Award Topics
The topic for the 2011 award was "New Directions for Turkish Foreign Policy in a Changing World Order: Challenges and Opportunities". The sixth Sakıp Sabancı International Research Awards were given at a ceremony held on Monday, June 6th, at Sabancı University Sakıp Sabancı Museum - the Seed. The ceremony was hosted by Güler Sabancı, Chairman of the Board of Trustees, and PresidentProfessor A. Nihat Berker. The winner was Professor Kemal Kirişci from Boğaziçi University.
Winners
The first prize: Kemal Kirişci. Boğaziçi University. “Turkey’s engagement with its neighborhood: A “synthetic” and multi-dimensional look at Turkey’s foreign policy transformation” .
Second prize: Güneş Murat Tezcur & Alexandru Grigorescu. Loyola University Chicago. “Europeanization Regionalism in Turkish Foreign Policy” .
Third prize: Clemens Hoffman & Can Cemgil. Sussex University “A Pax Turca in the Middle East?” .
Jury
Prof. Dr. Sabri Sayarı: Sabancı University
Prof. Dr. Ustun Erguder : Director, Istanbul Policy Center / Sabancı University
Prof. Dr. Mustafa Aydın: Kadir Has University
Prof. Dr. Riva Kastoryano: Center for International Studies and Research Director, Paris
Associate. Prof. Martin Sampson: Minnesota University
Prof. Dr. Malik Mufti: Tufts University
Dr. Nathalie Tocci: Instituto Affari Internazionali’de Senior Fellow
Winning Articles
Prof. Dr. Kemal Kirişci / “Turkey’s engagement with its neighborhood: A “synthetic” and multi-dimensional look at Turkey’s foreign policy transformation”
Doç. Dr. Güneş Murat Tezcur & Doç. Dr. Alexandru Grigorescu / “Europeanization Regionalism in Turkish Foreign Policy”
Dr. Clemens Hoffman & Can Cemgil / “A Pax Turca in the Middle East?”
Dr. Ioannis N. Grigoriadis / "Turkey’s New Foreign Policy Activism: Evaluating its Political and Economic Underpinnings”
Dr. Alper Kaliber / “Reorganization of Geopolitics: Understanding the New Activism in Turkish Foreign Policy”
Please do not cite or reproduce without permission of the author.
Keynote Speeches
Martin Sampson
Notes for speech on behalf of the jury at the 2011 Sakip Sabanci Award ceremony at the Sabanci Museum on June 8, 2011
Winner: Kemal Kirişci
Just as it is appropriate and advantageous that Turkey has an ambitious, nuanced, and complex relationship with the outside world, it is advantageous and important that scholarship that seeks to understand these nuances and complexities flourish. That is the purpose of the Sakip Sabanci award, and the diversity and number of papers it has attracted attest to the richness of the subject. There was a time decades ago when a significant part, although not all, of Turkey’s foreign policy was derivative of someone else’s cold war. Two decades ago a time ensued in which many wondered if the end of the cold war meant a strategic marginalization of Turkey that would significantly reduce its importance internationally. Few if any people in that era could have imagined that two decades later Turkey would have significant latitude to find its own way in a number of internationally crucial foreign policy arenas. Few people in that era could have imagined how the topic of Turkish foreign policy would widen from a focus on state activities to a continuation of that focus plus a consideration of impacts various societal and economic groups would play in Turkey’s relationship with the outside world and its foreign policy. The current era is a time in which scholarship has become far more important for understanding and for democratic debate because of these kinds of changes. The existence of this award could not have found a better era, in regard either to the fascination of the topic or the importance of informed debate and discussion. I salute those who created this award. The papers submitted this year present an array of terms which underscore the interest of their authors in the orientation and/or the complexity of Turkey’s relationship with the outside world. “Concurrent repositioning”, “omni-enmeshment”, “neo-Ottoman”, “Pax Turca,” “new foreign policy activisim” are some of them, underscoring the debate on how best to understand the complexities of Turkey’s foreign policy. Some of the papers examined the implications of Turkey’s leverage as that relates to its foreign policy endeavors. There were case studies on narrow but crucial aspects of Turkey’s foreign policy some of which examined how well the policy was implemented in those particular circumstances. There were case studies on highly visible, broader parts of Turkey’s policy. And there was one paper that argued the advantages of an ambiguous foreign policy in a turbulent region. One of the central challenges is to understand the new context in which Turkey is operating. Part of that context is driven by outside factors, such as the overthrow of a Mubarak or the revolt in Syria against the Asad regime. Part of the context, however, is the rise of Turkey’s international presence as a result of Turkey’s own efforts of many kinds. It is not difficult to find evidence. Examples of such evidence include the trivial point that there is Turkish chocolate for sale at the Timbucktu airport or that a finalist and in the eyes of many the best entry in New York City’s contest for a new taxicab came from a Turkish company to the fact that it was Turkey whose embassy in Tripoli was able to mediate the release of reporters despite Turkey’s complex situation of NATO membership plus extensive economic interests in Libya. The evidence is abundant. The difficulties are to understand the major kinds of this evidence, how they add up, and what kinds of implications that has for Turkey’s foreign policy. These are not easy tasks, which is precisely why academics and others who analyze Turkey’s international situation are so valuable and why it is so helpful to have an award that helps stimulate and recognize their scholarship.
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