TR Turkiye 2025–2040: An Introduction to a Power Projection

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Turkiye 2025–2040: An Introduction to a Power Projection

Why This Series, and Why Now:

Most texts written about TR (Turkish Republic) fall into one of two lazy extremes. Either they lean toward excessive optimism, bordering on narrative building rather than analysis, or they reduce the country to a permanent crisis case and spend pages explaining why nothing will ever work. This series consciously rejects both.

The purpose here is not to praise TR, nor to indict it. The purpose is to ask a harder question: what Turkey can realistically become over the next fifteen years, what it cannot become, and under which conditions it moves in either direction.

This is not a prediction exercise. It is not a policy wish-list either. It is an attempt to map capacity, constraints, and the consequences of choices.

Abstract: Why 2025–2040?

- The timeline is not arbitrary.

- The mid-2020s mark a structural threshold for Turkiye:

- The demographic advantage is peaking.

- Energy dependency is beginning, slowly, to fracture.

- The defence–technology ecosystem has reached operational maturity.

- Regional influence is no longer episodic, but sustained.

- And by 2040, the outcomes of today’s decisions will no longer be reversible.

- This is the horizon where Turkiye’s trajectory hardens into form.

- The question will no longer be “where is Turkiye heading?” It will be “what kind of power did Turkiye actually become?”


This series does not read TR through GDP figures alone. But it also does not dismiss them. Instead, it treats power as a composite structure, built across several interacting layers. The central question is not whether Turkiye grows. It is whether Turkiye can grow without fragmenting, expand without exhausting itself, and convert scale into durable influence.

This is not a daily politics thread. It does not orbit personalities, parties, or electoral cycles. It does not reduce outcomes to single causes, nor does it hide behind the convenient language of “external forces”. And it does not assume that every problem has a technocratic fix. This is not a defence brief for Turkiye. Nor is it an indictment. It treats Turkiye as what it is: a serious actor with agency, contradictions, and limits.

Counter-arguments are welcome. Corrections are part of the process. Because Turkiye’s future will not be shaped by applause or condemnation, but by serious, sustained debate.

The first article asks a foundational question: Is Turkiye truly a “threshold country”, or is this concept overstated?

From there, the series will be moves step by step — through economics, energy, technology, geopolitics, institutions, and risk — each one will be a separate piece, all part of the same structure. This introduction is not a conclusion. It is a line drawn in the sand. Let's start!

 

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Article I

Turkiye as a Threshold Power: From Middle Power to Systemic Actor

1. Introduction: The Misreading of Turkiye

Most contemporary analyses still approach Turkiye through outdated binaries: West vs. East, democracy vs. authoritarianism, NATO ally vs. revisionist actor. These frames are increasingly insufficient. They describe tensions, but they fail to explain direction.

Turkiye today is neither a declining peripheral state nor a fully consolidated great power. It is something structurally more ambiguous and therefore more consequential: a threshold power.

A threshold power is not defined by absolute GDP size alone, nor by institutional prestige. It is defined by its ability to convert regional influence into systemic leverage, and by its capacity to operate across multiple geopolitical layers simultaneously—economic, military, technological, and cultural.

This article argues that Turkiye has crossed the threshold separating classical middle powers from emergent systemic actors. The transition is incomplete, uneven, and fragile. But it is real.

2. Conceptual Framework: What Is a Threshold Power?

In international relations literature, middle powers are typically described as rule-followers, coalition builders, and agenda shapers within existing systems (Cooper, Higgott & Nossal, 1993). Great powers, by contrast, shape the system itself.

Threshold powers sit uncomfortably between these categories.

They:

• lack the scale to dominate globally,
• but possess enough autonomy to resist systemic constraints,
• and enough regional gravity to reshape surrounding orders.

Examples historically include late-19th century Germany, post-war Japan in its industrial phase, and China in the early 2000s. In each case, economic metrics lagged behind strategic impact—until they did not. Turkiye increasingly fits this pattern.

3. Macroeconomic Reality: Constraints Without Paralysis

There is no serious argument that Turkiye’s macroeconomic structure is without weaknesses. High inflation volatility, currency depreciation cycles, energy dependency, and low domestic savings remain binding constraints.

