: consent to ignorance. A fifth cognitivo-experimental transversal level can also be identified: consent to experimentation, learning and training. We first analyze two key symptoms of the despotism of resilience: its incantatory feature and the way it supports mutilated life within a contaminated area and turns disaster into a cure. Then, we show how, in the reenchanted world of resilience, loss opens doors, that is, it paves the way to new “forms of life”: first through ignorance-based disempowerment; second through submission to protection. Finally, we examine the ideological mechanisms of resilience and how it fosters a government through the fear of fear. We approach resilience as a technology of consent mobilizing emotionalism and conditioning on one side, contingency and equivalence on the other.
{"title":"Resilience in Fukushima: Contribution to a Political Economy of Consent","authors":"Thierry Ribault","doi":"10.1177/0304375419853350","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1177/0304375419853350","url":null,"abstract":"This article is a contribution to the political economy of consent based on the analysis of speeches, declarations, initiatives, and policies implemented in the name of resilience in the context of the Fukushima nuclear disaster. It argues that, in practice as much as in theory, resilience fuels peoples’ submission to an existing reality—in the case of Fukushima, the submission to radioactive contamination—in an attempt to deny this reality as well as its consequences. The political economy of consent to the nuclear, of which resilience is one of the technologies, can be grasped at four interrelated analytical levels adapted to understanding how resilience is encoded in key texts and programs in the wake of the Fukushima Daiichi accident. The first level is technological: consent through and to the nuclear technology. The second level is sociometabolic: consent to nuisance. The third level is political: consent to participation. The fourth level is epistemological: consent to ignorance. A fifth cognitivo-experimental transversal level can also be identified: consent to experimentation, learning and training. We first analyze two key symptoms of the despotism of resilience: its incantatory feature and the way it supports mutilated life within a contaminated area and turns disaster into a cure. Then, we show how, in the reenchanted world of resilience, loss opens doors, that is, it paves the way to new “forms of life”: first through ignorance-based disempowerment; second through submission to protection. Finally, we examine the ideological mechanisms of resilience and how it fosters a government through the fear of fear. We approach resilience as a technology of consent mobilizing emotionalism and conditioning on one side, contingency and equivalence on the other.","PeriodicalId":46677,"journal":{"name":"Alternatives","volume":null,"pages":null},"PeriodicalIF":1.3,"publicationDate":"2019-05-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"https://sci-hub-pdf.com/10.1177/0304375419853350","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"45318251","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":3,"RegionCategory":"社会学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2019-05-01DOI: 10.1177/0304375419857421
Lisa Strömbom
This article contributes to the emerging literature on possibilities to disseminate agonistic narratives in seemingly deadlocked conflict settings. In this context, conflict parties’ existence is often perceived as being under threat, which makes it demanding to question the current societal order. However, even in the most protracted of conflicts, narratives exist that challenge concurring understandings of identity. Efforts to communicate alternative narratives of identity and memory are the focus of this study, which has two foci: First, it creates a theoretical understanding of agonistic narratives as challenging antagonistic memory constructions in conflicted societies. These agonistic narratives are seen as potentially destabilizing boundary constructions in understandings of the past. Second, it performs an empirical excavation into a contemporary practice of such boundary rupture. It presents results from a study with interviews and participatory observation with guides working within alternative tourism in Israel and Palestine who try to present alternative narratives of the conflict to their audience. The case study thus investigates agonistic elements in these encounters, underlining the mixed logics underpinning the existence of alternative narrative tours in intractable conflicts. Furthermore, it delves into facilitating and inhibiting conditions for carrying out alternative narratives in settings of intractable conflict.
