Understanding Turkish Foreign Policy in a Changing World: An Analysis of Turkish Foreign Policy from 1980 to 2014 through the Perspectives of Role Theory and Operational Code Analysis

This thesis examines Turkish national role conceptions (NRCs) during 1980–2014 based on the official policy statements of eighteen Turkish foreign policy-makers. It questions change and continuity in Turkish foreign policy behavior by evaluating ‘pre-AKP’ and ‘AKP’ (Justice and Development Party, Adalet ve Kalkınma Partisi) periods. The NRCs that Turkish foreign policy makers adopted in these periods suggests that there has been both a change and continuity of Turkish foreign policy. K. J. Holsti’s adaptation of role theory and leaders perception of states’ NRCs is utilized as a main theoretical framework to explain changes in Turkish foreign policy behaviors. This thesis also utilizes operational code analysis as another at-a-distance leadership assessment method to complement role theory. The thesis asserts that both methods have explanatory powers to identify changes in Turkish foreign policy behaviors. Utilizing both role theory and operational code analysis explains Turkey’s NRCs based on its leaders’ beliefs on, perceptions of the political universe and the strategies that they have adopted. The qualitative and quantitative content analysis methods are combined to analyze leaders’ official documents to see whether leaders’ perception of NRCs and belief system led different foreign policy behaviors. The research results help to understand changing Turkish foreign policy behaviors in Turkey from 1980 to 2014.