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A Century of Greek–Turkish Relations – A Handbook Cover Image
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A Century of Greek–Turkish Relations – A Handbook
A Century of Greek–Turkish Relations – A Handbook

Contributor(s): Nikos Christofis (Editor), Anthony Deriziotis (Editor)
Subject(s): Politics / Political Sciences, Politics, Social Sciences, Economy, Psychology, Essay|Book Review |Scientific Life, General Reference Works, Geography, Regional studies, Library and Information Science, Political Theory, Political Sciences, Governance, Sociology
Published by: Transnational Press London
Keywords: Mediterranean Politics; Aegean dispute; anti-Rum politics; geopolitical turmoil; Greece; Greek-Turkish relations; Lausanne treaty; minorities; population exchange; Turkey
Summary/Abstract: “A Century of Greek-Turkish Relations is an important handbook written by leading authorities from both shores of the Aegean Sea. Greek and Turkish scholars present in a balanced and objective way, as well as in a graspable and meaningful manner, the main periods in which key events brought the two sides into dispute or even conflict. These events, which are integrated in parallel and conflicting national narratives, fuel the historicity of the two national rivals. A century since the end of the Greek-Turkish war, the trauma of the Greek military defeat and the “disaster of the Asia Minor Greeks”, the establishment of the Republic of Turkey and the emblematic Treaty of Lausanne, render this kind of handbook undoubtedly essential. It opens the discussion to the wider audience in a rational and composed way and most importantly, the reader can follow through the pages, the dialogue between Turkish and Greek scholars. A book of this kind was missing from public history.” – Prof. Sia Anagnostopoulou, Panteion University“As an expert on the subject of “minorities” for the past fifty years with a number of publications in Turkish, English, and French, and based on the experts that are participating in the A Century of Greek-Turkish Relations: A Handbook, there is no doubt that this will become an indispensable tool, and above all, an objective account of the Greek-Turkish relations for both experts and the wider public.” – Prof. (emeritus) Baskin Oran, Ankara University“As editors of this important and timely book, Nikos Christofis and Anthony Deriziotis assert that uneducated narratives have perpetuated misunderstandings within Turkish-Greek relations. In their enlightening work, they dismantle these misconceptions, offering a nuanced exploration of the historical and contemporary complexities between the two nations. By featuring insights from leading experts, this book provides a crucial resource for anyone seeking a deeper understanding of Turkish-Greek relations, presenting new historical insights and analytical viewpoints on bilateral relations.” – Prof. Evren Balta, Özyeğin University“A comprehensive and insightful survey of Greek-Turkish relations. A number of distinguished academics have offered their expertise succeeding in the formidable task of touching upon several sensitive issues avoiding stereotypes and easy readings of problems that are burdened by history. A must read for students and experts alike.” – Prof. Sotiris Roussos, University of Peloponnese

  • E-ISBN-13: 978-1-80135-264-2
  • Print-ISBN-13: 978-1-80135-263-5
  • Page Count: 349
  • Publication Year: 2024
  • Language: English
The uses and abuses of history in Greece and Turkey

The uses and abuses of history in Greece and Turkey
(The uses and abuses of history in Greece and Turkey)

  • Author(s):Nikos Christofis, Kerem Öktem
  • Language:English
  • Subject(s):History
  • Page Range:15-27
  • No. of Pages:13
  • Keywords:Greece; Turkey; history; public; Greek; Turkish;
  • Summary/Abstract:History, or rather the uses and abuses of history were at the heart of the making of both Greek and Turkish nation-states. In the Greek Kingdom already in the 1830s, and in the Turkish Republic more than ninety years later, nationalist elites chose to remember certain episodes, and forget or even deny others. The power of seemingly historical narratives like the pan-Hellenic Megali Idea (Great Idea) or the pan-Turkic Turkish History Thesis was real: The former paved the way to the Asia Minor catastrophe, the latter legitimized Turkey’s claim on the empire’s Anatolian heartlands. The Greco-Turkish War is remembered in a diagonally opposed fashion, as a catastrophe in Greece and as the decisive victory that made possible the Turkish Republic, even though this narrative has been challenged in Turkey in recent years. These narratives and much history produced in both countries on the ‘other’ contained more ideology than history. Today, these narratives have lost some of their attraction or have been rearticulated with other metanarratives on European belonging or neo-Imperial Islamism, yet their core ideas on the civilised/good ‘self’ and the barbaric/quarrelling ‘other’ continue to circulate through public spheres and are frequently mobilised by right-wing political parties in Greece and the Justice and Development’s authoritarian power project in Turkey.
  • Price: 4.90 €
The Greek-Turkish War of 1919–1922

The Greek-Turkish War of 1919–1922
(The Greek-Turkish War of 1919–1922)

