the influence of the european union on turkish foreign policy

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This article was downloaded by: [171.67.34.69] On: 29 April 2013, At: 15:42 Publisher: Routledge Informa Ltd Registered in England and Wales Registered Number: 1072954 Registered office: Mortimer House, 37-41 Mortimer Street, London W1T 3JH, UK Perspectives on European Politics and Society Publication details, including instructions for authors and subscription information: http://www.tandfonline.com/loi/rpep20 The influence of the European Union on Turkish foreign policy Bill Park a a King's College London, UK Published online: 17 Jun 2011. To cite this article: Bill Park (2011): The influence of the European Union on Turkish foreign policy, Perspectives on European Politics and Society, 12:2, 220-222 To link to this article: http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/15705854.2011.572651 PLEASE SCROLL DOWN FOR ARTICLE Full terms and conditions of use: http://www.tandfonline.com/page/terms-and- conditions This article may be used for research, teaching, and private study purposes. Any substantial or systematic reproduction, redistribution, reselling, loan, sub-licensing, systematic supply, or distribution in any form to anyone is expressly forbidden. The publisher does not give any warranty express or implied or make any representation that the contents will be complete or accurate or up to date. The accuracy of any instructions, formulae, and drug doses should be independently verified with primary sources. The publisher shall not be liable for any loss, actions, claims, proceedings, demand, or costs or damages whatsoever or howsoever caused arising directly or indirectly in connection with or arising out of the use of this material.

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This article was downloaded by: [171.67.34.69]On: 29 April 2013, At: 15:42Publisher: RoutledgeInforma Ltd Registered in England and Wales Registered Number: 1072954 Registeredoffice: Mortimer House, 37-41 Mortimer Street, London W1T 3JH, UK

Perspectives on European Politics andSocietyPublication details, including instructions for authors andsubscription information:http://www.tandfonline.com/loi/rpep20

The influence of the European Unionon Turkish foreign policyBill Park aa King's College London, UKPublished online: 17 Jun 2011.

To cite this article: Bill Park (2011): The influence of the European Union on Turkish foreign policy,Perspectives on European Politics and Society, 12:2, 220-222

To link to this article: http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/15705854.2011.572651

PLEASE SCROLL DOWN FOR ARTICLE

Full terms and conditions of use: http://www.tandfonline.com/page/terms-and-conditions

This article may be used for research, teaching, and private study purposes. Anysubstantial or systematic reproduction, redistribution, reselling, loan, sub-licensing,systematic supply, or distribution in any form to anyone is expressly forbidden.

The publisher does not give any warranty express or implied or make any representationthat the contents will be complete or accurate or up to date. The accuracy of anyinstructions, formulae, and drug doses should be independently verified with primarysources. The publisher shall not be liable for any loss, actions, claims, proceedings,demand, or costs or damages whatsoever or howsoever caused arising directly orindirectly in connection with or arising out of the use of this material.

interesting aspect that comes to the forefront is that European policymakers did not embracethe liberal dogma for ideological reasons, as their American counterparts did, but more forinstrumental purposes: to weaken national market forces, who in cooperation with theirnational governments were impeding the European integration process. Ironically, however,the EU’s convictions in the transformative Europeanisation powers of liberal policies havebecome almost articles of faith. Thus, there has been a ‘shift from the pessimistic Germanordo-liberal view that capitalism is innately unstable to a more optimistic liberal view thatunderstands markets to be essentially benign, self-correcting institutions, which should be leftto function freely in all but the most exceptional circumstances’ (p. 67).

This drive by the EU to liberalise the European market on Anglo-American lines has beenespecially pronounced in the realm of finance and corporate governance, and McCann goes atlength to cover this process with two chapters dedicated to this field, which include theinteresting case studies of Germany and Italy, two countries with institutional marketstructures very different from the Anglo-American model favoured by the EU. This is certainlythe best part of the book. As mentioned, McCann shows accurately how far the EU has gonein changing these national structures, but at the same time, he demonstrates how nationalgovernments ‘evade the implications of measures they have accepted in the Council ofMinisters by pursuing economically nationalist implementation strategies [. . .] carefullyshaped to protect important established national relationships or favoured actors’ (p. 180).

The book loses a bit of strength in the last two chapters when McCann tackles the politicaleconomy of social and labour policies and industrial relations in Europe. This is due to thefact that in these fields he does not present any particular case studies to underpin hisarguments. Nonetheless, this part of the book offers a neat analysis of the tensions provokedby the asymmetry between monetary and financial processes and policies increasinglydetermined at supranational level and social and industrial disputes and negotiations dealtwith within the national realm. In this regard, McCann shows and concludes that the OpenMethod of Coordination (OMC), based on discussions of best practices, often ‘fails in the faceof substantial differences in the values and objectives of social policy across member states’(p. 181).

