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Foucault and Violence: A Genealogy of National Belonging and Representative Power in Turkey
Maze, Jacob Alan ; Salamon, Janusz (advisor) ; Brisku, Adrian (referee) ; Taglia, Stefano (referee)
The central aim of this dissertation is to introduce tools for studying a form of political violence in Michel Foucault's genealogical methodology. This is accomplished by reformulating theories from Hannah Arendt on violence to sync with Foucault's understanding of power, knowledge and experience. Violence is shown to be a relationship where one subject is prevented from fulfilling a strategy by another, which over time accumulates into widespread power relations, or nexuses of violence, within a society. This is contrasted with power, which is when one subject attempts to control the outcome of a situation, and as such it is productive. This method of genealogy is then employed in the case of national identity (i.e., nationalism) in Turkey. Tracing its historical emergence, the late Ottoman Empire becomes the focal point. A network of allegiances, referred to as sultanic power, constituted the relationships that were exercised prior to the nineteenth century. While one pledged their loyalty and subservience to their ruler, this required their ruler to offer them security and prosperity in return. Over the Long Nineteenth Century, a new network of power relations emerged based on representation through the practices and discourses that developed. I come to outline what I term representative power....
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Comparative Study on the Military Effectiveness of the Turkish Army Post 2016 Coup
Koutský, Tomáš ; Kofroň, Jan (advisor) ; Maze, Jacob Alan (referee)
The bachelor's thesis is a process-tracing case study focusing on the military effectiveness of the Turkish armed forces (TAF) before and after the failed coup d'état that occurred on the night of July 15, 2016. Inspired by the works of Stephen Biddle and Caitlin Talmadge, the work combines variables of the authors and tries to determine if the military has lost its military effectiveness in conventional warfare, by searching for examples of coup-proofing operational practices within the TAF. Since Talmadge depicts such practices as occurring in authoritarian regimes, a brief overview of the current Turkish semi-authoritarian political landscape is added at the beginning, along with a brief description of the role of the TAF within the system. Additionally, a description and timescale of the coup is provided. During the research, coup- proofing practices were witnessed in three out of the four independent variables. Interestingly, the practices were not only found after the coup, but in the preceding years as well. A short- term decrease of military effectiveness was undeniably discovered. Currently, it is impossible to determine if such practices will continue in the long-run, that warrants further research. Furthermore, the deterioration has not affected the TAF significantly, due to its military...
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