Turkey as a Great Power? Back to Reality

Abstract

This article provides a critical analysis of popular claims that Turkey is a rising power by discussing Turkey's prospects of becoming a great power at global and regional levels. The article relies on concepts from Neorealist and Regional Security Complex theories to present and survey relevant data and argues that Turkey is not and will not become a global power pole in terms of capabilities, and that it is not a regional power in terms of influence. Turkey's position and prospects in Europe and the Middle East are discussed.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author.

Note on Contributor

Ąžuolas Bagdonas is assistant professor of International Relations at Fatih University in Istanbul. He received his PhD in Political Science from Central European University in 2011. His main research interests are US and Russian foreign policies, geopolitics, and the transformation of war.

Notes

1. Cornell, “Turkey: Return to Stability?,” 227; Özkan, “A New Approach to Global Security,” 80; Ilgıt and Ozkececi-Taner, “Turkey at the United Nations Security Council,” 193; Hickok, “ Hegemon Rising,” 105–19; Erickson, “Turkey as Regional Hegemon,” 25–45; Mufti, “A Little America”; Friedman, The Next 100 Years; and Çağaptay, The Rise of Turkey, 11, 133.

2. For example, Oğuzlu and Dal, “Decoding Turkey's Rise,” 617–36; Çağaptay, “Defining Turkish Power,” 797–811. The BRIC countries include Brazil, Russia, India, and China, and sometimes South Africa as added as well (BRICS).

3. Critical works within the Realist framework include Dinçer and Kutlay, “Turkey's Power Capacity”; Öniş and Kutlay, “Rising Powers,” 1409–26; Grigoriadis, “Turkey's Foreign Policy Activism,” 159–73.

4. Dahl, “The Concept of Power,” 201–15.

5. For an example of a more comprehensive and very influential index, see Singer, “Reconstructing the Correlates,” 32. For others, since military power depends on economic power, the single most important indicator is the size of the economy, as captured by the GDP—see Organski, World Politics. An overview of various approaches to measuring national power is available in Tellis et al., 25–33.

6. Waltz, Theory of International Politics, 131.

7. For example, Turkey is listed as one of the key exporters of 11 of the 41 raw materials deemed essential for the EU economy - see European Commission, Report, 77–81.

8. IEA, Oil and Gas Emergency Policy.

9. United Nations, World Population Prospects 2012.

10. UNDP, Human Development Report 2013.

11. OECD Better Life Index 2013.

12. The Economist Intelligence Unit. The Political Instability Index 2010.

13. Biddle, Military Power, 2.

14. Maoz, “Resolve, Capabilities,” 195–229.

15. SIPRI, Factsheet, 2.

16. IISS, “Chapter Four: Europe,” 93.

17. For example, see Kennedy, The Rise and Fall of Great Powers.

18. Krauthammer, “The Unipolar Moment,” 23–33.

19. Waltz, “The Emerging Structure of International Politics,” 44–79; Kegley and Raymond, A Multipolar Peace?; Buzan, The United States and the Great Power.

20. Huntington, “The Lonely Superpower,” 35–49; Kissinger, Does America Need a Foreign Policy?; Bremmer, Every Nation for Itself.

21. Buzan and Wæver, Regions and Powers.

22. Ibid., 35.

23. Ibid., 37.

24. Fawn, “Regions and Their Study,” 5–34; Hurrell “One World?,” 127–46.

25. Variations of such an argument are possible. One author suggests that Turkey could become a great power within the next decade without fully belonging to any region—see Barrinha, “The Ambitious Insulator,” 165–82.

26. Nolte, “How to Compare Regional Powers,” 881–901.

27. Prys, “Hegemony, Domination, Detachment,” 479–504.

28. It should be noted that the concept of a region is itself an ambiguous one. What constitutes a region and which countries are seen to belong may depend on the definitional criteria. Buzan's and Wæver's functional definition of regions based on the intensity of security interdependence is followed here, although their understanding of security is much wider than the traditional realist one and almost anything can become a security issue if it is successfully securitized. See Buzan's and Wæver, Regions and Powers, 47–8.

29. Hale, Turkish Foreign Policy, 220–5.

30. İşeri and Dilek, “The Limitations of Turkey's New Foreign Policy,” 41–54.

31. Kardaş, “Turkish–Azerbaijani Energy Cooperation and Nabucco,” 55–77.

32. Buzan and Wæver, Regions and Powers, 352–6.

33. Mearsheimer, “Back to the Future,” 5–56.

34. Gerhards and Hans, “Why not Turkey?,” 741–66.

35. Baudner, “The Politics of ‘Norm Diffusion’,” 922–38; Saatçioğlu, “AKP's ‘Europeanization’,” 86–101.

36. Buzan and Wæver, Regions and Powers, 391–6.

37. Dal, “The Transformation of Turkey's Relations,” 245–67; Altunışık and Martin, “Making Sense of Turkish Foreign Policy,” 569–87.

38. Valbjorn and Bank, “The New Arab Cold War,” 2–24.

39. Hinnebusch, “The Middle East Regional System,” 39.

40. IISS, “Chapter Seven,” 303.

41. Spiro, The Hidden Hand of American Hegemony.

42. Walt, “Do No (More) Harm.”

43. United Nations, World Population Prospects 2012.

44. All data from U.S. Energy Information Administration's website - http://goo.gl/7JWwsa.

45. For a full overview of the impact of sanctions, see Katzman, “Iran Sanctions.”

46. Selçuki and Gros, “The Changing Structure of Turkey's Trade”.

47. According to the World Bank's data, Turkey devoted 0.86 percent of its GDP to R&D in 2011, much below the European average or Israel's 3.97 percent. http://goo.gl/bnUAiT.

48. See, for example, Ant and Ersoy, “Egypt's Turmoil”.

49. Wagner, “Economic Interdependence,” 461–83.

50. IISS, “Chapter Seven,” 297–354.

51. Kristensen and Norris, “Global Nuclear Weapons Inventories,” 75–81.

52. Sharp, “U.S. Foreign Aid to Israel.”

53. Ibid.

54. Wezeman and Wezeman, Trends in International Arms Transfers, 2.

55. Trotta, “Iraq War Costs.”

56. Blair and Jansson, “Sanctions, Military Strikes.”

57. Oğuzlu,“Soft Power in Turkish Foreign Policy,” 81–97; Altunışık, “The Possibilities and Limits of Turkey's Soft Power,” 41–54; Kalın, “Soft Power and Public Diplomacy in Turkey,” 5–25.

58. Akgün and Gündoğar, The Perception of Turkey, 17–23.

59. Altunışık, “The Turkish Model,” 45–63.

60. Davutoğlu,“Turkey's Foreign Policy Vision,” 77–96.

61. Nye, Soft Power, x.

62. Layne, “From Preponderance to Offshore Balancing,” 86–124.

63. Layne, “America's Middle East Grand Strategy after Iraq,” 5–25.

64. Buluwi, “The Saudi-Turkey Cold War.”

65. Goren, “An Unfulfilled Opportunity for Reconciliation,” 128.

66. Calabrese, “Turkey and Iran,” 86–87.

67. Cohen and Freilich, “Breakdown and Possible Restart,” 43.

68. Smith, “Oil Wealth and Regime Survival,” 232–246; Albrecht and Schlumberger, “Waiting for Godot,” 371–92. Bellin, “Reconsidering the Robustness of Authoritarianism,” 127–49.