  • Author(s):Charalampos Minasidis
  • Language:English
  • Subject(s):Pre-WW I & WW I (1900 -1919), Interwar Period (1920 - 1939)
  • Page Range:29-42
  • No. of Pages:14
  • Keywords:Greek; Turkish; War; Greece; Western; Turkey; Ottoman Empire;
  • Summary/Abstract:The Greek-Turkish War of 1919–1922 is known as the Asia Minor Campaign in Greece and as the Western Front of the Turkish War of Independence in Turkey. It was fought between the Kingdom of Greece and the Turkish National Movement between 15 May 1919 and 11 October 1922. It is sometimes regarded as a continuation of the Great War or First World War (1914–1918), and it was one of the post-1918 conflicts that contributed to the partition of the Ottoman Empire, and thus part of what historiography calls the Greater War (1911–1922) or the Long Great War (1914–1922). It was also a means of settling the Greek-Ottoman/Turkish dispute over the fate of the Ottoman Greeks and the areas they inhabited. Thus, it was both a conventional and an unconventional war fought by states and peoples. Its conclusion led to the Treaty of Lausanne of 1923 that ratified, for the first time in history, a compulsory population exchange. The military defeat was named the Asia Minor Catastrophe in Greece, and this term was later also used to refer to its impact on the civilians. Simultaneously, the war meant the collapse of the institution of monarchy in both countries and the establishment of republics in Turkey in 1923 and in Greece in 1924.
  • Price: 4.90 €
The 1923 Greco-Turkish Population Exchange: An Assessment of its History and Long Shadow at its Centennial

The 1923 Greco-Turkish Population Exchange: An Assessment of its History and Long Shadow at its Centennial
(The 1923 Greco-Turkish Population Exchange: An Assessment of its History and Long Shadow at its Centennial)

  • Author(s):Aytek Soner Alpan
  • Language:English
  • Subject(s):Interwar Period (1920 - 1939)
  • Page Range:43-59
  • No. of Pages:17
  • Keywords:Greco; Turkish; Population Exchange; Assessment; Centennial; History;
  • Summary/Abstract:Nation-building is ipso facto accompanied by ethnic homogenization and demographic engineering operations, including exchanging or transferring populations. This method was considered a standard part of the policy repertoire of the nation-states to manage the so-called minority question in the period from 1875 to 1949, constituting a continuum in the history of greater Europe marked by ethnoreligious conflicts, ethnic cleansing, and genocidal violence. As predicted, this period was also defined by a miasma of forced displacements and refugee waves. Consequently, the minority question was coupled with an extensional phenomenon observed in the form of another question, the refugee issue.
  • Price: 4.90 €
Agreements and Friendship between Greece and Turkey in 1930: Multifaceted Official Nationalist Discourses and Opposing Voices

Agreements and Friendship between Greece and Turkey in 1930: Multifaceted Official Nationalist Discourses and Opposing Voices
(Agreements and Friendship between Greece and Turkey in 1930: Multifaceted Official Nationalist Discourses and Opposing Voices)

  • Author(s):Anna Vakali
  • Language:English
  • Subject(s):Interwar Period (1920 - 1939)
  • Page Range:61-74
  • No. of Pages:14
  • Keywords:Agreements; Friendship; Greece; Turkey; Multifaceted; Official; Nationalist;
  • Summary/Abstract:Following ten years of animosity and war, starting with the Balkan Wars, and culminating with the Greek-Turkish War between 1919 and 1922, as well as the enforced population exchange between Greece and Turkey mainly during 1924, the “friendship era” between the two countries was established by the prime ministers Eleftherios Venizelos and İsmet İnönü with agreements signed in June and October 1930. While scholarly work often refers to 1930 as a milestone in the relations between the two countries, existing literature has mainly dealt with the motives urging the latter to change their foreign policy and follow the rapprochement of 1930. Instead, in this chapter, I will focus on the discursive strategies employed by the Greek and Turkish governments, as well as by their loyal press, in order to justify the new policy of “forgetting the past” for the sake of a “brand new world” towards the international and mainly their domestic audiences. More importantly, I will provide space for opposing, as well as for silenced voices and even contradictory elements existing within the official discourses themselves. I will thereby argue that a complete understanding of the rapprochement of 1930, as well as of the later developments in Greek-Turkish relations, includes an analysis of the different national imaginaries existing at that time, the underlying ethnic tensions, as well as the unfulfilled demands for the compensation of material losses stemming from the preceding war period.
  • Price: 4.90 €
Anti-Rum Politics in Turkey, 1923-1946

Anti-Rum Politics in Turkey, 1923-1946
(Anti-Rum Politics in Turkey, 1923-1946)

