Turkey's changing discourses of strategy: A critical realist analysis

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Tezin Türü: Doktora

Tezin Yürütüldüğü Kurum: Orta Doğu Teknik Üniversitesi, İktisadi ve İdari Bilimler Fakültesi, Uluslararası İlişkiler Bölümü, Türkiye

Tezin Onay Tarihi: 2016

Öğrenci: HASAN YÜKSELEN

Danışman: FARUK YALVAÇ

Özet:

This dissertation analyzes Turkey’s changing discourses of security strategy since the foundation of the Republic. The concept of strategy, which is classically analyzed through the level of analysis distinction, is handled through employing the ontological depth concept of critical realism. To reach an historical and sociological analysis, the concept of strategy, which is conceived as an agential attribute, is analyzed within the dynamic interaction of agent and structure. In this way, agential and ideational aspects of strategy, conceived as ends that was tended to be forgotten or neglected in favor of material aspects conceived as means, can be analyzed from a dialectical perspective. In other words, this dissertation incorporates the evolution of strategy within the dialectics of agent-structure in which agency intentionally strives to overcome the constraining effects of structure through emancipatory strategies. In Turkish Foreign Policy, agency showed no hesitancy to formulate strategies and represent them through discourses. However, what is spoken – discourses – about strategy could not always be realized in outcomes as what is actualized. This dissertation seeks an explanation to the source of incongruence between what is spoken and what is actualized. This dissertation contributes to the existing literature on critical realist analysis of Turkish Foreign Policy by incorporating the concept of strategy and strategic discourse within this framework.