Yet the analytical mistake lies in assuming these constraints negate structural ascent.

Turkiye’s GDP, when measured in nominal dollars, fluctuates sharply due to exchange rate dynamics. But in purchasing power parity (PPP) terms, Turkiye has already entered the top tier globally. More importantly, its industrial diversification has deepened, not narrowed.

Defense manufacturing, automotive supply chains, white goods, construction services, agri-industry, and increasingly electronics and UAV-related technologies form a resilient production base. This matters because threshold powers are not built on finance alone—they are built on things that move, fly, produce, and secure.

4. The Turkic Axis: Institutionalizing Cultural Geography

The Turkic States Organization represents the most explicit attempt to translate identity into structure.

Common alphabet initiatives, integrated logistics corridors, defense cooperation frameworks, and gradual economic harmonization suggest a long-term vision closer to confederal coordination than symbolic diplomacy.

This is not an EU-style supranational project. It is looser, slower, and culturally thicker. Its strength lies precisely there.

For Turkiye, this axis extends strategic depth eastward without provoking immediate great-power containment. It anchors influence from Anatolia toward Central Asia while bypassing traditional chokepoints.

4.1 Syria: From Intervention to Structural Absorption

Syria represents the most advanced—and most controversial—case of Turkish deep integration without formal annexation.

Unlike classic military interventions, Turkiye’s involvement in northern Syria has evolved into a layered governance ecosystem: security provision, currency circulation, trade integration, education alignment, and labor mobility.

The circulation of the Turkish lira is not symbolic. It is macroeconomic gravity in action. Health services, policing, energy supply, and municipal coordination increasingly rely on Turkish institutions or Turkish-backed systems. Over time, this generates irreversible sunk costs against alternative alignments.

Should reconstruction begin within the next decade, Turkiye is positioned not merely as a neighbor, but as the default reconstruction hub. This is not influence. It is absorption without annexation.

4.2 Libya: Strategic Depth Through Managed Fragility

Libya illustrates a different model: strategic leverage through selective stabilization.

Turkiye does not seek full institutional closure in Libya. It seeks indispensability. Defense agreements, maritime delimitation, training missions, and energy exploration rights together form a permanent access architecture.

Libya offers something rare: Mediterranean projection with legal and military cover.

Over a 15-year horizon, even partial normalization disproportionately benefits Turkish firms, ports, and energy corridors. Upside asymmetry is massive; downside risk is capped.

4.3 Somalia and the Horn of Africa: Peripheral, Yet Decisive

Somalia is often misread as humanitarian overreach. In reality, it is geopolitical anchoring.

Military training bases, infrastructure projects, and diplomatic legitimacy have created trust without colonial memory. Somalia functions as a forward node linking the Red Sea, the Gulf, and the Indian Ocean.

Returns are indirect but cumulative: defense, logistics contracts, diplomatic alignment. Power compounds quietly.

4.4 The Balkan Continuum: Soft Power with Hard Edges

The Balkans remain Turkiye’s most underestimated integration zone.

Banks, construction firms, cultural exports, and mediation roles generate a dense influence web. EU stagnation amplifies this effect. Turkiye does not replace Europe; it coexists as a parallel gravity center.

This quietly extends Turkiye’s economic hinterland into Europe itself.

4.5 Variable Geometry Integration

Across these axes, Turkiye applies variable geometry integration:

Full functional integration (Northern Syria)
Strategic military anchoring (Libya, Somalia)
Institutional-cultural convergence (Turkic states)
Soft-economic penetration (Balkans)

This flexibility explains why classical power metrics undercount Turkiye’s trajectory.

Empires imposed uniformity. Turkiye builds custom-fit dependencies.

5. Technology, Defense, and the Industrial Multiplier

Defense aviation, UAV ecosystems, AI-enabled autonomy, satellite launch capabilities, and indigenous naval platforms are not prestige projects. They are industrial multipliers.

Defense exports generate foreign currency, reduce import dependency, and embed long-term service relationships. Few sectors convert sovereignty into revenue as efficiently.

This is where Turkiye’s threshold status becomes tangible.

6. Risks: Overextension, Institutional Friction, and Economic Volatility

Threshold powers fail when ambition outruns institutional capacity.

