What is it about?
The article develops a theory to account for when and how domestic identity contestation spills over into foreign policy. When domestic actors are blocked by institutional obstacles, they take their identity struggles outside to the foreign policy arena. I explore this in the case of Turkey, showing how the ruling Justice and Development Party used EU accession criteria to weaken Republican Nationalist institutional obstacles such as the military and the judiciary to make room for the spread of its Ottoman Islamist identity proposal back home.
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Why is it important?
The article employs a theoretical framework for systematically capturing competing understandings of identity, and examines external contestation as the mechanism by which support for various proposals for national identity can shift. I develop a unique data set drawing on surveys, interviews, ethnographic participation, and pop culture sources such as novels and television shows to extract Turkey's competing proposals for identity, and use process tracing to demonstrate shifts in support for these proposals over time.
Perspectives
Particularly with Turkey's increasing authoritarianism at home and aggressiveness in foreign policy abroad, this article provides a timely take on how the ruling party was able to shore up hegemony for its Ottoman Islamist proposal. The article's conclusion explores powerful challenges to this bid for hegemony, notably the Gezi Park protests and the rupture of relations between the Justice and Development Party and the Gulen movement.
Dr. Lisel Hintz
Cornell University
Read the Original
This page is a summary of: “Take it outside!” National identity contestation in the foreign policy arena, European Journal of International Relations, June 2015, SAGE Publications,
DOI: 10.1177/1354066115588205.
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