This electronic thesis or dissertation has been downloaded from the King’s Research Portal at https://kclpure.kcl.ac.uk/portal/ Discursive change in Turkish strategic culture: changing narratives, roles and values Renda, Kadri Awarding institution: King's College London The copyright of this thesis rests with the author and no quotation from it or information derived from it may be published without proper acknowledgement. END USER LICENCE AGREEMENT Unless another licence is stated on the immediately following page this work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International licence. https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ You are free to copy, distribute and transmit the work Under the following conditions: Attribution: You must attribute the work in the manner specified by the author (but not in any way that suggests that they endorse you or your use of the work). 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DISCURSIVE CHANGE IN TURKISH STRATEGIC CULTURE: CHANGING NARRATIVES, ROLES AND VALUES By KADRI KAAN RENDA Thesis Submitted to the Department of European and International Studies for the Degree of Doctor of Philosophy King’s College London June 2013 Abstract This thesis is devoted to analysing change in Turkish strategic culture, which is conceptualized as change in narratives. In the mainstream literature it has been customary to provide explanations about the change in Turkish foreign policy by applying existing theories which focus on the ideological differences between Kemalism, Islamism and Liberalism or the implications of democratization and globalization for Turkish society, economy and politics. This thesis proposes a different framework based on the discursive practices of the Turkish foreign policy elite in the form of narratives. The main research question is: What sorts of narratives regarding national defence and security have been produced by the AKP elite to challenge the dominant national security state narratives? It is the overarching argument in this thesis that within the emerging Turkish strategic culture the Ottoman past is neither seen as a distant past nor a temporal other; Turkey’s geography and neighbourhood is neither a liability nor a spatial other; and concepts and values such as soft power and the promotion of democratic values is no longer considered as naïve nor alien by the Turkish state elite. This thesis suggests that three contested narratives can be found within Turkish strategic culture. Among these narratives, the thesis identifies the emergence of two new narratives which challenge a hitherto dominant master narrative, i.e. the national security state master narrative. These two counter-narratives are i) Turkey as a “great country” that is able to address foreign policy issues with a renewed self-esteem that stems from the nostalgic utilization of its historical and cultural assets; and ii) Turkey as an “internationally active player” that aspires to contribute to the international system by playing a new international role and by aligning itself with universal norms and values. By extending the analysis of Turkish strategic culture to the field of narratives and narrative analysis this study demonstrates that Turkish strategic culture is no longer a strategic culture of a national security state or a flank state or a middle power, it is rather constructed within the narratives of the Turkish state elite, which is primarily built upon the overarching narratives of great country and internationally active player. Contrary to the ideology-centred explanations and paradigm shift arguments about the change in Turkish foreign policy, the approach suggested in this thesis provides rather complex, yet arguably more nuanced and comprehensive explanation than the ones on offer in the literature. Lastly, by taking master narratives and counter narratives as the units of analysis to understand the cultural change, this thesis also contributes to the literature on strategic culture by illustrating the role of agency and their practices of challenging dominant narratives by producing counter- narratives. Key words: Turkish foreign policy, strategic culture, narrative analysis, discursive change, master narratives, counter-narratives. II The copyright of this thesis rests with the author and no quotation from it or information derived from it may be published without proper acknowledgement. III Acknowledgements I think this thesis is written at the point where my desires to learn more meet the imperfections of my knowledge of the vast field of international relations and political science. Embarking on a doctoral research in the United Kingdom has been the utmost challenge of my life so far. It was a wonderful, life-changing endevaour, yet a humbling experience to me. In retrospect, doing PhD is a challenging, demanding undertake, but I, now, feel content with myself that I made the right choice and came to the UK to further my academic studies. There are many people I would like to thank for giving me this opportunity and supporting me to carry out my research and to spend 4 years of my life in London. My supervisor, Prof. Christoph Meyer, is the first person to whom I should express my gratitude for his smart, invaluable criticisms that sharpened my academic skills. Meeting Christoph is not only a milestone in my academic life, but I also take him as a scholarly role model to myself. I also feel lucky to know Bill Park, from whose knowledge on Turkey I have benefitted a lot. I greatly appreciate his willingness to introduce me to his colleagues and friends in Turkey, some of whom I interviewed during my fieldworks in Turkey. I would also like to thank Prof. Thomas Diez and Dr. James Ker-Lindsay in my examination committee for their helpful comments and corrections to improve my thesis. During my studies at King’s College London, I met wonderful people with whom I not only had lively academic debates at many academic or non-academic occassions but also shared some good times outside the college. I am glad to know: Aude de Caunes, Paolo Chiocchetti, Christos and Vicky Courtelis, Lorenzo Fusaro and Simon McMahon. I also owe special thanks to my friends in Ankara, Birmingham, Brussels, Istanbul, London and Sheffield: Claudia Cajvan, Barış Gülmez, Didem Buharı-Gülmez, Defne Günay, Mizuki Kitagawa, Ali Onur Özçelik, Laura Palma, Hüsrev Tabak, Özgür Tüfekçi, friends at the Europeanization in Turkey workshops held by the Middle East Technical University and many other friends who supported me one way or another during my studies abroad. I am also grateful to my interviewees who generously gave up their time to answer my questions. I would also like to thank the following people for their help and support during my fieldworks in Ankara, Istanbul and Brussels: Özlen Çelebi, Emel Oktay, Ahmet Akif Oktay and Christina Bache-Fidan. IV I wish to express my sincere thanks to the staff of several libraries: King’s College London Maughan Library, the library of the London School of Economics and Political Science, the British Library, the National Library of Turkey, Bilkent University Library, Turkish Grand National Assembly Library and Documentation Centre. I acknowledge the financial support of the Turkish Ministry of National Education for making my stay in the UK financially possible and I thank the people in Turkish Educational Consulor who everyday deal with financial and administrative problems of many bursaries of the Turkish Government. My final gratitude goes to my family. My parents have always been supportive throughout my education life. My debt and gratitude to my mother, Dilek Renda, who encouraged me to do PhD abroad in the absence of my