Europeanization of foreign policy and world culture: Turkey’s Cyprus policy

The re/definition of national interests is a dialectical process that involves not only internal dynamics and domestic interests but also explanatory factors transcending national level, such as the European-level and global-level stimuli. Accordingly, the study offers four alternative explanantia for Turkey’s preferences on the Cyprus question: European Union’s (EU) constraining stimuli, EU’s constitutive stimuli, global-level constraining stimuli, global-level constitutive stimuli. The original empirical data support that it is the in/congruence between the ‘EU-level constraining stimuli’ and the ‘global-level constitutive stimuli’ that predicts Turkish perceptions on national interests and thus, Turkish attitudes towards the EU-led reform on Cyprus policy. Keywords: CyprusEuropeanizationforeign policyTurkeyworld cultureStanford School Acknowledgements Special thanks to Chris Rumford, Seckin Baris Gulmez, and the Association of EU Experts of Turkey for helpful comments and suggestions. The research relies upon voluntary, informed consent as well as anonymity and confidentiality of participants (unless agreed to the contrary in advance). Of course, any errors are mine alone. Notes 1. 117 state officials from various state institutions in Turkey, including Ministries, Undersecretariats affiliated with the Prime Ministry, as well as the Secretariat General for EU affairs, Turkish Grand National Assembly, Turkish International Cooperation and Development Agency (TIKA), Turkish Broadcasting Agency (TRT), and Turkish Employment Organization (İŞ-KUR). 46 NGO members including academics, 63 lawyers from EU/International Relations section of Bar associations, 27 foreign trade experts from several Chambers of Commerce in Turkey, 5 respondents from the Delegation of the EU to Turkey, 1 member of the Turkey-EU Joint Parliamentary Committee, 1 European Commission official as well as the leader of the Turkish Liberal Democratic Party. 2. Parliamentarians (surname-alphabetical order): Taha Aksoy, Canan Arıtman, Mehmet Ceylan (vice-chair, External Relations Committee), Abdullah Çalışkan, Mehmet Çerçi, Zeynep Dağı, Mehmet Sait Dilek, Nevin Gaye Erbatur, Algan Hacaloğlu, Atilla Kart, Murat Mercan (chair, External Relations Committee), Mustafa Öztürk, Hüseyin Pazarcı, Ahmet Kenan Tanrıkulu, Ufuk Uras, and Yaşar Yakış (chair, EU Harmonization Committee). Others: Mustafa Durna (NGO leader), Hatice Yazgan (academic), three anonymous bureaucrats, Serkan Çatalpınar (lawyer).