  • Author(s):Alexandros Lamprou
  • Language:English
  • Subject(s):Interwar Period (1920 - 1939), WW II and following years (1940 - 1949)
  • Page Range:75-85
  • No. of Pages:11
  • Keywords:Anti-Rum; Politics; Turkey; 1923-1946;
  • Summary/Abstract:The compulsory population exchange between Turkey and Greece agreed upon in Lausanne led to the permanent expulsion of the Greek Orthodox populations of the new Republic with the exception of the Greek population of Istanbul, and of the islands Imbros and Tenedos. More specifically, the Treaty of Lausanne stipulated that the Greeks of Istanbul who had resided in the prefecture of Istanbul before 30 October 1918 were to be exempted from the compulsory population exchange. In general, throughout the interwar period and beyond the Greek population of Istanbul as well as the other non-Muslim communities of Turkey were subject to the nationalist policies of the young Republic. The position of the Greeks of Turkey was also determined by the ups and downs in the relations between the Greece and Turkey.
  • Price: 4.90 €
“The State Will Always Pursue You”: A History of Greeks in the Republic of Turkey

“The State Will Always Pursue You”: A History of Greeks in the Republic of Turkey
(“The State Will Always Pursue You”: A History of Greeks in the Republic of Turkey)

  • Author(s):Kutay Onayli
  • Language:English
  • Subject(s):History, Ethnohistory, Interwar Period (1920 - 1939)
  • Page Range:87-102
  • No. of Pages:16
  • Keywords:History; Greeks; Republic; Turkey; Greek community;
  • Summary/Abstract:The Greek community of Istanbul found itself between a rock and a hard place in the Autumn of 1922. With the Hellenic military expedition in Asia Minor ending in riotous defeat and the Allied occupation of the Ottoman capital soon to come to a close, the city’s 100,000 or so Hellenes feared coming Turkish reprisals. Weary of a decade of Turkish-nationalist Committee of Union and Progress (CUP) government, which had repeatedly attacked the Constantinopolitan Greek community’s communal rights and autonomy and had in effect besieged its religious, educational, cultural, and economic institutions, the city’s Greeks had offered Istanbul’s Allied occupiers a warm welcome. The community – or at least its political leadership, press, and numerous philantrophic and cultural institutions – had also been outspoken in its support of the Greek war effort in Anatolia. Just when, however, centuries of what was effectively second-class subjecthood as tolerated but often vilified non-Muslim Ottoman dhimmi seemed to be coming to an end, Mustafa Kemal’s new Turkish nationalist movement in Ankara gained the upper hand, and would soon come to rule all of Turkey. Aware that Greek communities across Asia Minor were being displaced along with the retreating Hellenic army and fearing a repeat of the Great Fire of Smyrna, which, accompanied by massacres of non-Muslim civilians, had eradicated Greek life in the fabled Aegean port city, the community found itself at its most fragile in the final days of the Ottoman Empire. A rapid exodus to Athens began, especially amongst those who had had been politically active during and after the Great War, and by the time the Ankara government took over Istanbul from the Allies, the city’s Greek population was beset by nothing less than total uncertainty, and had essentially lost its communal leadership and political elite. Though this has received little scholarly attention, the community also lost much of its cultural leadership in this period, with a majority of the city’s leading intellectuals in forced exile in Greece by 1923. To give a sense of the intellectual vibrancy and diversity that Greek Istanbul held – and lost – in the early 20th century, the departees included elder statesmen of Greek Ottoman letters such as Manuel Gedeon (a great historian of the Greek Orthodox Church and Ottoman Greeks more generally) and Stavros Voutyras (who had been running various iterations of his newspaper Neologos for nearly 50 years) to a younger generation of intellectuals such the Spanoudis (Konstantinos the firebrand publisher of the city’s leading newspaper Proodos, his spouse Sofia a Dresden-trained pianist and music critic) and the Delis (Ipatia a translator who was published work by Oscar Wilde amongst others in late Ottoman Istanbul, her husband Christos the poet behind Ano-Kato, perhaps the most successful of the city’s nearly two dozen Greek-language political satire magazines after 1908). The city’s fabled Greek Philological Society – the fountainhead of all kinds of intellectual and social debate from literary criticism of Ancient Greek classics to essay competitions on the nature of love and the marriage in the 1910s – was shuttered, its singular library shipped off to Ankara never to be seen again. Its grandiose neoclassical headquarters, in an ironic twist that very much foreshadowed the difficult decades awaiting the city’s Greeks, would be confiscated and turned into the headquarters of Kemal Atatürk’s ruling Republican People’s Party (Cumhuriyet Halk Partisi, CHP).
  • Price: 4.90 €
Muslim Minority of Greece: From Lausanne to the Greek Civil War

Muslim Minority of Greece: From Lausanne to the Greek Civil War
(Muslim Minority of Greece: From Lausanne to the Greek Civil War)