{"title":"Exploring Prospects for Agonistic Encounters in Conflict Zones: Investigating Dual Narrative Tourism in Israel/Palestine","authors":"Lisa Strömbom","doi":"10.1177/0304375419857421","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1177/0304375419857421","url":null,"abstract":"This article contributes to the emerging literature on possibilities to disseminate agonistic narratives in seemingly deadlocked conflict settings. In this context, conflict parties’ existence is often perceived as being under threat, which makes it demanding to question the current societal order. However, even in the most protracted of conflicts, narratives exist that challenge concurring understandings of identity. Efforts to communicate alternative narratives of identity and memory are the focus of this study, which has two foci: First, it creates a theoretical understanding of agonistic narratives as challenging antagonistic memory constructions in conflicted societies. These agonistic narratives are seen as potentially destabilizing boundary constructions in understandings of the past. Second, it performs an empirical excavation into a contemporary practice of such boundary rupture. It presents results from a study with interviews and participatory observation with guides working within alternative tourism in Israel and Palestine who try to present alternative narratives of the conflict to their audience. The case study thus investigates agonistic elements in these encounters, underlining the mixed logics underpinning the existence of alternative narrative tours in intractable conflicts. Furthermore, it delves into facilitating and inhibiting conditions for carrying out alternative narratives in settings of intractable conflict.","PeriodicalId":46677,"journal":{"name":"Alternatives","volume":null,"pages":null},"PeriodicalIF":1.3,"publicationDate":"2019-05-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"https://sci-hub-pdf.com/10.1177/0304375419857421","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"47261522","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":3,"RegionCategory":"社会学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2019-05-01DOI: 10.1177/0304375419847385
Sara Kalm
In an era of increased mobility, naturalization is crucial for shaping international legal and political identities. It is therefore important to move beyond the legal definition of naturalization in order to comprehend its affective and social meaning. This article develops the notion “affective naturalization” by combining the literature of affect and politics with insights from economic anthropology and by focusing on the varied practices of citizenship conferment. Through different modes of naturalization, citizenship can be offered as a gift, it can take the form of a birthright, it may be obtained as a prize that one has achieved, and it can occasionally be bought. The specific practice of conferment changes the identity of the citizenship/“thing” that is being acquired, the roles of the giver and the receiver as well as the interrelation between them. The different practices of conferment thus reflect as well as constitute social relations in differing ways.
{"title":"Affective Naturalization: Practices of Citizenship Conferment","authors":"Sara Kalm","doi":"10.1177/0304375419847385","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1177/0304375419847385","url":null,"abstract":"In an era of increased mobility, naturalization is crucial for shaping international legal and political identities. It is therefore important to move beyond the legal definition of naturalization in order to comprehend its affective and social meaning. This article develops the notion “affective naturalization” by combining the literature of affect and politics with insights from economic anthropology and by focusing on the varied practices of citizenship conferment. Through different modes of naturalization, citizenship can be offered as a gift, it can take the form of a birthright, it may be obtained as a prize that one has achieved, and it can occasionally be bought. The specific practice of conferment changes the identity of the citizenship/“thing” that is being acquired, the roles of the giver and the receiver as well as the interrelation between them. The different practices of conferment thus reflect as well as constitute social relations in differing ways.","PeriodicalId":46677,"journal":{"name":"Alternatives","volume":null,"pages":null},"PeriodicalIF":1.3,"publicationDate":"2019-05-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"https://sci-hub-pdf.com/10.1177/0304375419847385","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"42545632","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":3,"RegionCategory":"社会学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2019-05-01DOI: 10.1177/0304375419853148
Cle-Anne Gabriel, Samira Nazar, Danfeng Zhu, Jodyanne Kirkwood
Among other aims, degrowth calls for a deprioritization of economic growth as primary indicator of success. However, deprioritizing economic growth is challenging because it is the antithesis of business as we know it today. Yet, in this study, we find examples of enterprises operating in the renewable energy industry in the Global South, which deprioritize traditional economic growth as their preferred indicator of success. We interviewed 30 renewable energy enterprises (REEs) on the basis of an importance-performance analysis (IPA). Our findings confirm that conventional measures of financial performance are not universally applicable to all enterprises in the Global South. Specifically, we observed that the REEs that are least satisfied with conventional economic performance indicators possess two characteristics in common: (1) they have strong social motivations (e.g., energy access and poverty alleviation) and (2) they are averse to economic growth in the traditional sense. We draw insights from these REEs for the future of post-growth enterprise, including the importance of localness in success and performance appraisal as the Global South transitions toward degrowth. We also introduce 14 alternative performance indicators, suggested by the REEs themselves, which may help bring enterprises closer to post-growth orientation in the Global South.
