Conference Program

Border stability and how international borders function have increasingly gained importance in global politics due to the unprecedented risks emerging from porous borders such as refugees, terrorists, smugglers which weakened the borderless world discourse of globalization. The wall constructed along the Turkish-Syrian border is one of the new waves of border barriers built in the twenty-first century and represents a radical shift in Turkey’s Middle East policy. It argues that the decision to erect the “Turkish Wall” is the result of President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan’s government’s desire to improve relations with the European Union, Russia, and the United States in the context of the Syrian Civil War. The study confines itself to the practices administrating the 'physical functions of the 'border' dealing with tangible properties of wall rather than social and symbolic representations of the wall. In this regard 'fortified boundaries' concept developed by Hassner and Wittenberg alongside Walters' geopolitical boundaries categorization will be used to define the conceptual framework to analyze Turkey's transformed Syrian border. The study will benefit from interviews conducted with foreign policy officials and local bureaucrats during the field research in Hatay. By examining the interplay with Turkey's wall politics and its foreign relations, this study will be rather a rare attempt to analyze the issue of Turkey’s border with Syria from a state and foreign policy perspective.

In hybrid regimes, where electoral institutions fail to ensure an even playing field between the incumbent and opposition, achieving electoral success often demands a certain level of coordination from opposition parties. While the existing literature widely agrees on the crucial role of pre-electoral alliances in defeating the incumbent, there is a notable gap in our understanding of the barriers to effective cooperation among opposition parties. While some pre-electoral alliances won surprising victories against incumbents, opposition coordination in others resulted in humiliating electoral defeats and autocratic consolidation. Notably, during the general elections of 2022 in Hungary and 2023 in Turkey, opposition coordination faltered, resulting in the failure to oust autocratic-leaning incumbents. In contrast, the 2020 Montenegro elections and the 2023 Polish elections witnessed successful opposition coordination and government turnover through the electoral process. Through a most-similar-system design comparing two negative and two positive cases of opposition success in four hybrid regimes, we explore the factors that account for these divergent outcomes. Specifically, we posit that intense levels of opposition coordination, aiming to unify parties around a single candidate and rigid policy compromises, are prone to failure (as seen in Hungary and Turkey). Conversely, moderate levels of opposition coordination, preserving the diversity of party identities while finding common ground (as observed in Poland and Montenegro), are more likely to yield opposition success in elections.

Over the past four decades, neoliberal policies have transformed the public space, prioritizing private sector profit maximization, often resorting to political interventions, including coup attempts, to expand neoliberal influence. The aftermath of the 2008 economic crisis saw the emergence of authoritarian neoliberalism, where states embraced authoritarian tendencies to facilitate private sector dominance, leading to debates on the nature and timing of this shift within neoliberalism. The evolution of Turkish foreign policy in the last 30 years reflects a significant departure from classical principles, adopting a revisionist territorial approach, particularly in Syria and Iraq. The military operations conducted under the guise of counter-terrorism have shifted from mere "clearance operations" to establishing military bases for regional control. This research aims to explore how neoliberalism has influenced Turkish foreign policy, focusing on the defense industry's role in this transformation. Semi-structured interviews with official in the Turkish Defense Industry and Turkish Armed Forces will provide insights into the relationship between the private and public sectors, shaping the concept of "national interest" and its manifestation in foreign policy.

This paper explores the changing role of Japanese NGOs in climate change governance. Firstly, I focus on the involvement of Japanese NGOs in the environmental policymaking and its implementation process after WWII up to the UNCED. It became clear that Japanese NGOs gradually transformed from pollution victims’ and anti-pollution movements during the period of high economic growth into citizens’ movements, and that the network with overseas NGOs have expanded and developed to some extent. However, many NGOs are still focused on the local community. Compared with NGOs in other developed countries, it is undeniable that the financial power, human resources (e.g. expertise, research capacities), and policy advocacy capabilities necessary for global environmental governance remain limited in Japan.

Secondly, I examine the involvement of Japanese NGOs in climate change policy-making process after the UNCED up to the COP 28 of UNFCCC. I want to clarify the reasons why coal-fired power plants have not been abolished in Japan despite the global trend toward decarbonization. By examining this case the superficiality of democratic windows, which seemed to be open to Japanese NGOs is explored. Also, I hypothesize that the collusion among the business community, the political party and the bureaucrats has hindered Japan’s climate change governance. The climate change litigations filed by NGOs in the Netherlands and the United State show us the possibilities to break collusion. I conclude that Japanese NGOs must collaborate with new actors, such as lawyers, investors, shareholders, and asset owners in order to change Japan's climate policy.