For Turkiye, risks include:

• prolonged inflation cycles,
• governance predictability erosion,
• capital access constraints,
• and diplomatic overreach.

None are fatal individually. Combined, they are dangerous.

7. Conclusion: Gravity Before Wealth

Turkiye has not yet translated influence into full prosperity. But history shows that systemic actors often gain gravity before wealth.

The decisive question is no longer whether Turkiye has regional influence. It does. The real question is whether this influence network can be converted into sustained macroeconomic uplift and institutional resilience.

That question is quantitative. Article II will address exactly that.

References​

• Acemoglu, D., & Robinson, J. (2012). Why Nations Fail.
• Cooper, A., Higgott, R., & Nossal, K. (1993). Relocating Middle Powers.
• IMF World Economic Outlook (various years).
• World Bank Development Indicators.
• SIPRI Arms Transfers Database.
• OECD Economic Surveys: Turkiye.

 

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Article II
Quantitative Scenarios for Turkiye (2025–2040):

From Influence to Income

1. Why Scenarios Matter More Than Forecasts

Macroeconomic forecasting fails most precisely where it matters most: at structural turning points. Turkiye is currently at such a point.

Point estimates—single GDP numbers, growth rates, or income projections—create false certainty. Scenario analysis, by contrast, exposes the range of plausible futures, conditional on policy coherence, global cycles, and internal discipline.

This article constructs four quantitative scenarios for Turkiye between 2025 and 2040:

• Optimistic (Convergence)
• Baseline (Managed Volatility)
• Pessimistic (Stagnation with Influence)
• Disruption (Downside)

These are not political predictions. They are macroeconomic outcome envelopes.

2. Baseline Assumptions (Common to All Scenarios)

To avoid narrative bias, all scenarios share the following structural assumptions:

• Population stabilizes around 88–92 million
• Urbanization exceeds 80%
• Defense and strategic industries remain state-supported
• Turkiye maintains strategic autonomy (no full bloc absorption)
• Global order remains multipolar (no unipolar reset)

The divergence comes from policy execution quality, not from destiny.

3. Core Variables Modeled

Each scenario tracks the same quantitative indicators:

Nominal GDP (USD)
GDP (PPP)
GDP per capita (USD)
Export volume
Energy import dependency (%)
High-tech exports (% of total)
Defense exports (USD)
Average inflation band
Currency stability regime

These are the levers through which influence converts into income—or fails to.

4. Scenario I — Optimistic: Strategic Convergence
Narrative Logic

This scenario assumes:

• Successful inflation disinflation (single digits by 2027–28)
• Energy diversification materially reduces current account pressure
• Defense, aerospace, electronics, and AI-enabled manufacturing scale
• Institutional predictability improves without radical liberalization
• No miracle reforms. Just consistency.

Quantitative Outcomes (2040)
Indicator Value
Nominal GDP over $2.5 trillion
GDP (PPP) $4.5–5 trillion
GDP per capita $22,000–27,000
Exports $500–550 billion
High-tech exports 18–22%
Energy import dependency <40%
Defense exports $30 billion
Inflation 5–7% band

Implication:

Turkiye overtakes Italy in nominal GDP between 2035–2038, becomes Europe’s 4th or 5th largest economy, and locks in threshold-to-systemic transition.

This is not a Germany-level outcome. It is a France-level influence-to-income alignment.

5. Scenario II — Baseline: Managed Volatility
Narrative Logic

• This is the most likely path.
• Inflation declines but remains sticky (8–12%)
• Currency depreciation continues, but orderly
• Export growth offsets domestic inefficiencies
• Energy gains are real but partial
• Institutions improve unevenly
• Momentum without full convergence.

Quantitative Outcomes (2040)
Indicator Value
Nominal GDP over $2 trillion
GDP (PPP) $3.8–4.2 trillion
GDP per capita $17,000–20,000
Exports $400–460 billion
High-tech exports 12–15%
Energy import dependency 50-55%
Defense exports $18–22 billion
Inflation 8–11% band

Implication:

Turkiye matches or slightly surpasses South Korea in PPP terms, but not nominally. Italy still remains just out of reach.

Influence continues to outpace income.

This is the “strong regional pole, incomplete economic translation” equilibrium.

