Neoclassic realist approach in foreign policy analysis: Turkey's foreign policy in Syria

"Foreign policy", one of the two main sub-disciplines of international relations, has focused on the states known as the main actors of the international system. Its main issue is to understand why the international policies implemented by the states and how they affect other states. All foreign policy activities of states in foreign policy follow each other and form a holistic structure in a process which is referred to as the "foreign policy process". In other words, the actors' behaviors in foreign policy are those that appear parallel to the foreign policy process and are also referred to as foreign policy practices. "Foreign policy analysis" refers to the analysis of the foreign policy process as a whole. The purpose of this research is to develop a foreign policy analysis methodology within the framework of "the need for additional measures for developing and analyzing Turkish foreign policy behaviors in a healthier way" problematique. This methodology should take into account the relationship and interaction between appropriate factors affecting foreign policy behavior based on today's/third term's foreign policy analysis approachsitting in an appropriate theoretical framework.In this context, the following steps are presented in order to provide a scientific, methodological and objective analysis: - The factors affecting foreign policy behaviors are determined and the appropriate factors are listed, - According to the qualifications of the actors; the effect and priority of the factors were determined by considering the relationship and interaction between appropriate factors, - "Foreign Policy Process" defined, - A foreign policy analysis methodology has been developed in order to present a scientific, methodological and objective analysis. By using the methodology which was developed under the name of "Foreign Policy Relevance and Compliance Analysis Methodology", Turkey's Syria Policy in the period of 2001-2017 has been analyzed and the applicability of the methodology has been tested.