  • Author(s):Samim Akgönül
  • Language:English
  • Subject(s):Ethnohistory, Interwar Period (1920 - 1939), Ethnic Minorities Studies
  • Page Range:103-117
  • No. of Pages:15
  • Keywords:Muslim; minority; Greece; identity; organization; Ottoman Empire; demographic; engineering; nation-building; process;
  • Summary/Abstract:The Muslim minority in Greece emerged due to the structural identity organization of the Ottoman Empire and the demographic engineering decisions made during the nation-building process. This chapter aims to analyze the situation of this minority between two significant events: the compulsory population exchange between Greece and Turkey in 1923, which exempted Muslims in Western Thrace, and the conclusion of the Greek Civil War with the victory of loyalist forces. Firstly, the impact of the compulsory exchange on the region will be examined. Then, the Treaty of Lausanne will be analyzed from the perspective of the Muslims in Greece. Subsequently, the focus will shift to the demographic changes in Western Thrace between 1923 and 1940. Finally, the chapter will address the situation of the minority during World War II and the Greek Civil War.
  • Price: 4.90 €
Greek-Turkish Relations in the Shadow of World War II

Greek-Turkish Relations in the Shadow of World War II
(Greek-Turkish Relations in the Shadow of World War II)

  • Author(s):Zuhal Mert Uzuner
  • Language:English
  • Subject(s):Interwar Period (1920 - 1939)
  • Page Range:119-132
  • No. of Pages:14
  • Keywords:Greek-Turkish; Relations; Shadow; World War II;
  • Summary/Abstract:In the long history of Greek-Turkish relations, good and bad memories about each other coexist. Especially after the creation of the modern Turkish state in 1923, the two nation-states started to have diplomatic relations. International order and relative power positions in the eastern Mediterranean have been vital to bilateral relations. In other words, the foreign policies of both states evolved under the shadow of great power politics. So, the contemporary needs of countries shaped the policies more than ideational factors that othering each other. Significantly, the rise of a common external threat against both countries promoted a political perspective to see the common worries of both people. It is possible to explain it within an analogy: when the photographer focuses on a tree, the camera may not see it as part of a whole forest behind it in a blurred background. Specific disagreements exacerbated with prejudices fed by grand national narrative create the illusion that the photographer disregards the rest of the relationship that is full of compassion on the common civility of Turks and Greeks in the Eastern Mediterranean. The role of the third actors in bilateral relations together with the international system is another significant factor in blurring the picture. Greek-Turkish relations before and during World War II present the limits of the impact of international order on foreign policy priorities and the impact of the perception of the two nations.
  • Price: 4.90 €
Realpolitik with a Twist: The United States and Greek-Turkish Relations

Realpolitik with a Twist: The United States and Greek-Turkish Relations
(Realpolitik with a Twist: The United States and Greek-Turkish Relations)

  • Author(s):Ekavi Athanassopoulou
  • Language:English
  • Subject(s):Political history, Recent History (1900 till today)
  • Page Range:133-149
  • No. of Pages:17
  • Keywords:Realpolitik; Twist; The United States; Greek-Turkish; Relations;
  • Summary/Abstract:The long-standing tension between the two North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) allies, Greece and Turkey, and their recurrent spats has often made them the subject of Western diplomatic and political attention. There are three external actors, the United States, NATO and the EU which have been particularly interested in Greek-Turkish relations and the security situation in the eastern Mediterranean. Of these three parties NATO has had the least significant role to play, while between the United States and the EU the former has the longer period of involvement in this part of the world and today continues to play a major, though arguably, less committed role. This paper examines the overall US response to the turbulence between its two allies since the 1950s by placing it within the larger context of US foreign policy.
  • Price: 4.90 €
Rum Polites in the Context of Turkish-Greek Relations

Rum Polites in the Context of Turkish-Greek Relations
(Rum Polites in the Context of Turkish-Greek Relations)

  • Author(s):İlay Romain Örs
  • Language:English
  • Subject(s):Recent History (1900 till today)
  • Page Range:151-163
  • No. of Pages:13
  • Keywords:Rum; Polites; Context; Turkish-Greek; Relations;
  • Summary/Abstract:The field of international affairs traditionally neglects the role, let alone the presence, of transnational entities and downplays their importance in bilateral relations. Recent references to globalization, on the other hand, rarely take into account earlier forms of cosmopolitan existence that predate nation-states, therefore not allowing the recognition of the limitations of nationalism or the development of insights into any post-national possibilities.
  • Price: 2.00 €
The Muslim Minority of Western Thrace, 1945-1999: A strained saga

The Muslim Minority of Western Thrace, 1945-1999: A strained saga
(The Muslim Minority of Western Thrace, 1945-1999: A strained saga)