6. Scenario III — Pessimistic: Stagnation with Power. (Not a collapse, but a failure to manage processes)

Narrative Logic

• This scenario assumes:
• Inflation cycles persist above 15%
• Capital access deteriorates
• Energy transition stalls
• Institutional unpredictability increases
• Geopolitical influence remains, but costly

Power without productivity.

Quantitative Outcomes (2040)
Indicator Value
Nominal GDP $1.6–1.8 trillion
GDP (PPP) $3.0–3.5 trillion
GDP per capita $13,000–17,000
Exports $330–360 billion
High-tech exports <10%
Energy import dependency >65%
Defense exports $15 billion
Inflation 15–20% band

Implication:

Turkiye remains geopolitically indispensable but economically constrained. Influence becomes a fiscal burden, not a multiplier.

Historically, this is where threshold powers stall.

Scenario IV — Disruptive Downside: Fragmentation Under Pressure
Narrative Logic

This scenario does not assume mismanagement alone.
It assumes structural disruption.

Disruptive Downside emerges when multiple stressors overlap rather than arrive sequentially. Individually manageable shocks become systemically destabilizing when they synchronize.

The core triggers are:

• prolonged global financial fragmentation limiting capital access,
• a renewed energy price shock combined with delayed domestic capacity,
• geopolitical overextension turning influence into fiscal burden,
• and institunional unpredictability that erodes confidence faster than policy can respond.
• In this scenario, Turkiye does not collapse. But It loses coherence.

Quantitative Outcomes (2040)
Indicator Value
Nominal GDP $1.2 trillion
GDP (PPP) $2.5 – 2.9 trillion
GDP per capita $10,000 – $12,000
Exports $260 – 300 billion
High-tech exports <8%
Energy import dependency >60%
Defense exports $10–12 billion
Inflation 25–35% band
Structural Characteristics

• Currency volatility becomes chronic rather than cyclical
• Capital flight dominates long-term investment
• Influence abroad remains, but is increasingly subsidized
• Public finance shifts from development to stabilization mode
• Informality expands, productivity contracts
• The state retains coercive capacity, but loses coordinating capacity.

Strategic Implications:

In Disruptive Downside, Turkiye is no longer a threshold power. It becomes a reactive power.

Foreign policy choices narrow. Economic diplomacy weakens. Regional leverage remains visible but expensive. Influence ceases to compound; it merely survives.

Historically, this is the scenario where states lose a decade—sometimes two—without dramatic collapse, yet with profound opportunity cost.

Why This Scenario Matters

Disruptive Downside is unlikely, but not impossible.

Its function is not prediction.
Its function is discipline.

It defines the boundary conditions beyond which policy errors stop being reversible. For threshold powers, this boundary is thinner than commonly assumed.

Analytical Note

If Scenario IV materializes, recovery requires:

• external stabilization anchors,
• partial loss of strategic autonomy,
• and painful institutional resets.

In other words, the price is not collapse. The price is lost sovereignty over the recovery path.

7. Comparative Catch-Up Timelines

Under scenario analysis:

- Russia (nominal GDP): Catchable in Optimistic scenario by 2030s
- South Korea (PPP): Matched in Baseline, surpassed in Optimistic
- Italy (nominal GDP): Only surpassed in Optimistic, post-2035
- France/Germany: Not catchable within 15 years under any scenario

8. Conversion Coefficient: Influence → GDP

The hidden variable across all scenarios is what can be called the Influence Conversion Coefficient (ICC).

Turkiye already has influence. What varies is how much of that influence converts into:

• contracts,
• export lock-in,
• supply-chain centrality,
• and long-term rents.
• Optimistic scenario assumes high ICC.
• Pessimistic assumes low ICC.

This is a policy choice, not fate.

9. Structural Risk Factors That Break All Scenarios​

Some shocks collapse the entire model:

• prolonged energy price spikes
• uncontrolled regional wars
• internal political fragmentation
• global financial fragmentation cutting capital flows

Threshold powers are resilient—but not immune.

10. Conclusion: Numbers With Direction​

Quantitatively, Turkiye’s future is not binary. It is conditional.


The country does not need to become a liberal utopia to converge.
It needs macroeconomic discipline aligned with its strategic reality.


