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Israel and Turkey have more in common than their recent military and economic cooperation and their secular and democratic credentials. In both states there was a crisis of national identity in the 1990s as the previously dominant conceptions of the national identity were challenged and unsettled. The crises of national identity in Israel and Turkey share some important features. They also have a potentially broader relevance since such crises are now becoming increasingly common. By examining these identity crises and comparing them, this paper attempts to offer a theoretically grounded and empirically informed understanding of national identity crises and their causes. A crisis of national identity occurs when the prevailing conception of the national identity is undermined and loses its ‘taken-for-granted’ nature making it subject to extensive contestation and debate. No objective criteria, however, can be specified for precisely when this point is reached. On the basis of a comparison of the crises of national identity in Israel and Turkey, this paper argues that a change in state-society relations is behind the identity crises in both countries. The gradual loss of the state’s monopoly in defining the national identity resulted in growing societal discord over the definition of the national identity, with the persistence and intensity of this discord being widely interpreted as indicative of a crisis of national identity. Thus, this paper contends that a crisis of national identity occurs when a national identity was imposed largely from above by the state, and when the states loses this ability?as it invariably does, especially as a result of globalization?opening the way for a variety of different social groups to advance different conceptions of the national identity and compete with each other to make their conception of the national identity hegemonic. When no societal consensus is reached over the proper definition of the national identity and there are multiple definitions of the national identity in competition, this situation is perceived by many as indicative of a crisis of national identity. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Multiparty cabinets in parliamentary political systems create a unique context in which foreign policy decisions are made. Under certain (and frequent) conditions, the senior political party must negotiate any differences with its junior partner(s) or risk the collapse of the governing coalition. This context occurs in many important states in international politics, including Israel, Japan, Germany, Turkey, and India. The result may be a government unable to resolve differences and make meaningful policy decisions or a government that is hijacked by narrow political interests and pushed to extremes. This paper will compare the foreign policy behaviors and processes of multiparty governments to those of single party governments using events and crisis behavior datasets. Building on previous research, specific theoretical propositions will be tested across a number of states in order to provide a general understanding of the effects of, and conditions under which, coalition politics may influence the foreign policies of key players in global politics. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Why are Israel and Turkey becoming so politically polarized as their societies develop economically? This paper will explore the impact of the fragmentation of the public sphere as economic development, increasing levels of education, and the electronic ..PAT.-Unpublished Manuscript [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The Union of European Football (Soccer) Associations is geographically, culturally, politically, and economically a much broader array of countries than the European Union. Russia, Israel, and Turkey, for example, are members of UEFA but not the EU. This ..PAT.-Unpublished Manuscript [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article examines two stateless societies, the Kurds and Palestinians, according to the concept of social security. The author contends that the societal security concept is essential to understanding a range of threats that cannot be understood through the lens of state security. It concludes that the policies of Israel and Turkey served to eliminate the power of the traditional power holders that had been resistant to secular nationalism.

This article explores the impact of religious ideas on Turkish foreign policy towards Israel in the post-cold war era. First, I explain how to employ religious ideas as an independent variable. Although the literature on the relationship between religion and politics is growing, the literature on religion and IR, and particularly foreign policy is sparse. My research suggests that religious ideas can impact diplomacy on various levels along with other factors, such as domestic interests and international imperatives. Religion can function as both an identity and idea. Some constructivist scholars have linked religion in the matrix of identity politics. Although this is helpful, it is not informative when we want to measure the specific effect of religion on foreign policy change. This article offers more precision by analyzing religious ideas, rather than religion per se or religious identity, which provides a more useful tool kit for research. It is now accepted that the world, ─and Turkey to the surprise of many─ is not secular, but very religious. The case of Turkish foreign policy towards Israel is particularly interesting in this context. Mainstream scholars applaud how “good friends” Israel and Turkey have become amongst all the regional instability and mutual domestic suspicion. This article underlines that anti-Israeli views generated from above in the Turkish ultra-religious print and visual media has affected the overall Turkish-Israeli relations adversely. I provide specific examples from the events of the last five years. The results of my research are counterintuitive. That is, one would have expected the Turkish-Israeli relations to flourish after getting over the most important obstacles, i.e. reaching important military agreements in mid-1990s, and as long as the expected utility curves for both countries kept constant. However, there were several unexpected ideational roadblocks most of which cannot be explained properly without a reference to religion. The deterioration of relations cannot be explained properly if one ignores religious ideas. In addition, we observe that the elitist world of diplomats is not insulated from religious ideational influence. In sum, only a detailed study of religious ideas can help us understand the diversity, depth and interconnectedness of Islam for Turkish mentality and its direct implications on Turkish foreign policy. ..PAT.-Unpublished Manuscript [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]