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Sunday's Zaman, Turkey
May 9 2010
DavutoÄ?lu -- one year on
AMANDA PAUL
Earlier this month, Ahmet DavutoÄ?lu celebrated his one year
anniversary as Turkish foreign minister, which he marked by delivering
a speech at the University of Oxford in the UK in which he described
all the ups and ups (because Turks never really admit to downs) in
Turkey's foreign policy over the last 12 months. All in all I would
say it has been quite a hectic but pretty successful year. Of course,
not all of DavutoÄ?lu's initiatives have borne fruit, but given the
often unfortunate constraints of Turkish domestic politics, he has
still not done too badly. DavutoÄ?lu has seen the profile of his
country, and of course, himself, rise on the international stage, and
Turkey has become an increasingly powerful and influential regional
player.
Turkey has moved away from its old image of being something of a
troublesome and unreliable neighbor and taken on a far more flattering
image of a proactive and pragmatic actor in its direct neighborhood
and indeed far beyond. While his predecessor, current Economy Minister
Ali Babacan, was also quite successful and popular, DavutoÄ?lu has had
a greater level of success. The combination of his academic background
and foreign policy experience, including several years spent advising
Prime Minister Recep Tayyip ErdoÄ?an along with his very `down to earth
approach,' has given him a special edge and sparkle, and he enjoys
close and intimate relationships with counterparts all over the world.
He has the ear of both Brussels and Washington and uses this very much
to Turkey's advantage.
His `strategic depth' book, which was published in 2002 (the year the
Justice and Development Party [AKP] came to power) and which outlines
the challenges faced by Turkey in a radically modernizing world, has
become a `must read' for anybody working on Turkish foreign policy,
and his `zero problems with neighbors' slogan has become famous the
world over. In short, DavutoÄ?lu has turned words into action and has
turned Turkish foreign policy on its head. While Turkey remains a
committed ally to its partners in the West, at the same time it has
reached out and formed pragmatic and strategic relationships with
countries which were until only a few years ago viewed as hostile.
Indeed, Ankara has increased its clout in almost its entire
neighborhood whether that is the Middle East, Russia, the South
Caucasus or the Balkans. Ankara has also become far more aware of its
unique geostrategic location and is now promoting itself as an energy
super-hub. The origin of the energy is not important; rather Turkey
wants to transport it and line its coffers from the lucrative role it
is able to play as a transit state.
Of course, not everything is rosy. Relations with Israel are worse now
than they ever have been, and the special `one nation two states'
relationship with Azerbaijan has been damaged and trust eroded as a
result of Turkey's rapprochement with Armenia.
Furthermore, to a certain degree, Turkey has spread itself too thin by
apparently trying to be everything to everybody, and some efforts to
raise Turkey's image abroad and to portray the country as an example
to the rest of the region have been hampered by the fact that Turkey
has been unable to solve some if its own long-standing problems at
home. While Turkey has been more than ready to offer its services as a
mediator in a whole range of different conflicts around the world, it
has still failed to deal adequately with its own Kurdish and Alevis
problems, for example. It is also still questionable whether DavutoÄ?lu
has enough influence in domestic policy to determine whether or not
his foreign policy will be successful when the stakes are really high.
Clearly, the Armenia-Turkey rapprochement is a good example of this.
It was a great policy but such was the influence of domestic pressure
that the government seemed to crack, which resulted in Prime Minister
ErdoÄ?an linking it to the Nagorno-Karabakh conflict, which has damaged
Turkey's credibility.
Turkey also has a bad habit of having too many pans boiling at the
same time and a tendency to switch attention to something else when
one project starts to go off the rails. When the Kurdish opening hit
trouble, the rapprochement with Armenia was suddenly in the spotlight.
Now that this has stalled, DavutoÄ?lu has begun to busy himself with
Iran, which keeps Turkey in the headlines for the right reasons.
And, of course, with European Union membership talks heading toward
`crunch time' -- because unless there is some change vis-a-vis Cyprus,
Turkey will soon run out of negotiating chapters -- Turkey is trying
to pile up as many `assets' as possible on to the table to demonstrate
to the EU that the EU has no other option than to keep the process
moving forward and find some way out of this apparent dead end because
the EU simply needs Turkey too much to consider any other options.
