Turkey-Syria relations changing in the wake of Arab spring: A social constructivist analysis

The Arab Spring that emerged in the Middle East in 2011 has effected Turkey's foreing policy, which is constructed upon the basis of soft power and developing good relations with its neighbors, in a negative way. The aim of this study is to reveal how rapidly the relations between Turkey and Syria, which were at the level of friendship, declined in the wake of the Arab Spring and find out Turkey's Syrian policy through discourse of policy makers via a social constructivist perspective. In this study the discourse of Turkish policy makers will be analyzed within the framework of values and norms that form the basis of Social Constructivism, the identity-interest and stucture-actor relationships. In the discourse analysis, Turkey will be asserted to use a moral-based discourse that is based on human values related to the Syrian crises. The analysis will show that Turkey's rhetoric was more cautious when the protests in Syria first started, but the rhetoric began to harden along with the deepening crisis and that the "friend country" identity that was attributed to Syria before has transformed in a negative way. It will be argued that this transformation in the discourse includes only the Syrian regime and that policy-makers continue to evaluate the people who have risen to the regime in Syria as "brothers". In addition, it will be also argued Turkey's Syria policy began to be militarized after Syria dropped a Turkish jet and that Turkey stated to use a security-based discourse after this period. Key words: Constructivism, Discourse, Foreign Policy, Arab Spring, Syria, Turkey