In the first webinar of the ELIAMED-Medyascope Media Series, Dr. Habibe Özdal, Prof. Dr. Şaban Kardaş and Suat Kınıklıoğlu, in moderation of Ioannis N. Grigoradis, talked about possible Eurasian tendencies of Turkish foreign policy.
The first episode of ELIMED webinar series, which is a media and information project presented by Center for Applied Turkey Studies (CATS) and supported by Stiftung Mercator and German Federal Foreign Ministry, took place on 15th March.
After pointing out Turkey’s archaic Eastern identity and its centuries-old westernisation efforts, Mr. Grigoradis have the stage to Dr. Habibe Özdal who’s an Assistant Professor of International Relations at Istanbul Okan University.
Dr. Özdal told that Turkey’s relations with the West are much more institutional than its relations with Russia which is in general based on personal relations of Erdogan and Putin. Dr. Özdal underlined that Turkey’s relations with West is certainly not replacable with Russia.
Reminding Turkish economical benefits from Russia, especially on tourism and trade, Dr. Özdal said that those benefits have played a significant role in Turkey’s failed mediating efforts.
Lecturer of Politics and International Relations from TOBB University of Technology and Economics, Prof. Dr. Şaban Kardaş took the word after Dr. Özdal.
Defining Turkey as a “regional power in desire of regional autonomy”, Professor Kardaş said that Turkey now has to deal with a new Russia whose power is seriously in decay. He also noted that when looked into the history of great powers, declining powers tend to keep their overexpansionist policies.
Researcher Suat Kınıklıoğlu, a former member of Turkish Parliament who has a paper to be published soon that focuses on Eurasianism in Turkey, pointed out to Russia’s efforts to influence the Western public:
“Russia has smartly invested in social media, famous personalities and figures. Sputnik Turkey has more than one million followers on Twitter and despite being banned in many European countries they are continuing to influence debate in Turkey.”
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