09.05.2010
May 9 2010
DavutoÄ?lu -- one year on
AMANDA PAUL
Earlier this month, Ahmet DavutoÄ?lu celebrated his one year
anniversary as Turkish foreign minister, which he marked by delivering
a speech at the University of Oxford in the UK in which he described
all the ups and ups (because Turks never really admit to downs) in
Turkey's foreign policy over the last 12 months. All in all I would
say it has been quite a hectic but pretty successful year. Of course,
not all of DavutoÄ?lu's initiatives have borne fruit, but given the
often unfortunate constraints of Turkish domestic politics, he has
still not done too badly. DavutoÄ?lu has seen the profile of his
country, and of course, himself, rise on the international stage, and
Turkey has become an increasingly powerful and influential regional
player.
Turkey has moved away from its old image of being something of a
troublesome and unreliable neighbor and taken on a far more flattering
image of a proactive and pragmatic actor in its direct neighborhood
and indeed far beyond. While his predecessor, current Economy Minister
Ali Babacan, was also quite successful and popular, DavutoÄ?lu has had
a greater level of success. The combination of his academic background
and foreign policy experience, including several years spent advising
Prime Minister Recep Tayyip ErdoÄ?an along with his very `down to earth
approach,' has given him a special edge and sparkle, and he enjoys
close and intimate relationships with counterparts all over the world.
He has the ear of both Brussels and Washington and uses this very much
to Turkey's advantage.
His `strategic depth' book, which was published in 2002 (the year the
Justice and Development Party [AKP] came to power) and which outlines
the challenges faced by Turkey in a radically modernizing world, has
become a `must read' for anybody working on Turkish foreign policy,
and his `zero problems with neighbors' slogan has become famous the
world over. In short, DavutoÄ?lu has turned words into action and has
turned Turkish foreign policy on its head. While Turkey remains a
committed ally to its partners in the West, at the same time it has
reached out and formed pragmatic and strategic relationships with
countries which were until only a few years ago viewed as hostile.
Indeed, Ankara has increased its clout in almost its entire
neighborhood whether that is the Middle East, Russia, the South
Caucasus or the Balkans. Ankara has also become far more aware of its
unique geostrategic location and is now promoting itself as an energy
super-hub. The origin of the energy is not important; rather Turkey
wants to transport it and line its coffers from the lucrative role it
is able to play as a transit state.
Of course, not everything is rosy. Relations with Israel are worse now
than they ever have been, and the special `one nation two states'
relationship with Azerbaijan has been damaged and trust eroded as a
result of Turkey's rapprochement with Armenia.
Furthermore, to a certain degree, Turkey has spread itself too thin by
apparently trying to be everything to everybody, and some efforts to
raise Turkey's image abroad and to portray the country as an example
to the rest of the region have been hampered by the fact that Turkey
has been unable to solve some if its own long-standing problems at
home. While Turkey has been more than ready to offer its services as a
mediator in a whole range of different conflicts around the world, it
has still failed to deal adequately with its own Kurdish and Alevis
problems, for example. It is also still questionable whether DavutoÄ?lu
has enough influence in domestic policy to determine whether or not
his foreign policy will be successful when the stakes are really high.
Clearly, the Armenia-Turkey rapprochement is a good example of this.
It was a great policy but such was the influence of domestic pressure
that the government seemed to crack, which resulted in Prime Minister
ErdoÄ?an linking it to the Nagorno-Karabakh conflict, which has damaged
Turkey's credibility.
Turkey also has a bad habit of having too many pans boiling at the
same time and a tendency to switch attention to something else when
one project starts to go off the rails. When the Kurdish opening hit
trouble, the rapprochement with Armenia was suddenly in the spotlight.
Now that this has stalled, DavutoÄ?lu has begun to busy himself with
Iran, which keeps Turkey in the headlines for the right reasons.
And, of course, with European Union membership talks heading toward
`crunch time' -- because unless there is some change vis-a-vis Cyprus,
Turkey will soon run out of negotiating chapters -- Turkey is trying
to pile up as many `assets' as possible on to the table to demonstrate
to the EU that the EU has no other option than to keep the process
moving forward and find some way out of this apparent dead end because
the EU simply needs Turkey too much to consider any other options.
09.05.2010