  • Author(s):Georgios Niarchos
  • Language:English
  • Subject(s):WW II and following years (1940 - 1949), Post-War period (1950 - 1989)
  • Page Range:165-178
  • No. of Pages:14
  • Keywords:Muslim; Minority; Western; Thrace; 1945-1999; saga; Greco-Turkish; war;
  • Summary/Abstract:The Muslim community of Western Thrace emerged onto the geo-political landscape as a result of the Treaty of Lausanne (23 July 1923) that ended the Greco-Turkish war of 1919-1922. The Treaty was preceded (30 January 1923) by a bilateral Convention Concerning the Exchange of Greek and Turkish Populations, which exempted from its provisions the ‘Moslem inhabitants of Western Thrace’ and the ‘Greek inhabitants of Constantinople’, who were subjected to special protective measures.
  • Price: 4.90 €
The “Troubled Triangle”: Greece, Turkey, and Cyprus, 1940s-1990s

The “Troubled Triangle”: Greece, Turkey, and Cyprus, 1940s-1990s
(The “Troubled Triangle”: Greece, Turkey, and Cyprus, 1940s-1990s)

  • Author(s):Nikos Christofis
  • Language:English
  • Subject(s):WW II and following years (1940 - 1949), Post-War period (1950 - 1989)
  • Page Range:179-193
  • No. of Pages:15
  • Keywords:Troubled Triangle; Greece; Turkey; Cyprus; 1940s-1990s;
  • Summary/Abstract:Greek-Turkish relations have been throughout history marked by a succession of disputes and problems. The period from 1930 to the early 1950s has been an exception. Indeed, the period started in 1930, when the Treaty of Friendship signed after the Greek Prime Minister, Eleftherios Venizelos, and the first President of the Turkish Republic, Mustafa Kemal, came to the conclusion that a policy based on confrontation and indefinite enmity would not advance their respective national interests, and ended in the early 1950s, when the later prospect for closer relations when both countries opted to join Western alliance system and simultaneously became NATO members in 1952. Still, this period made it easy for Turkey and Greece to pursue common policies and strengthen friendship.
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Greek-Turkish Relations During the Junta Regime in Greece (1967-1974)

Greek-Turkish Relations During the Junta Regime in Greece (1967-1974)
(Greek-Turkish Relations During the Junta Regime in Greece (1967-1974))

  • Author(s):Melek Fırat, Özge Özkoç
  • Language:English
  • Subject(s):Post-War period (1950 - 1989)
  • Page Range:195-205
  • No. of Pages:11
  • Keywords:Greek-Turkish; Relations; Junta; Regime; Greece; 1967-1974);
  • Summary/Abstract:The 1960s witnessed significant changes in the Cold War. After the Cuban Missile Crisis in 1962, negotiations between the U.S. and USSR on various issues, especially disarmament, started the period of détente. Nevertheless, the U.S. tried to limit the leftist movements and the actions of the USSR both in NATO allies and in the periphery, due to the 68 movement, the decolonization process, and the rise of the Non-Alignment Movement. The seizure of power by the colonels in Greece in 1967, and the three-year interim period in Turkey as a result of the memorandum of 12 March 1971, can therefore be understood in light of the international conjuncture as well as the domestic developments in these two countries. Thus, the US, whose influence on these two NATO allies increased considerably, took action to find a solution to the “Cyprus problem” to counter the resistance to NATO membership led by one of the most influential figures in the Non-Alignment Movement, Archbishop Makarios, and the Cypriot communist party AKEL. For this reason, the Cyprus problem shaped the relations between Greece and Turkey in the period from 1967 to 1974.
  • Price: 4.90 €
The Aegean Dispute

The Aegean Dispute
(The Aegean Dispute)

  • Author(s):Alexis Heraclides
  • Language:English
  • Subject(s):Post-War period (1950 - 1989)
  • Page Range:207-219
  • No. of Pages:13
  • Keywords:Aegean; Dispute; Greece; Turkey; design;
  • Summary/Abstract:The Aegean dispute between Greece and Turkey was set on course in late 1973 and early 1974 and has not been resolved after half a century. Attempts at a settlement have been made via dialogue and bilateral talks and in two historical moments the two sides had reached a mutual understanding of the concerns of the other side and the overall framework of a comprehensive settlement. The most promising talks which verged on actual negotiations were those of 1977-81, 2002-3 and for a fleeting moment also in 2010. From 2002 until 2016 there have been no less than 60 rounds of talks which were postponed sine die in mid-2016, following the abortive 15 July 1016 coup in Turkey. Thereafter each side blames the other side for the lack of progress of the talks although it is more than clear that both share responsibility (though not for the same reasons) for its non-settlement. In 2021, the talks restarted but were again postponed as relations plummeted to one of their worst levels since 1974, with even the worst case scenario, an armed clash a distinct possibility be it by accident (perhaps as a result of brinkmanship gone wrong) or even by design.
  • Price: 2.00 €
Greek-Turkish Relations and Civil Society: Healing the wounds?

Greek-Turkish Relations and Civil Society: Healing the wounds?
(Greek-Turkish Relations and Civil Society: Healing the wounds?)

