Black sea's geopolitics: Actors, policies and areas of conflict

Geopolitics is one of the most important issues in international relations. Many geopolitical theories basically attach importance to Eurasian geography. The Black Sea, located in Eurasia, has been the focus of many actors with the power vacuum in the region and new concepts brought to geopolitics after the Cold War. The fact that the Black Sea is a key point especially in economy and security has affected the policies of the actors who want to have power in the basin. In this study, the main point of view was determined as geopolitical and the Black Sea Basin was examined from a geopolitical perspective. In the first part of the study, the conceptual framework of geopolitics was created and then the geopolitical elements of the Black Sea basin were examined. In the second part of the study, the policies of regional and global actors towards the Black Sea basin were examined and the conflicts in the region were included. In the last section, the geopolitical advantages of Turkey's being a riparian to the Black Sea are explained and the policies implemented to become a regional power in the Black Sea are given. Since international relations have mutual political interaction, the biggest difference of this study from previous studies can be stated as the recent developments. In this context, it is aimed to make predictions about how the natural gas discovered by Turkey in 2020 and the Canal Istanbul Project, which started on 26 June 2021 and is expected to be completed until 2027, will affect both the Montreux Straits Convention and the geopolitics of the basin.