By way of criticism, one has to mention that McCann establishes perhaps a too clear-cutdistinction between the EU, on one side, and member states, on the other. These are notalways opposing actors. There is certainly much more overlap than McCann suggests. Readerswho hope to find analyses about the Europeanisation of the political economies of smaller andperipheral EU member states will also be disappointed. As in other books, the focus isconcentrated on the big four: Germany, France, the United Kingdom and Italy. The book alsodoes not draw on quotes or insights of European and national policymakers. Therefore, theagential and inter-subjective dimensions are overlooked. Those expecting normativepredications on possible alternative models for the EU will also not find much material.However, despite these shortcomings, the book is a very useful read for those interested in ashort, balanced and well-documented account of how the political economy of the EU hasevolved, and more importantly, why it has not evolved further, since its creation in 1957 untilthe ‘Great Recession’ of 2008–2009.

Miguel Otero-IglesiasOxford Brookes University, Oxford, UK

� 2011, Miguel Otero-Iglesias

The influence of the European Union on Turkish foreign policy

Ozlem TerziFarnham, Ashgate, 2010. ISBN 978-0-7546-7842-7

Turkish foreign policy has undergone a remarkable transformation in recent years, oftencharacterised as a shift from a ‘hard power’ to a ‘soft power’ approach. Less kindly, under theIslam-inspired government of the Justice and Development Party (JDP), Ankara has also been

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accused of undergoing an ‘axis shift’, from Turkey’s familiar western alignment to thedevelopment of warmer and closer ties towards its Middle Eastern neighbours and the Islamicworld more broadly. This volume sets out to explore the extent to which this shift can beexplained by the concept of ‘Europeanisation’ – or as a consequence of the EU accessionprocess, which is not necessarily the same thing.

The book begins appropriately with a discussion of the concept of ‘Europeanisation’,and then goes on to consider its impact domestically on Turkey’s political parties,governments, the military and civil society. The second part of the book focuses on aconsideration of the ‘Europeanisation’ of foreign policy practice. Here, it investigatesTurkey’s troubled relationships with Greece and Armenia, its approach to the Cyprusproblem, the development of closer ties with Syria, Iraq and Iran, and the recent difficultiesbetween Ankara and Washington. The book concludes with an assessment of the prospectsfor a permanent ‘Europeanisation’ of Turkish foreign policy and of an unambiguous shiftof its axis.

Perhaps the book’s most compelling finding is that Turkey’s ‘strategic depth’ doctrine,which seeks to develop multilateral, cooperative and warmer ties with each of itsneighbourhoods and beyond, and which in itself should not be construed as a threat toTurkey’s western friendships, can only be convincing if it is coupled with a strong EUprospect. Given the slowdown in Turkey’s EU accession process, the ‘strategic depth’ and‘soft power’ approaches to Turkey’s primarily Islamic neighbourhood do indeed take on theappearance of an axis shift (p. 134). Furthermore, these pages convincingly argue that theresponsibility for this cannot be laid exclusively or chiefly at Ankara’s door. In particular,Terzi asserts that the JDP’s handling of the Cyprus problem offers the most convincingdemonstration of Turkey’s foreign policy ‘Europeanisation’. Yet, and notwithstanding theoverwhelming Turkish Cypriot approval of the Annan Plan and its comparablyunambiguous rejection by the island’s Greeks, Ankara’s ‘reward’ has been Nicosia’saccession to the EU – which in itself might add an additional veto on Turkey’s eventualEU accession – the continuing EU embargo and isolation of the Turkish Cypriot north ofthe island, and the European Council’s December 2006 decision to in effect freezenegotiation on Turkey’s accession chapters. As if this was not discouraging enough, theJDP was also obliged to withstand withering attacks from the less ‘Europeanised’ sectionsof Turkey’s bureaucracy and Turkish society for its alleged readiness to sell out Turkishinterests.

There are one or two problems with the author’s approach to the question he sets himself.One is with his understanding of the concept of ‘Europeanisation’. Terzi claims to build hisstudy by focusing on the ‘social learning’ and ‘identity construction’ aspects of the concept(p. 1), yet he also writes that ‘Europeanisation’ can be broadly defined as the process ofdownloading EU’s regulations and institutional structures to the domestic level’ (p. 11), whichsurely implies a somewhat different appreciation of the concept. The occasional analyticalconfusion generated by this conceptual fuzziness is compounded by what Terzi recognises asthe difficulties involved in identifying and ordering the motivations that might underpinTurkey’s changed behaviour – for example, might it derive from internalised value shifts orfrom a process of instrumental cost benefit calculation? And might any value change inTurkish foreign policy stem less from interaction with the EU than from, say, the thinking offoreign minister Davutoglu?