  • Author(s):Leonidas Karakatsanis
  • Language:English
  • Subject(s):Politics / Political Sciences, Recent History (1900 till today)
  • Page Range:221-238
  • No. of Pages:18
  • Keywords:Greek-Turkish; Relations; Civil Society; Healing; wounds;
  • Summary/Abstract:When the notion of “civil society” appears in everyday discussions, positive images usually arise in people’s minds, like charities, community initiatives, informal networks, or formal Non-Governmental Organizations (NGOs) defending the rights of peoples, providing services, or working for peace in conflict areas all over the world. Although the cases of misuse of funds or even corruption have been growing commensurately with the number of NGOs worldwide, these are usually considered an anomaly, dark exceptions in a field where “doing good” is—or at least should be—the main purpose of action. Such a positive image of civil society has its roots in the thinking and writings of traditional liberal political thinkers like the Frenchman Alexis de Tocqueville or contemporary American political scientist Robert D. Putnam, thinkers who see civil society as a bastion of democracy. According to them, civil society is rooted in the kindness and unmediated collaboration between laypeople, standing in contrast to centre-stage politics where conflicts of interest and manipulation are the main drivers for action.
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Greek-Turkish Relations: The “Helsinki Moment” in Greece’s strategy to turn the EU into a catalyst for conflict resolution

Greek-Turkish Relations: The “Helsinki Moment” in Greece’s strategy to turn the EU into a catalyst for conflict resolution
(Greek-Turkish Relations: The “Helsinki Moment” in Greece’s strategy to turn the EU into a catalyst for conflict resolution)

  • Author(s):Panayotis J. Tsakonas
  • Language:English
  • Subject(s):Politics / Political Sciences, Recent History (1900 till today)
  • Page Range:239-252
  • No. of Pages:14
  • Keywords:Greek-Turkish; Helsinki Moment; Greece; EU;
  • Summary/Abstract:In the late 1990s Greece undertook a significant reform initiative vis-à-vis Turkey, the neighboring state which has been considered as Greece’s major security threat since the mid- ‘70s. Greece’s reform initiative –which attempted to alter the very logic of Greek-Turkish relations—reached its institutional climax at the Helsinki ΕU Summit of December 1999, when Turkey was granted candidate status after Greece’s decision to lift its long-lasting veto. Was this paramount foreign policy shift the result of a rational recognition of Greece’s new strategic needs and priorities, of a more in-depth ideational change related to a collapse of the traditional – and reigning – orthodoxy about how to deal with the ‘threat from the east’, and of the effects of the force of Europeanization on foreign policy formation, or of a combination of all the above?
  • Price: 4.90 €
Greek-Turkish Relations and the Refugee Question

Greek-Turkish Relations and the Refugee Question
(Greek-Turkish Relations and the Refugee Question)

  • Author(s):Anthony Deriziotis
  • Language:English
  • Subject(s):Politics / Political Sciences, Migration Studies
  • Page Range:253-266
  • No. of Pages:14
  • Keywords:Greek-Turkish; Relations; Refugee; Question;
  • Summary/Abstract:One could argue that the Greek-Turkish relations have been through enough trouble within the last one hundred years and that there has been a diversity of issues that have plagued their relations, involving -among others- sovereignty, minority, jurisdiction, security and religion issues. Nationalism has fuelled several of them, but in recent years energy politics has been a major factor of friction, especially after other countries in the east Mediterranean Sea, like Egypt, Israel and Cyprus, have discovered significant natural gas reserves in their respective Exclusive Economic Zones (EEZs). However, it is not unlikely that such relations, which have been turbulent for long periods of time, where most of the bilateral issues have never, essentially, been addressed by the two states, will be vulnerable to new challenges, as time goes on and the economic, social and political context within both countries, but also in the wider area of the Eastern Mediterranean Sea, is constantly changing. In the absence of mutual understanding and tolerance, and at times of tension, any issue could be perceived as a potential threat from the other side, and an escalation to a crisis could be imminent. Migration and the refugee issue form one of these current challenges that have been affecting Greek-Turkish relations.
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Reciprocal Minorities in Greece and Turkey: Α century of adversity

Reciprocal Minorities in Greece and Turkey: Α century of adversity
(Reciprocal Minorities in Greece and Turkey: Α century of adversity)

