Most analysts agree that Turkey's foreign policy is essentially peaceful, using diplomacy and multilateralism in the resolution of its conflicts with other states. Here, Umut Uzer offers a necessary corrective to this standard analysis by revealing the Kemalist influence in Turkey's state ideology. This defined the identity of the state as Turkish, resulting in responsibilities towards Turks residing beyond its borders, and a more engaged foreign policy that ranged from declarations of support for ethnic kin outside Turkey to outright takeover of territory. Focusing on the annexation of Hatay from Syria in 1939, Turkey's involvement in Cyprus culminating in a military operation in 1974 and its policy toward the Karabagh dispute between Azerbaijan and Armenia in the 1990s, "Identity and Turkish Foreign Policy" is indispensable for all those interested in Middle East politics and international relations as well as Turkey more specifically.

This book offers an analysis of Turkish foreign policy based on transnational(ist) perspectives. In order to counterbalance the state-centric accounts that dominate this area of study, the authors provide theoretical frameworks as well as historical and contemporary case studies that emphasize transnational dynamics. The content is divided into four complementary sections that explain and exemplify transnational (f)actors in the context of Turkish foreign policy. The first addresses theoretical and ideational frameworks that illustrate the relevance of a transnational account, while the second demonstrates the possibility of developing transnationally oriented approaches even in historical cases, going beyond a presentist focus. In the third and fourth sections, the book focuses on two prominent non-state actors, namely diaspora communities and non-governmental organizations, which operate at the interstices of the domestic and the international. This allows the authors to highlight the significance of transnational dynamics in Turkey’s foreign policy.