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Abstract
This research investigates the relation between regional power policies of Turkey and the media strategy of President Erdoğan. After the coup attempt on July 15, 2016, the Justice and Development Party started to implement regional power policies, which are focusing on security affairs. The political power fell into the hands of the President. Regional power policies are used as a legitimised as a tool for the transition to authoritarianism. The main purpose of this transition is to suppress dissident voices by controlling the media. In this article, I argue that President Erdoğan uses regional power policies as a tool to control the national media. The President is trying to create the image of a world leader for himself by using the pro-government media companies. Turkey’s of natural gas, the Libya issue and the NATO Summit in Madrid will be discussed in terms of media’s perspectives.
Disclosure Statement
No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author.
Notes
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9 Ibid., p. 20.
10 Ibid., pp. 20–21.
11 Kutlay and Öniş, ‘Turkish foreign policy in a post-western order’, pp. 1096–1099.
12 Kutlay and Öniş, ‘Turkish foreign policy in a post-western order’, p. 1088.
13 ‘Turkey’, Human Rights Watch, (10 February 2023).
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18 Rahim Rahimov, ‘The Geopolitics of Sacralization: Turkey’s Reversion of the Hagia Sofia’, Israel Journal of Foreign Affairs 15(2), (2021), p. 274.
19 Ibid., p. 274.
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21 ‘Evolution of BRICS’, BRICS, (27 July 2022).
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26 Robert Stewart-Ingersoll and Derrick Frazier, ‘Regional Powers and Security Orders: A theoretical framework’, Oxon: Routledge, (2012), p. 11.
27 Ibid., p. 11.
28 Daniel Flemes, ‘Conceptualising regional power in international relations: Lessons from the South African case’, German Institute for Global and Area Studies (GIGA): Working Papers 53, (June 2007), p. 11.
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30 Emel Poyraz and Melih Dinçer, ‘Public diplomacy activities of Turkey in the globalizing world’, Intermedia International e-Journal 3(4), (2016), p. 30.
31 ‘GDP (current US$)’, World Bank, (2022).
32 Dal, ‘Conceptualising and testing the ‘emerging regional power’ of Turkey in the shifting international order’, p. 21.
33 Ibid., pp. 5–21.
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35 ‘Ukraine: the head of French diplomacy in Turkey to ‘encourage’ it in its ‘positive’ action’, Le Figaro, (25 September 2022).
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38 ‘President Erdoğan: ‘Türkiye is a global power’’, Hürriyet, (8 July 2022).
39 ‘President Erdoğan: Turkey is improving its regional and global power position day by day’, TRT Haber, (11 July 2022).
40 Berdal Aral, ‘‘The world ıs bigger than five’: A salutary manifesto of turkey’s new ınternational outlook’, Insight Turkey 21(4), (2019), p. 71.
41 Ibid., p. 71.
42 Meliha Benli Altunışık, ‘The trajectory of a modified middle power: an attempt to make sense of Turkey’s foreign policy in its centennial’, Turkish Studies 24(3–4), (2023), p. 668.
43 Bülent Aras, ‘Turkey’s state problem’, Alternatives: Global, Local, Political 44(1), (2019), p. 3.
44 Evren Balta, ‘From geopolitical competition to strategic partnership: Turkey and Russia after the Cold War’, Uluslararası İlişkiler 16(63), (2019), p. 69.
45 ‘President Erdoğan: We will not allow the great and powerful Turkey to stagnate or decline’, TRT Haber, (25 August 2022).
46 Kutlay and Öniş, ‘Turkish foreign policy in a post-western order’, pp. 1101–1102.
47 ‘Greece buys six more Rafale fighter jets, frigates from France’, Reuters, (25 July 2022).
48 Kutlay and Öniş, ‘Turkish foreign policy in a post-western order’, p. 1096.
49 Ibid.
50 E. Fuat Keyman, ‘Turkish foreign policy in the post-Arab Spring era: from proactive to buffer state’, Third World Quarterly 37(12), (2016), p. 2283.
51 C. Edwin Baker, Media, Markets, and Democracy (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2004), p. 125; Peter Arthur, ‘Democratic consolidation in Ghana: the role and contribution of the media, civil society and state institutions’, Commonwealth & Comparative Politics 48(2), (2010), p. 204.
52 Marius Dragomir and Astrid Söderström, ‘The State of State Media, the Media and Journalism Research Center’, (2022), p. 42.
53 Ibid., p. 12.
54 Murat Akser and Banu Baybars-Hawks, ‘Media and democracy in Turkey: Towards a model of neoliberal media autocracy’, Middle East Journal of Culture and Communication 5, (2012), p. 302.
55 ‘Oil and gas gush out before every election’, Sözcü, (28 December 2022); ‘Statement from Erdoğan on natural gas discovery’, Bloomberg HT, (26 December 2022).
56 ‘1 trillion dollar good news! ‘Gas sufficient for 50 years will be processed here’’, Milliyet, (27 December 2022); ‘Natural gas good news signal for Turkey! Exactly 110 billion cubic meters’, Star, (3 November 2022).
57 Kutlay and Öniş, ‘Turkish foreign policy in a post-western order’, p. 1100.
58 ‘To Kılıçdaroğlu who said, ‘What are we doing in Libya?’’, Takvim, (3 July 2022).
59 ‘Emin Çölaşan, What are we doing in Libya?’, Sözcü, (14 March 2023).
60 ‘Türkiye, Sweden and Finland signed a joint memorandum!’, A Haber, (7 March 2023).
61 ‘Erdoğan left his mark on 2022’, Yeni Akit, (30 June 2022).
62 ‘Meral went crazy when Turkey came out stronger from the table’, Yeni Akit, (30 June 2022).
63 ‘Kemal Kılıçdaroğlu’, Twitter, (30 June 2022).
64 Ibid.
65 Ibid.
66 ‘Prof Dr İlhan Uzgel: Contrary to propaganda, Erdoğan returned empty-handed’, Evrensel, (30 June 2022).
67 ‘The law on amending the press law and some laws’, the Official Gazette, (18 October 2022).