The Western Condition - St Antony's College - University of Oxford

The Western Condition: Turkey, the US and the EU in the New Middle East
important milestone, which increased intelligence sharing and joint military operations against
Kurdish militants along their countries’ porous border. 47
Autonomisation and the pursuit of ‘strategic depth’ (2007 – 2011)
Turkey’s ‘liberal moment’ came to a gradual halt from the mid-2000s onwards. While its EU
accession process and its associated reforms stagnated, the resurgence of armed conflict between
the Turkish military and the PKK pushed securitisation back to the top of the government’s
political agenda. Largely outside the Turkish government’s control, these developments were
nevertheless compounded by changing socio-political dynamics within Turkey.
As previously noted, the end of the PKK’s ceasefire was in part a consequence of the shifting
geopolitical dynamics following the US occupation of Iraq, namely the growing momentum for
Kurdish autonomy and an enlarged manoeuvring space for Kurdish militants along the Turkish
border in northern Iraq. The downturn in the EU – Turkish relations, meanwhile, was closely
related to the post 9/11 rise of Islamophobia in many European countries. 48 Coupled with the
popular backlash within Europe against what many regarded as a union pushed too far and too
deep by out-of-touch ‘Eurocrats’, public perceptions of Turkey’s accession prospects took on an
explicitly alarmist and unaccommodating turn. They found representation at the highest level of
European decision making with the election of ‘Turcosceptic’ politicians, Angela Merkel and
Nicolas Sarkozy, as the chancellor and president of Germany and France. These developments
exacerbated – and were in turn exacerbated by – a general sense of disillusionment within Turkey
eventually leading to the AKP government’s turn towards a more confrontational style of politics
first at home and then, increasingly, abroad.
The external causes leading to the loss of the EU ‘anchor’ and the re-securitisation of the
Kurdish issue only partly explain this confrontational turn, which is also connected to the
changing power relations within Turkey. Between 2007 and 2011, riding on strong economic
growth seemingly unaffected by the economic crisis in the West and buoyed by successive
election victories, the AKP government pursued its efforts to challenge the socio-political
47 For Turkey’s Iran policy under the AKP government, see Karabekir Akkoyunlu, ‘Turkey’s Iranian Conundrum: A
Delicate Balancing Act’ in Kerem Öktem, Ayşe Kadıoğlu, Mehmet Karlı (eds) Another Empire? A Decade of Turkey’s
Foreign Policy under the Justice and Development Party (Istanbul: Bilgi University Press, 2012).
48 The revelation that many of the key operatives of the September 11 attacks were based in Hamburg (the so-called
‘Hamburg Cell’) and the murders of Dutch politician Pim Fortuyn and director Theo van Gogh were key events that
caused a swelling of public anger against all Muslims in countries like the Netherlands, Belgium, Austria, France and
Germany. Although none of the perpetrators of these attacks were Turks, the existence of a large Turkish
community in Europe and Turkey’s candidacy for EU membership, put Turks (and Turkey) at the receiving end of
this anger.
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