L’image de l’ « Europe » comme un continent doté de limites inflexibles et indiscutables est largement partagée dans l’opinion publique des pays traditionnellement considérés comme européens. Dans le milieu des années 2000, les débats liés aux référendums sur le Traité Constitutionnel (2004-2005) conduisent pourtant un certain nombre d’acteurs politiques de premier plan à proposer des définitions de ce qu'elle serait ou ne serait pas. Mais plutôt que d'interroger le contenu de cette « Europe au sens large » convoquée dans ces différents discours, la controverse dont se saisissent les politologues et tout un ensemble de chercheurs a souvent l’objectif plus spécifique d’évaluer le caractère européen d’un pays en particulier : la Turquie, alors depuis peu reconnue candidate officielle à l’Union Européenne (UE – 1999). Bien que candidate, celle-ci se trouve tour à tour intégrée puis mise au ban de l’« Europe », du fait d’un supposé déficit d’européanité, pour être renvoyée du côté d’autres catégories régionales comme l' « Asie », le « Moyen Orient » ou le « Monde Musulman ». Cette thèse se saisit alors du paradoxe turc avec l’ambition de décrypter le sens du mot « Europe » dans une perspective géographique. Pour se faire, elle propose une investigation basée sur l’analyse de représentations turques du Monde, d’étudiants du premier cycle universitaire (Licence). Une première analyse de géographie régionale relativement classique, qui permet de fournir quelques éléments de contextes aux représentations analysées, cherche à identifier une région européenne homogène basée sur des indicateurs socio-économiques ou l’analyse de la trajectoire du pays par rapport à cette région sur le temps long. Cette première démarche, néanmoins, ne permet pas d'aboutir à une identification claire de ce qu’est l’« Europe » et suggère que le problème est sans doute profondément ancré du côté des représentations de l'objet qu'elle constitue voire, plus généralement, du Monde. Une deuxième investigation consiste alors à faire émerger le contenu, à la fois sémantique et spatial de l’« Europe », propre à la population d’étude et ce tant au niveau individuel qu'agrégé. De là, s'ensuit une troisième analyse visant cette fois à évaluer la place relative de l’« Europe » dans le Monde et l’éventualité de son déclin en considérant les préférences résidentielles de ladite population. Pour se faire, cette thèse propose une perspective décentrée, construite sur un matériau empirique issu de deux enquêtes de terrain et différentes méthodes de traitements, croisant méthodes d’analyses interprétatives et empiriques. Ainsi, à travers une analyse systémique de différentes formes de représentations, elle devient susceptible de mettre en évidence la singularité d’un regard turc sur le Monde. / The narrative according to which « Europe » is a continent with inflexible and irrefutable limits is a mainstream belief in states traditionally considered as European. However, circa 2004-2005, the debates owed to the European Treaty have seen the introduction of strong statements about what it would or wouldn't be. Though, instead of exploring the issue of a “large scale Europe” from a geographical dimension; the controversy most political scientists and other researchers took hold of was driven by an attempt to decide on the place of Turkey in that region which recently had been recognized an official candidate to EU (1999). As a matter of fact, despite its candidacy, Turkey would remain both part and apart of the region, because of a supposed “europeaness” deficit. Rather it would be expected to be part of other regional categories such as « Asia », the « Middle East » or the « Muslim world ». Thenceforward, through the unique and paradoxical example that is Turkey - focusing on representations of Turkish undergraduate students -, this thesis proposes to decrypt differently what stands for “Europe”, in a geographical perspective. First, this study proposes a classical regional analysis to set up the frame through which we will examine Turkish representations and geographic imaginaries. Yet it also aims to define a homogenous European region based on different classical factors in order to sketch the study's background. Then a long-term analysis of the contemporary Turkish international relations underlines its strong anchorage into European politics and the limits of attempting to define « Europe » through that lens. On the contrary, it leads to consider that the image of a strongly bordered « Europe » may come from people’s representations. Thus, in a second time, the study focuses on the emerging representations - both individual and collective - of a spatial and conceptual definition of « Europe ». Third, it interrogates the attractiveness of European countries relatively to the rest of the World, with the ambition to evaluate its potential “decline”. In a non-Eurocentric perspective, this thesis examines some Turkish way to look at « Europe » by developing two original survey materials built on a mix of interpretative and explicative methods, and a systemic analysis of its results.

This essay explores the Swedish state’s geopolitical view and creation, of the spatial spaces in and of the Arctic. With a critical geopolitical framework, a discourse analysis is conducted on the Swedish strategy for the arctic region, with the ambition to unfold the underlining spatial spaces, actors and dramas that this discourse creates. The result of this analysis shows that Sweden creates three different Arctic spaces within its geopolitical discourse; a Swedish Arctic, a Nearby Arctic and a Regional Arctic. This has major political consequences, which will be illuminated in the essay. Perhaps the most noteworthy being the ulterior theoretical view of the Swedish state regarding the environment and the relationship between the global space and the Regional Arctic, in relation to the threat of global and regional environmental deterioration.