{"title":"Performance Beyond Economic Growth: Alternatives from Growth-Averse Enterprises in the Global South","authors":"Cle-Anne Gabriel, Samira Nazar, Danfeng Zhu, Jodyanne Kirkwood","doi":"10.1177/0304375419853148","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1177/0304375419853148","url":null,"abstract":"Among other aims, degrowth calls for a deprioritization of economic growth as primary indicator of success. However, deprioritizing economic growth is challenging because it is the antithesis of business as we know it today. Yet, in this study, we find examples of enterprises operating in the renewable energy industry in the Global South, which deprioritize traditional economic growth as their preferred indicator of success. We interviewed 30 renewable energy enterprises (REEs) on the basis of an importance-performance analysis (IPA). Our findings confirm that conventional measures of financial performance are not universally applicable to all enterprises in the Global South. Specifically, we observed that the REEs that are least satisfied with conventional economic performance indicators possess two characteristics in common: (1) they have strong social motivations (e.g., energy access and poverty alleviation) and (2) they are averse to economic growth in the traditional sense. We draw insights from these REEs for the future of post-growth enterprise, including the importance of localness in success and performance appraisal as the Global South transitions toward degrowth. We also introduce 14 alternative performance indicators, suggested by the REEs themselves, which may help bring enterprises closer to post-growth orientation in the Global South.","PeriodicalId":46677,"journal":{"name":"Alternatives","volume":null,"pages":null},"PeriodicalIF":1.3,"publicationDate":"2019-05-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"https://sci-hub-pdf.com/10.1177/0304375419853148","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"48243409","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":3,"RegionCategory":"社会学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2019-02-01DOI: 10.1177/0304375419854599
Burak Bilgehan Özpek
Disappearance of the established security paradigm of Kemalist state has not helped to create strong institutions and legal-bureaucratic structures that are supposed to prevent a certain political elite to dominate the political system and criminalize its adversaries by security reasons. Instead, survival concerns and political will of the Justice and Development Party (AKP) has become replacement of the established paradigm. This has created a systemic crisis. On the one hand, the AKP has played the role of a regular political party, which is supposed to have equal rights and privileges with other players in the game. On the other hand, the AKP has been the tutelary actor that determines what national security is and who threatens national security. As a result of this picture, the AKP has exploited its monopoly over securitization to eliminate the criticisms of the opposition groups. Therefore, any political party or political group has not been viewed as a national security threat only if it has not threatened the political survival of the AKP. Such a crisis has also affected the AKP’s approach toward the Kurdish question. Unlike the established paradigm’s allergy toward the political demands of Kurds due to its commitment to nation-state principle, the AKP’s fluctuated policy toward the Kurds resembles to a political party’s survival strategy rather than a policy stemming from a consistent national security paradigm.
{"title":"The State’s Changing Role Regarding the Kurdish Question of Turkey: From Consistent Tutelage to Volatile Securitization","authors":"Burak Bilgehan Özpek","doi":"10.1177/0304375419854599","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1177/0304375419854599","url":null,"abstract":"Disappearance of the established security paradigm of Kemalist state has not helped to create strong institutions and legal-bureaucratic structures that are supposed to prevent a certain political elite to dominate the political system and criminalize its adversaries by security reasons. Instead, survival concerns and political will of the Justice and Development Party (AKP) has become replacement of the established paradigm. This has created a systemic crisis. On the one hand, the AKP has played the role of a regular political party, which is supposed to have equal rights and privileges with other players in the game. On the other hand, the AKP has been the tutelary actor that determines what national security is and who threatens national security. As a result of this picture, the AKP has exploited its monopoly over securitization to eliminate the criticisms of the opposition groups. Therefore, any political party or political group has not been viewed as a national security threat only if it has not threatened the political survival of the AKP. Such a crisis has also affected the AKP’s approach toward the Kurdish question. Unlike the established paradigm’s allergy toward the political demands of Kurds due to its commitment to nation-state principle, the AKP’s fluctuated policy toward the Kurds resembles to a political party’s survival strategy rather than a policy stemming from a consistent national security paradigm.","PeriodicalId":46677,"journal":{"name":"Alternatives","volume":null,"pages":null},"PeriodicalIF":1.3,"publicationDate":"2019-02-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"https://sci-hub-pdf.com/10.1177/0304375419854599","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"45093217","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":3,"RegionCategory":"社会学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2019-02-01DOI: 10.1177/0304375419871428
Bulent Aras
