Is Turkey Ready for the Post COVID-19 World Order?

• Author: Bayraktar, Bora
• Position: ARTICLE

Introduction

On December 10, 2019, China announced that it had identified a new virus named COVID-19 in the city of Wuhan. Soon after neighboring countries reported their own cases, and it was clear that the virus had already spread all over the world. The World Health Organization (WHO) declared a global emergency on January 30, 2020. Shortly after, the virus was identified in Africa and Europe forcing the WHO to declare the coronavirus outbreak a pandemic on March 11, 2020. (1) With the outbreak of the COVID-19 pandemic the world has transformed rapidly, states and institutions have changed priorities. Lockdown travel bans, closure of schools, and businesses became common measures to respond. Turkey has not been an exception in implementing these measures. In fact, Ankara was very quick to act at the beginning of the COVID-19 crisis.

The dramatic picture created by the COVID-19 pandemic, empty squares and airports in major cities, halted flights, abandoned planes on the tarmac, made more people think about the way the world operates. The slowness and weakness of the major countries to address the pandemic widened the debate on the changing world order, citing the inability of states to provide support to their citizens. Thus, the pandemic turned out to be a global political, economic problem, obviously more than a health issue. Logistic chains were broken therefore many countries could not provide simple basic medical equipment like masks. The world economy faced one of its worst crises in modern times. Health and food security surfaced as major security issues. Nation-states came to the fore as the only source to provide basics, discrediting international organizations. The efficiency of global institutions and economic systems started to be questioned. Concepts like 'post-COVID-19 order,' 'new normal' became common. Many analysts suggested that 'the world will never be the same again.'

It may be too early to reach concrete solutions and a definition about the post-COVID-19 order, however, we can still track the direction of the change and question whether nation-states are adapting to the new situation. This study attempts to provide a framework by comparing the present situation with the post-Cold War order and shed light on the course of the change. Hence, questions like 'Has the COVID-19 pandemic triggered a change in the world order? If it has, what is the nature, scope, and content of this change?' are addressed. The study takes the case of Turkey, as a regional power and a nation-state, to see whether it is ready for the new era and is adapting to the transforming international order. Thus, Turkey's response to the COVID-19 pandemic is analyzed.

The hypothesis of this study is that the change in the post-Cold War order had started long before the COVID-19 pandemic, in the mid-2010s with the

Arab uprisings, but the outbreak accelerated the change and made it more visible. At the global level, the major changes are in the balance of power i.e., declining the U.S. power, the rise of regional powers, technology, communications, etc. The other major change is in globalism in terms of economic and political relations. International organizations are losing credit against the nation-state. Ideologically, neo-liberalism and internationalism have to cope with growing nationalism, as states are prioritizing security versus cooperation. In this regard, the article claims that Turkey provides a good example of a regional power that is adapting to the changing situation with its responses to the recent challenges. Located at the crossroads of global and regional geopolitical competition, Turkey has always faced great security challenges, especially due to Iraq and Syria civil wars. Specifically, after 2015 Turkey became the target of international terrorist attacks, its cities were bombed by terrorists, and the country had to respond to one of the worst refugee flows of this century while dealing with economic challenges before the outbreak of the COVID-19 pandemic. Turkey responded to these challenges by transforming its executive system, adopting a presidential system with a referendum, recalibrating its foreign relations, and restructuring its security apparatus. These steps can be analyzed in accordance with the changing global order and the threats, which these changes created. The COVID-19 pandemic, starting from March 2020, in this regard, provided important challenges and tested Turkey's preparedness. The assumption of this study is that Turkey had already started to adapt to the transforming world order -which is still in the making- due to the fact that it pioneered facing the challenges because of its unique location. And this helped Turkey to react more rapidly to the COVID-19 pandemic.

This study will use a comparative analysis to see the direction of the change in line with the parameters given above that is, change in the balance of power, the role of the international institutions versus nation-states, and changing economic policies. It may be too early to reach conclusions and concrete results since the facts and ideas on the subject are still evolving. For this reason, it is hard to frame the subject theoretically. This article is divided into five sections. The first section of the article will examine the concept of the 'World Order.' The second section will focus on the geopolitical challenges, how they changed the global balance of power, and what the post-COVID-19 order will look like.

The third section will analyze Turkey's response to the post-COVID-19 era by comparing its regulations in the 1990s. The fourth section will compare and contrast the challenges, and the changes in the field of the economy. In the following section, the role of the international organizations and the nation-state is the focus of the study. Finally, in the conclusion, I hope to demonstrate to what extent Turkey's COVID-19 measures indicate the country's readiness for the post-COVID-19 order.

In this study, I used initial thoughts and reactions of analysts to the phenomenon, from opinion articles, and arguments, to explain the direction of the change. On Turkey's preparedness, I have analyzed the reformation of the political system, actions of the state on recent challenges, Turkey's foreign and security policies in 2015-2021, and measures taken to combat COVID-19. Recent news articles, statements of officials, and measures of governments are all part of the research.

What Is World Order?

Different schools of thought attribute different meanings to the concept of the 'World Order.' Realists see international politics as the act of balancing among sovereign states. For them, world order is the product of a stable distribution of power among the major states. Liberals, on the other hand, look at the relations among peoples as well as states. They see order, arising from broad values like democracy and human rights, as well as from international law and institutions such as the United Nations (UN). (2) Whether it is based on law or power, institutions or deterrence, world order implies a way of understanding and generally accepted manner of operating of international actors within a framework.

Henry Kissinger defines world order as "the concept held by a region or civilization about the nature of just arrangements and the distribution of power thought to be applicable to the entire world." According to him, world order rests on "a set of commonly accepted rules that define the limits of permissible action and a balance of power that enforces restraint where rules break down." (3) He indicates that order and stability result not from a desire to pursue peace or justice but from a 'generally accepted legitimacy,' and it is based on equilibrium of forces. Legitimacy is an international understanding of the nature of workable arrangements, and of the permissible aims and methods of foreign policy. No state expresses its dissatisfaction with a revolutionary foreign policy. (4) Liberal theorist John Ikenberry underlines the fact that this understanding is formalized and institutionalized as we have experienced after the post-Cold War by the major powers. (5) NATO and EU enlargement are examples of this institutionalization. The UN started to play a greater role in preventing conflict after the collapse of the Soviet Union, and International Monetary Fund (IMF), World Bank, and World Trade Organization (WTO) became important platforms to solve economic issues.

From a historical context, we are on the eve of entering the 5th global order. The Concert of Europe accepted in Vienna in 1815, following the Napoleonic Wars, can be regarded as the first example of world order. Metternich's formula for European equilibrium was based on common interest of the powers in preserving peace to ensure continental harmony. (6) This system collapsed with the breakout of World War I, in 1914. American President Woodrow Wilson tried to establish a new liberal order based on open diplomacy and self-determination with his Fourteen Points, ending great wars and colonialism. The League of Nations was an attempt to create a permanent international body to keep the dialogue open among the big powers. However, this liberal order did not last long; Britain and France went back to colonialism while Nazi Germany and Fascist Italy challenged the system as revolutionary actors pulling the world to another great war in 1939.

After Nazi Germany was defeated, the victorious powers established a new order based on the current balance of power. A new nation's system was organized around the UN and other supporting international institutions. The Founding Charter of the UN was signed on June 26, 1945. In the economic front 1944 Bretton Woods system, the World Bank, and IMF were established. Bipolarity became the norm, as the U.S. and the Soviet Union remained as only two superpowers dominating the world, and although rivals, they worked...