If influence and income finally move in the same direction, Turkiye crosses the line from threshold to system-shaper.


Article III will examine the political economy mechanisms that decide which scenario materializes.

References:​

• IMF World Economic Outlook (2024–2025)
• World Bank World Development Indicators
• OECD Economic Outlook: Turkiye
• SIPRI Arms Transfers Database
• Rodrik, D. (2011). The Globalization Paradox
• Energy Transition Outlooks (IEA)

 

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Article III​

The Political Economy of Conversion:​

Why Some Power Translates into Wealth—and Some Doesn’t

The Central Question No One Likes to Ask​

By now, one fact should be uncontroversial: Turkiye has influence.
What remains deeply contested—and often emotionally charged—is whether that influence reliably converts into income, productivity, and long-term prosperity.

History is brutal on this question. Many states have wielded power. Few have monetized it.

This article addresses the uncomfortable core of Turkiye’s trajectory: the political economy mechanisms that decide whether influence becomes a multiplier—or a drag.

Influence Is Cheap; Conversion Is Expensive​

Influence is easier to acquire than wealth.

Military presence, diplomatic reach, mediation capacity, cultural exports, and security guarantees generate visibility and leverage quickly. Conversion, however, demands institutional discipline, legal predictability, financial depth, and coordination capacity.

The literature is clear on this point. Power without institutions tends to:

• raise transaction costs,
• attract rent-seeking,
• and produce diminishing returns (North, Wallis & Weingast, 2009).

Threshold powers fail not because they lack ambition, but because they cannot price their influence correctly.

The Conversion Chain: From Flag to Balance Sheet​

For influence to translate into GDP growth, it must pass through a specific chain:

1. Access (political or military presence)
2. Preference (being the default partner)
3. Contract Capture (firms win deals)
4. Supply-Chain Lock-in (repeat dependency)
5. Financial Repatriation (profits return home)

Break any link, and influence becomes symbolic.

Turkiye performs well at steps 1 and 2.
Its mixed record begins at steps 3 to 5.

Defense Sector: The Exception That Proves the Rule​

Defense and aerospace remain Turkiye’s most successful conversion domain.

Why? Because the sector aligns all five conversion steps:

• Political access via security cooperation
• Preference through operational trust
• Contract capture via state-backed firms
• Long-term maintenance lock-in
• Foreign currency inflows

This is why defense exports punch far above their nominal share. They reveal what happens when influence meets institutional coherence.

The lesson is structural, not sectoral.

Where Conversion Leaks: Construction, Energy, and Services​

In construction and infrastructure, Turkiye secures access and contracts—but often fails at financial repatriation. Delayed payments, political risk, and currency mismatches dilute returns.

In energy diplomacy, geopolitical leverage does not always translate into equity stakes or pricing power. Influence secures routes; ownership secures income. These are not the same. Services—tourism, logistics, education—remain under-institutionalized. They generate revenue, but not compounding productivity gains. Influence here creates cash flow, not capital formation.

Institutional Thickness vs. Personal Networks​

One of Turkiye’s structural dilemmas is the reliance on personalized state capacity. Charismatic leadership, informal networks, and ad-hoc coordination can move fast. But they scale poorly. When influence is brokered through personalities rather than institutions, conversion depends on continuity—which is fragile.

Political economy literature consistently shows that institutional thickness, not leadership brilliance, determines long-run conversion rates (Acemoglu & Robinson, 2012). This is not an ideological claim. It is an empirical one.

The Middle-Income Trap​

The middle-income trap is often misunderstood as a growth slowdown problem. It is actually a conversion failure.

Countries escape it when they:

• upgrade technology,
• deepen capital markets,
• and enforce credible rules.

They fall into it when influence substitutes for reform. Turkiye’s risk is not stagnation. It is plateau with power.

Financial Architecture: The Silent Gatekeeper​

No influence converts without finance. Deep capital markets, risk pricing, long-term credit, and currency credibility determine whether firms can scale abroad and repatriate gains. Turkiye’s shallow domestic savings base and volatile currency regime tax its own multinationals. Firms win contracts—but finance them expensively. This erodes the Influence Conversion Coefficient (ICC) discussed in Article II.