  • Author(s):Konstantinos Tsitselikis
  • Language:English
  • Subject(s):Politics / Political Sciences, Ethnic Minorities Studies
  • Page Range:267-280
  • No. of Pages:14
  • Keywords:Reciprocal; Minorities; Greece; Turkey; century; adversity;
  • Summary/Abstract:Muslims in Greece and non-Muslims in Turkey have historically found themselves in an ambivalent, mirrored status of legal protection, one which has often been undermined for political and ideological reasons. Their religious, educational, and other institutions have been subject to distinct legal norms based on a communal perception resembling the autonomy that the Ottoman Empire had reserved for the non-Muslim millets. The pre-modern Ottoman millet divisions partly found their final expression in the formation of the nation-states of the Balkans during the late 19th and early 20th centuries. The Christian states that seceded from the Ottoman Empire (Greece, Bulgaria, Romania, and Serbia) borrowed from the millet system to lay out the institutional and legal framework of Muslim communities that remained within their borders. This model prevailed in Turkey also, and was used to govern the same non-Muslim minorities that the empire had recognized as millets – namely, Greek-Orthodox (Rum Ortodoks/Romioi), Armenians, and Jews. In Greece and Turkey, the notion of citizenship was strongly influenced by a post-Ottoman perception of ethnicity and turned into a theory of racial belonging (and non-belonging) continuity of both nations based on the ‘Greek genos’ and the ‘Turkish ırk’.
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Energized Geopolitical Turmoil in the Endangered Eastern Mediterranean: Towards Anthropocene geopolitics?

Energized Geopolitical Turmoil in the Endangered Eastern Mediterranean: Towards Anthropocene geopolitics?
(Energized Geopolitical Turmoil in the Endangered Eastern Mediterranean: Towards Anthropocene geopolitics?)

  • Author(s):Emre İşeri
  • Language:English
  • Subject(s):Geopolitics
  • Page Range:281-292
  • No. of Pages:12
  • Keywords:Energized; Geopolitical; Turmoil; Endangered; Eastern Mediterranean; Towards; Anthropocene; geopolitics;
  • Summary/Abstract:As the Republic of Turkey reaches its centennial, it has still been struggling with various foreign policy conflicts inherited from the Ottoman Empire. Among those issues, the Cyprus question strikes out as one of those intractable conflicts. Contrary to those initially optimistic perspectives that those relatively recently discovered potential energy reserves would serve as catalysts to bring peace to the island, those resources have actually put further strained geopolitical rivalry between Greece and Turkey as the kin states of divided Cyprus. Differently put their geopolitical ambitions, clashing maritime claims, and the perception of energy resources/their transportation routes as strategic assets have paved the way for antagonism juxtaposed around the Cyprus problem. The primary regional actors of the conflict - Greece and Turkey- have been insisting on their maximalist outlook to gain the upper hand in the ongoing geopolitical rivalry over the fossil fuels adjunct to Cyprus in the engendered Eastern Mediterranean. However, those states’ conventional geopolitical lenses have remained myopic in the new geographical epoch, namely the Anthropocene (the age of humans) in which the very existence of humans is in jeopardy.
  • Price: 4.90 €
“Hawks and Romantics”: The Role of Media in Turkish-Greek Diplomatic Seesaw

“Hawks and Romantics”: The Role of Media in Turkish-Greek Diplomatic Seesaw
(“Hawks and Romantics”: The Role of Media in Turkish-Greek Diplomatic Seesaw)

  • Author(s):Emre Metin Bilginer
  • Language:English
  • Subject(s):International relations/trade
  • Page Range:293-300
  • No. of Pages:8
  • Keywords:Hawks; Romantics; Role; Media; Turkish-Greek; Diplomatic See; saw;
  • Summary/Abstract:This chapter will approach Turkish-Greek relations in an alternative way. Unfortunately, the perception of Turkish-Greek relations has been manipulated repeatedly by various sources over time. Due to the history textbooks, both sides have grown up hostile towards each other. In every crisis, both societies were terrified of how societies were mobilized and manipulated with negative motivations against each other. Both sides are competent in this struggle. Furthermore, the media plays a significant role in this adverse competition. This struggle brings us to one reality: There are two types of people, notably in media, revealing the adverse mobilization on both sides: HAWKS and ROMANTICS. This chapter will approach the impact of those two blocs in the Turkish-Greek diplomatic seesaw.
  • Price: 2.00 €
“With or Without You”: Turkish-Greek Relations from the Perspective of Securitisation Theory

“With or Without You”: Turkish-Greek Relations from the Perspective of Securitisation Theory
(“With or Without You”: Turkish-Greek Relations from the Perspective of Securitisation Theory)