Terzi might also be accused of an overly uncritical approach to changes that have takenplace in Turkey in recent years. Domestically, he rightly makes much of the growth of civilsociety, and the encouragement of that growth by the EU. However, Turkey’s undoubtedlymore dynamic civil society has also spawned a plethora of nationalistic, xenophobic,authoritarian and Islamist groups that cannot be said to fully share the values ofpluralism, human and minority rights, and tolerance that are typically associated with‘Europeanisation’. Indeed, xenophobic nationalism in Turkey appears to have prospered inlarge measure as a reaction against Ankara’s pursuit of EU–friendly policies andapproaches.

In the foreign policy arena too, Terzi is not wrong to note that Turkey’s recent emphasis on‘soft power’, multilateralism and engagement seem to mirror the EU. However, he omits to

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take full account of the extent to which the harshness of Ankara’s anti-Israeli rhetoric, itsuncritical embrace of the human rights abusing regimes of Iran and Sudan (and its June 2010Security Council vote against imposing a fourth round of sanctions on Iran), itsunreconstructed and emotional approach to Armenian genocide allegations, its proliferationof visa-free agreements that would conflict with EU acquis, and the persistence of aparticularly virulent and widespread popular anti-Americanism, do not find their match inEurope.

He might also have asked himself why and how it is that non-EU countries in westernEurope, such as Norway or, until relatively recently, Sweden, are nevertheless no less‘Europeanised’ than are the EU’s founder members. This book takes us some way to a betterunderstanding of the shift in Turkey’s foreign policy. But it also leaves us with a long way stillto go.

Bill ParkKing’s College London, UK

� 2011, Bill Park

Adapting to European Integration? Kaliningrad, Russia and the European Union

Stefan Ganzle, Guido Muntel & Evgeny Vinokurov (Eds.)Manchester, Manchester University Press, 2008. ISBN 978-0-7190-7901-6

Kaliningrad, given its status since 2004 as a Russian exclave within the European Union [EU],poses political and practical problems as well as opening unique opportunities forcollaboration between Russia and the EU. It is therefore unsurprising that it has caught theattention of scholars, and this volume brings together contributions from 21 authors from arange of countries including Russia. The central issue of the book is the EU’s capacity for‘Europeanisation’ in countries unlikely to accede to the EU, but located on its edge. The bookwill also be of interest to political scientists and politics students interested more generally inthe EU and/or Russia.

This short review cannot cover the whole content of Adapting to European Integration?, buta reader who wishes to skim the volume can do so fairly rapidly. The conclusions to eachchapter give an excellent summary of the content, and the whole book is organised in a veryclear and logical fashion. The book explores ‘the extent to which Kaliningrad – its politicalstructures, policy-making processes and policy outputs – became subject to change andadaptation forged by EU models, norms and standards as a result of interaction with‘‘Europe’’ (p. 250). The authors conclude that EU impact has been even less than theyexpected. It is true that the EU and Russia have been able to discuss and resolve security issuesrelating to Kaliningrad. However, the opportunity to cement good relations via furthercollaboration has not really been taken up. Despite Putin’s apparent acceptance thatKaliningrad should be a ‘pilot’ for EU–Russian cooperation, Russia has not backed up thisrhetoric with a coherent strategy for the region. For the Russian authorities, maintaining tightcentral control of all regions and asserting Russia’s sovereignty and equal status vis-a-vis itsWestern neighbours remain the chief priorities. The authors discover limited EU impact ineconomic affairs and education, but where there is collaboration, this is seen as occurring in ahaphazard way, because it suits Russian political elites in particular instances: an example ofEuropeanisation ‘a la carte’.

The chapters on Kaliningrad illustrate its Janus-like quality, looking both East and West.On the one hand, as Anna Karpenko illustrates, Kaliningraders see themselves as more‘European’ than other Russians and have done so since Soviet times (when fascination withKonigsburg was only heightened by official attempts to blot it from historical memory). Onthe other hand, twenty-first century Kaliningrad is a fast-growing, economically successfulRussian region, which arguably does not need to open to Western markets. Its status as aspecial economic zone has allowed it to become a major manufacturer for the Russianhinterland. In 2004, for example, half of Russian-manufactured televisions and two-thirds of

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