This thesis analyzes the construction of geopolitical imaginations of Turkey in the post-September 11 era on the basis of critical geopolitics and in the frame of a center (the United States and the European Union)-margin (Turkey) relationship. The dissolving of the relatively stable concepts of the Cold War era by globalization and the demise of the Soviet Union -such as state integrity, sovereignty, inside/outside dichotomy and state identity- has created deterritorialization in the global space of territorial states. However, territorial states have continued to exist via reterritorialization on the basis of new enemies/others/boundaries borrowed from old concepts, narratives and dramas. Following the September 11 attacks, the attempts to construct self/other dichotomy based on the geopolitical imaginations of the globe and Turkey in the US and the EU political circles have changed geopolitical imaginations of Turkey. Their discourses over Turkey have encountered counter-discourse of Turkish policymakers presenting Turkey as a &ldquo / bridge&rdquo / between civilizations to increase the &ldquo / strategic&rdquo / value of Turkey. In this study, taking into consideration the geography as a product of a specific power/knowledge alignment rather than something naturally given to determine foreign policy, the geopolitical (geocultural) imaginations of Turkey are being examined and the power-knowledge relationship is exposed.

This study seeks to examine the main theories and theorists of geopolitical imagining and argue for an intrinsic relation between traditional geopolitics and the development of international relations both in theory and practice. By doing so the study aims to pursue an assessment of the insights of critical geopolitics, as reflected in the works of John Agnew, Gerar&oacute / id &Oacute / Tuathail (Gerard Toal), Simon Dalby, Klaus Dodds and others, for the theory of IR, more specifically its dominant paradigm realism. The aim of this study, in other words, is to identify and describe the geopolitical assumptions that have led IR theory to turn out to be &bdquo / realist

The main objective of this dissertation is to analyze Turkish-American relationship from critical perspective. In this study critical geopolitics is used to examine the US policymakers&lsquo / discourses over representations of Turkey. Drawing on the theoretical literature, this dissertation took geopolitics as a deeply ideological concept and analyzed the ways in which US geopolitical discourse has shaped the Turkish-American relationship over time. The study outlined the historical evolution of the concept of the geopolitics since the end of the 19th century in order to reveal the limits of the classical geopolitical understanding, and to provide a theoretical framework against which the modern geopolitical imagination of the US has been formulated. Second, it revealed the ideological roots and the main characteristics of American geopolitical discourse. And third, the study applied critical geopolitics to the case of Turkish-American relations with respect to how the imagined geography of Turkey and the alliance have been shaped by the foreign and security policies of the US. Cold War, post-Cold War and post-September 11 periods are analyzed in separate chapters of this study. It is also argued in this dissertation that Turkey generally fits the geopolitical design of the United States and that these two countries have cooperated on numerous efforts in different parts of the world both during and after the Cold War. However, in this period the two allies also experienced several problems that display the limits of US geopolitical discourse.

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This thesis examines how and under what influences communities of Islamic faith have developed in post-Soviet Russia. My arguments are based on research conducted in Astrakhan, Russia in the summer of 2009. Astrakhan is the capital of Astrakhan Oblast in southwest Russia and has a reputation for being a multi-confessional and multi-ethnic city. Astrakhan is home to Russians, Tatars, Kazakhs, Kalmyks, and many other nationalities. I draw from interviews and newspaper analysis to examine what the local landscape of Islam looks like in Astrakhan, how has it changed since the collapse of the USSR, and what future trends are emerging. Mosque renovations and demolitions are the center of my analysis. Drawing on scholarship in critical geopolitics and critical geographies of religion, this paper seeks to understand how the Kremlin and other levels of government influence the development of Islam locally within Astrakhan. Interviews are used to study local understandings of the changing forms of Islam in Astrakhan, and to see if locals believe that the state has been supportive to the Islamic community. My research contributes to wider scholarship on the importance of the relationship between the state and local Islamic communities for Islamic nation-building in the Russian Federation.

The irregular migration over the Mediterranean Sea has become a priority on the political agenda in recent years. This paper examines whether the attempts of managing the irregular migration have constituted a process of externalisation of border control and/or migration management in the context of Italy and Libya. Specifically, a Memorandum of Understanding signed by the countries in February 2017 has been studied to determine if it can be understood as an example of externalisation. The Memorandum has been assessed using three criteria for externalisation, as identified by Paoletti (2011), as well as a model for categorising measures into ‘fencing’ or ‘gatekeeping’ strategies, presented by Triandafyllidou and Dimitriadi (2013). Additionally, a critical geopolitical perspective has been applied, aiming at identifying the Memorandum’s geopolitical implications. An examination of studies on previous agreements demonstrates that a process of externalisation has been occurring, and the analysis of the Memorandum indicates that the agreement can be understood as a part of this process. Furthermore, a number of geopolitical implications have been identified in the Memorandum, regarding power, sovereignty, borders and securitisation. Since there is no universal definition of what measures are considered to constitute externalisation, any assessments made are arguably subjective.

No description available.

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