Turkey’s Crypto Crackdown Leaves Investors Scrambling

Gerelyn Terzo
June 28, 2021
Paper No. 2082

Turkey has decided to throw down the gauntlet on the cryptocurrency industry. It has assigned money laundering and terror financing regulations to the nascent market, leaving Turkish crypto investors scrambling as they face sky-high inflation and a severely weakened national currency.

Iran, Russia, and Turkey: A Eurasionist Model of Foreign Relations

Emil Avdaliani
June 22, 2021
Paper No. 2078

Iran, Turkey, and Russia are building a new model of bilateral ties. Unshackled by formal alliances, the trio is showing it can work together to limit Western influence while avoiding an overreliance on one another. This mixture of correlating and contradictory interests, which characterizes the new Eurasianist model of bilateral relations, is a product of the changing global order.

Erdoğan’s Caricature State

Burak Bekdil
June 21, 2021
Paper No. 2077

Power fatigue per se does not fully explain the decline of Recep Tayyip Erdoğan. He will have a hard time uniting a majority of Turks around the flag and the mosque in the presidential elections of 2023.

Erdoğan’s Eastern Med Repentance: Too Little, Too Late

Burak Bekdil
June 17, 2021
Paper No. 2074

Turkey’s string of failures and increasing isolation in the Eastern Med have forced President Erdoğan to recalibrate his policy toward the region.

Biden’s Use of the G-Word Furthers Turkey’s Isolation

Burak Bekdil
June 1, 2021
Paper No. 2060

President Joe Biden’s use of the word “genocide” on Armenian Remembrance Day was not a game-changer in US-Turkish relations, which are plagued by more fundamental problems. But it enhances Turkey’s political isolation, weakens its arguments on whether a genocide did or did not occur in 1915-24, and further destabilizes whatever is left of Ankara’s soft power.

Turkey: How Not to Handle a Pandemic

Burak Bekdil
May 28, 2021
Paper No. 2054

Turkey’s official COVID-19 numbers reveal the government’s efforts to combat the pandemic as worthy of a commedia all’Italiana. As of mid-April, Turkey was the second-worst performer in the world, with 710.46 cases per million people. This is despite the country’s possession of a strong health infrastructure.

Turks May Be Rediscovering the Merits of the Secular Paradigm

Burak Bekdil
May 20, 2021
Paper No. 2038

The departure of some Turks from Erdoğan-style manifest Islamism based on visible piety instead of spiritual and moral piety probably means their departure from Erdoğan’s voter base.

Sisi’s Egypt Has the Upper Hand Over Erdoğan’s Turkey

The foreign policy of Turkish president Recep Tayyip Erdoğan, a combination of imperialism and Muslim Brotherhood sentiment, was most visible in his moves against Abdel Fattah Sisi’s Egypt. Ankara is beginning to recognize its folly. Will the new US administration learn from its mistake?

Turkish, not Saudi, Schoolbooks Under Scrutiny

In a sign of the times, Turkish schoolbooks have replaced Saudi texts as the focus of criticism of supremacist and intolerant curricula in the Muslim world.

The Stunted Growth of the Emerging Islamic Bloc

Burak Bekdil
April 20, 2021
Paper No. 2002

The emerging Islamic bloc of three Muslim states—Turkey, Azerbaijan, and Pakistan—seems feasible in theory, but its growth is constrained by the realities. Azerbaijan is still more Russian turf than Turkish, and Pakistan remains Chinese territory. The new Islamic bloc resembles three kids playing cowboy while their parents smile and watch. The parents will stay on the sidelines only until such time as they sense danger to their interests.