  • Author(s):Başak Alpan
  • Language:English
  • Subject(s):International relations/trade
  • Page Range:301-314
  • No. of Pages:14
  • Keywords:Turkish-Greek; Relations; Perspective; Securitisation; Theory;
  • Summary/Abstract:Besides other never-ending protracted conflicts in the world, such as the Israeli-Palestine conflict or the Northern Ireland case, if there is one set of bilateral relations in this part of the world that is quite prone to securitisation by the political elite of both parties involved, it is the Turkish-Greek relations. Indeed, the bilateral relations have often been tense, full of ebbs and flows, bringing into equation various elements such as a shared history, geographical proximity, a common cultural identity as well as historical traumas, displacement of populations and even disagreements over most basic concepts. To say the least, in this very complicated relationship, one side’s independence and self-fulfilment mainly owed to the other’s defeat and despair. As well known, Greece’s very existence as an independent state arose out of a war of national liberation against the Ottoman Empire in the 19th century, while the Turkish Republic mainly owed its establishment to the victory won in the Greek-Turkish War of 1919-1922. Just as the Greeks celebrate their partial liberation against the Ottoman Empire on 25 March, the day that is held to mark the Greek War of Independence, so on 30 August each year the Turks celebrate Mustafa Kemal Atatürk’s victory over the Greeks in 1922 during Turkey’s war of Independence. Turkish Independence War, which is the most fundamental building stone of the Republic of Turkey and the national identity of Turks is the Greeks’ “Asia Minor Catastrophe”. One inevitable concept that would occasionally pop out in this long-lasting relationship would be “security”. The notion of securitisation, which basically denotes that tendency, where an issue becomes a security issue-not necessarily because there is a real existential threat but because it is presented as such by the political actors, would naturally be a good candidate for being a strategy frequently resorted by the Turkish and Greek political actors. Within this context, another widely used concept is desecuritisation, which happens when issues are shifted out of emergency mode and included within the daily flow of politics. In this aforementioned long-lasting relationship, where the parties share so many things that could easily be listed as a part of the daily flow of life (such as culture, cuisine, music, tourism etc.), it could also be argued that Turkish-Greek relations have also been the terrain of desecuritisation manoeuvres.
  • Price: 4.90 €
The Prospects and Challenges for Cooperation in Cyprus

The Prospects and Challenges for Cooperation in Cyprus
(The Prospects and Challenges for Cooperation in Cyprus)

  • Author(s):Ahmet Sözen, Devrim Şahin
  • Language:English
  • Subject(s):Politics / Political Sciences
  • Page Range:315-327
  • No. of Pages:13
  • Keywords:Prospects; Challenges; Cooperation; Cyprus;
  • Summary/Abstract:Such is the importance of the Cyprus conflict that a settlement or strategic agreement has the potential to unlock sensitive regional issues and transform the Eastern Mediterranean into a region of cooperation and stability. Moreover, given the current international challenges ranging from the shifting international power balance, and the climate and energy crises to the mass refugee flows that cannot be tackled without cooperation, settlement of the Cyprus problem now more pressing than ever.
  • Price: 4.90 €
Greek – Turkish Encounters in the City: Who meets who in Kadıköy?

Greek – Turkish Encounters in the City: Who meets who in Kadıköy?
(Greek – Turkish Encounters in the City: Who meets who in Kadıköy?)

  • Author(s):Kerem Öktem
  • Language:English
  • Subject(s):Politics / Political Sciences, International relations/trade
  • Page Range:329-341
  • No. of Pages:13
  • Keywords:Greek; Turkish; Kadıköy; historical; political; cultural; economic;
  • Summary/Abstract:Greek – Turkish relations, like all concepts in life, do not really exist. They are discourses and constructions formed by individuals and institutions and shaped in the realm of their social relations. Examined critically the Greek – Turkish relations discourse reveals a set of foundational assumptions: There are two groups, or more specifically two nations, i.e., Turks and Greeks. These two nations establish the two sides of a complex set of historical, political, cultural and economic relations that have been mostly, but not exclusively contentious. Some also recognise that on the actor side, there is more diversity than this simple dichotomy would suggest: Greece has experienced long-term Albanian immigration and, more recently, immigration from the Middle East and South Asia. In Turkey, Kurds are the largest non-Turkish community, and, since the mid-2010s Syrian war refugees and immigrants have become a sizeable group by far outnumbering most other minority groups. This destabilization of the dominant founding ethnic groups of Greece and Turkey is reshaping both the relevance and the categories of Greek – Turkish relations as well as the importance of the spaces of encounter which this entry examines. For now, however, the primacy of the nation state continues to structure the field.
  • Price: 4.90 €
Post-script

Post-script
(Post-script)

  • Author(s):Anthony Deriziotis, Nikos Christofis
  • Language:English
  • Subject(s):Politics / Political Sciences, History
  • Page Range:343-344
  • No. of Pages:2
  • Keywords:Post-script; Bilateral; relations; Aegean Sea; post-Cold War; period;
  • Summary/Abstract:Bilateral relations in the Aegean Sea basin are the product of a rather complicated mixture of components, involving history, politics, national identities, populist narratives, irredentism, nationalism and regional factors, and as such, finding balance has been notoriously elusive. For the better part of their co-existence, Greece and Turkey have been bouncing from escalation to détente; a sequence that seems to have adopted an accelerating frequency in the post-Cold War period. From the Lausanne Treaty and the Convention Concerning the Exchange of Greek and Turkish Populations until the new round of earthquake diplomacy in the aftermath of the 6 February 2023 tragedy in central and southern Turkey, lay one hundred years of turbulent relations between two peoples that share much more than borders, but remain divided over national identities and politics.
  • Price: 4.90 €
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