The State as Coordinator​

Successful threshold powers evolve the state’s role.

Early phase: state as driver
Transition phase: state as coordinator
Mature phase: state as rule-enforcer

Turkiye remains between phase one and two. Too much control chokes initiative. Too little coordination wastes influence. The balance is technical, not ideological.

Comparative Insight: Why South Korea Succeeded​

South Korea’s rise was not due to superior culture or geopolitics. It mastered conversion. Security dependence was monetized into technology transfer. Export champions were disciplined, not indulged. Failure was punished. Power was never allowed to substitute productivity. This is the benchmark—not Europe, not ideology.

Conversion Failure as a Political Risk​

Unconverted influence creates domestic backlash. Citizens see power abroad but precarity at home. This breeds polarization, populism, and policy volatility—further damaging conversion capacity. Thus, conversion is not just economic. It is political stability insurance.

Conclusion: The Narrow Gate​

Turkiye stands before a narrow gate.

It has crossed the influence threshold. It has not yet crossed the conversion threshold.

History offers no guarantees. But it offers patterns.


States that align:

• influence with institutions,
• ambition with discipline,
• power with pricing,

become system-shapers. Those that do not remain impressive—but brittle.


References

• Acemoglu, D., & Robinson, J. (2012). Why Nations Fail
• Rodrik, D. (2016). Structural transformation literature
• IMF Staff Discussion Notes on emerging market convergence
• World Bank Enterprise Surveys
• SIPRI defense industry analyses

 

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Article IV​

Geopolitical Conversion Arenas:​

How Turkiye Turns Influence into Structural Power (2025–2040)

Introduction: Power Does Not Convert in a Vacuum​

Power accumulation, as established in the previous articles, is a necessary but insufficient condition for long-term national advancement. The decisive variable is not how much power a state holds, but where and how that power is deployed. In the international system, power converts into wealth, resilience, and strategic autonomy only within specific geopolitical arenas — zones where influence is continuous, multidimensional, and institutionally anchored.

For Turkiye, the 2025–2040 horizon will not be defined by abstract global rankings, but by its performance across a set of identifiable conversion arenas. These arenas are neither purely territorial nor fully formalized. They operate through layered presence: security, logistics, reconstruction, diplomacy, culture, and selective economic integration.

This article examines the primary geopolitical arenas where Turkiye’s accumulated power has the highest probability of structural conversion — and where failure would result in leakage, stagnation, or strategic overstretch.

1. Syria: From Tactical Depth to Permanent Leverage​

No geopolitical arena is more consequential — or more misunderstood — than Syria.

What began as a security buffer has evolved into a de facto influence zone combining:

• Military deterrence
• Administrative penetration
• Infrastructure provision
• Labor absorption
• Demographic rebalancing

Turkiye’s presence in Syria is not temporary in any meaningful sense. Roads, hospitals, energy lines, currency circulation, and educational frameworks already function in partial alignment with Turkish systems. This creates a rare condition in geopolitics: functional integration without formal annexation.

From a conversion perspective, Syria offers three mechanisms:

1. Security Externalization
   Threats are pushed outward, lowering domestic security costs over time.
2. Labor and Reconstruction Spillover
   Syrian reconstruction — when it begins in earnest — will not be neutral. Firms, logistics chains, and human capital will disproportionately route through Turkiye.
3. Transit Centrality
   Any future Levantine trade normalization will require Turkish corridors, ports, and mediation.

The risk is not overreach, but strategic ambiguity: prolonged uncertainty could freeze capital formation. Yet if stabilized, Syria may become Turkiye’s most undervalued long-term asset.

2. Libya: Maritime Power Meets Economic Optionality​

Libya represents a different class of arena: distant, fragmented, but strategically asymmetric.

Turkiye’s intervention altered the balance of power decisively, but more importantly, it established:

• A maritime jurisdiction framework (EEZ alignment)
• Defense-industrial embedding
• Elite-level political dependency

Libya’s relevance lies less in immediate returns and more in option creation:

• Energy corridors
• Eastern Mediterranean leverage
• North African logistics access
• Defense export lock-in

Unlike Syria, Libya is not about integration. It is about strategic veto power. Turkiye does not need Libya to stabilize fully; it needs Libya to remain unhostile and open-ended.