There is a recurrent state crisis in Turkey. The failed July 15, 2016, coup attempt exposed the failure of available mechanisms to tackle this crisis, which surfaced at a time of systemic transformation from parliamentary rule to an executive presidential system in Turkey. The ruling political elite suggested this transformation as a panacea to bureaucratic tutelage, which was considered as a barrier to an effective government. The shift from an administrative to entrepreneurial mode of executive rule was designed to defeat the crisis through improving good governance. In this sense, the presidential system brought a new state structure and majoritarian understanding of politics, with the president holding the monopoly on power at the center. While the shift to the presidential system is still a process in the making, it is far from addressing the state crisis and the toxic atmosphere of political polarization and deinstitutionalization in Turkey. This special issue on state crisis in Turkey provides snapshots of the crisis across different realms of the state Senem B. Çevik’s article examines Turkey’s global influence from a soft power perspective. The concept of soft power in international affairs was popularized at the end of the Cold War with the expansion of the liberal hegemony. Soft power aims to extend a country’s influence at times of peace and thus prevent wars and conflict. By this token, soft power promotes the values of the liberal hegemony and is thus defined by those values. As the foundations of power moved away from hard resources to softer resources after the end of the Cold War, governance, democracy, and cultural values became indispensable in determining a nation’s global influence. A nation’s tangible and intangible assets are assumed to produce attraction and by extension influence. The founding father of soft power, Joseph Nye, argues that countries may obtain the outcomes they want in world politics because other countries are admiring their values, emulating their example, and aspiring to their level of prosperity and openness. Despite the growing popularity of the use of soft power since the end of the Cold War, the trend has been in a downward spiral over the last few years with the resurgence of hard power politics in global affairs. Although soft power has still not fully fallen out of favor, it has received significant pushback from authoritarian regimes and illiberal democracies. For example, in a June 2019 interview with the Financial Times, Russian President Vladimir Putin claimed that the liberal order has become obsolete. Thus, the appeal of hard power in international relations and the apparent decline of liberal hegemony have shifted discussions on soft power. Today, a plethora of new actors are employing new methods to expand their global influence. Given this momentous change in discussions regarding soft power, this article examines Turkey’s current soft power capacity and attributes by analyzing its soft
土耳其经常出现政府危机。2016年7月15日失败的政变企图暴露了解决这一危机的现有机制的失败，这一危机在土耳其从议会统治到执行总统制的系统性转型期间浮出水面。执政的政治精英认为，这种转变是解决官僚主义监护的灵丹妙药，官僚主义监护被认为是有效政府的障碍。从行政管理模式向企业管理模式的转变，旨在通过改善善治来战胜危机。从这个意义上说，总统制带来了一种新的国家结构和对政治的多数主义理解，总统掌握着权力的垄断权。虽然向总统制的转变仍在进行中，但它远未解决土耳其的国家危机和政治两极分化和去体制化的有毒气氛。这期关于土耳其国家危机的特刊提供了国家不同领域危机的快照，Senem B. Çevik的文章从软实力的角度审视了土耳其的全球影响力。软实力在国际事务中的概念是在冷战结束后随着自由主义霸权的扩张而得到普及的。软实力的目的是在和平时期扩大一个国家的影响力，从而防止战争和冲突。因此，软实力促进了自由主义霸权的价值观，并因此被这些价值观所定义。冷战结束后，随着权力的基础从硬资源转向软资源，治理、民主和文化价值观成为决定一个国家全球影响力的不可或缺的因素。一个国家的有形和无形资产被认为能够产生吸引力，进而产生影响力。软实力之父约瑟夫·奈(Joseph Nye)认为，各国可能会在世界政治中获得他们想要的结果，因为其他国家正在钦佩他们的价值观，效仿他们的榜样，并渴望达到他们的繁荣和开放水平。尽管自冷战结束以来，使用软实力越来越受欢迎，但随着硬实力政治在全球事务中的复苏，这一趋势在过去几年里呈螺旋式下降趋势。尽管软实力还没有完全失宠，但它已经受到了专制政权和不自由民主国家的重大抵制。例如，俄罗斯总统普京在2019年6月接受英国《金融时报》采访时声称，自由主义秩序已经过时。因此，硬实力在国际关系中的吸引力和自由主义霸权的明显衰落已经转移了对软实力的讨论。今天，大量的新行为体正在采用新方法扩大其全球影响力。鉴于有关软实力的讨论发生了这一重大变化，本文通过分析土耳其软实力资源来考察其当前的软实力能力和属性
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Pub Date : 2019-02-01DOI: 10.1177/0304375419853751
Senem B. Çevik
Since the mid-2000s, Turkey has incorporated a soft power discourse into its foreign policy agenda and shifted its attention toward building up its soft power infrastructure. Up until 2013, Turkey was applauded as a regional powerhouse, an important player in the soft power arena, and a beacon of democracy and stability within an unstable region. However, the restrictions on free speech, media censorship, and the crackdown on the opposition have impacted Turkey’s current soft power ranking. While expanding its diplomatic network and public diplomacy apparatus to wield soft power, Turkey’s global reputation has seen a downward spiral. This article investigates the role that political leadership and political values play in determining Turkey’s soft power capacity. This article’s main contention is that while Turkey increases its global engagement and capacity to appeal non-Western audiences, its capacity to attract international audiences particularly in the West has diminished due to its democratic backsliding.
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Pub Date : 2019-02-01DOI: 10.1177/0304375419837415
B. Aras
This article analyzes attempts to redirect foreign policy against multiple crises in Turkey that inhibit change. The gap between the country’s capabilities and resources and its regional and international commitments has overshadowed former success stories in Turkish Foreign Policy (TFP) by casting an all-encompassing sense of siege, retreat, and isolation. The new narrative and guided political mobilization by government after July 15 in Turkey saw the redirection of foreign policy as a necessary response to the emerging situation, not an offshoot of failure in the previous era. A combination of efforts toward program change and problem/goal change characterized the leader-driven redirection in TFP. This article argues that despite the new narrative and authoritative control of the implementation of foreign policy, presumed redirection or recalibration is unlikely to happen in TFP in the post-July 15 era. There is not a solid plan for change and reform in foreign policy or in the state apparatus at large but rather only a rhetorical emphasis on such actions.
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