Conversion here is nonlinear: returns will come sporadically, through contracts, influence, and exclusion of rivals rather than steady trade flows.

3. Somalia and the Horn of Africa: The Long Game Arena​

Somalia is often dismissed as symbolic. That is a mistake.

In reality, Somalia functions as:

• A forward maritime node
• A military training hub
• A diplomatic gateway to East Africa
• A proof-of-concept for low-cost influence projection

Turkiye’s approach here is distinct: low visibility, long duration, minimal confrontation. This is patience power.

The economic payoff is indirect:

• Port management
• Construction
• Defense cooperation
• Soft-power entrenchment

Over a 15-year horizon, Somalia anchors Turkiye’s presence in the Red Sea–Indian Ocean continuum, a zone increasingly contested by Gulf states, China, and Western navies.

Conversion here is slow — but cumulative.

4. The Turkic Axis: Informal Confederation in Motion​

Among all arenas, the Turkic Axis holds the highest latent multiplier effect.

The Turkic States Organization is not yet a bloc, but its trajectory is unmistakable:

• Linguistic harmonization
• Institutional synchronization
• Transport and logistics integration
• Defense coordination signals

This is not an EU-style project. It is looser, culturally thicker, and strategically asymmetric — with Turkiye as the natural gravitational center.

If even partially realized, this axis:

• Extends Turkiye’s influence from Central Asia to Europe
• Creates supply-chain redundancy
• Reduces geopolitical isolation
• Enhances bargaining power vis-à-vis China, Russia, and the EU

The risk is fragmentation under external pressure. The opportunity is scale without formal empire.

5. The Balkans: Soft Power with Strategic Memory​

The Balkans represent a classic soft-power arena:

• Cultural affinity
• Historical continuity
• Political mediation
• Economic presence

While returns are modest, stability here prevents negative spillovers and reinforces Turkiye’s image as a regional balancer rather than a disruptor.

Conversion is reputational, not fiscal — but reputational capital compounds.

6. Pakistan, Malaysia, Indonesia and Selective Asian Alignment​

Beyond geography, Turkiye has constructed ideological and technological corridors with states seeking strategic autonomy.

These relationships are not blocs; they are mutual insulation agreements against over-dependence on any single great power.

Their conversion value lies in:

• Defense exports
• Technology sharing
• Diplomatic vote alignment
• Narrative legitimacy

Conclusion: The Architecture of Conversion​

What unites these arenas is not proximity, ideology, or regime type. It is convertibility.

Turkiye’s 2040 power projection will depend less on headline GDP figures and more on whether these arenas:

• Stabilize or fragment
• Institutionalize or remain ad hoc
• Attract capital or repel it

Power that cannot anchor itself geographically leaks. Influence that lacks economic channels dissipates.

Turkiye is no longer testing whether it can project power. The open question is whether it can discipline that power into lasting structure.

Article V will move inward — from geography to institutions — and examine whether Turkiye’s domestic systems are capable of absorbing and multiplying the gains generated across these arenas.

References​

1. Nye, J. S. (2011). The Future of Power. PublicAffairs.
2. Mearsheimer, J. J. (2001). The Tragedy of Great Power Politics. W.W. Norton.
3. Stein, A., & Tierney, M. (2020). Turkey’s Expanding Military Footprint. Atlantic Council.
4. Pusztai, W. (2021). Turkey in Libya: Strategic Depth or Strategic Overstretch? ECFR.
5. International Institute for Strategic Studies (IISS). (2022). The Red Sea and the Horn of Africa.
6. Laruelle, M. (2021). The Turkic World: Political Cooperation and Strategic Limits. Wilson Center.
7. Organization of Turkic States. (2021–2024). Summit Declarations and Roadmaps.
8. Kibaroglu, M. (2020). Defense Industrialization and Strategic Autonomy in Turkey. SETA.

 

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Article V​

Domestic Absorption Capacity:​

Why Power Sometimes Plateaus Before Becoming Prosperity

Power is often discussed as something that must be acquired, expanded, or projected. Far less attention is paid to what happens after power arrives. Yet history suggests that the decisive phase for rising states is not accumulation, but absorption. Many countries manage to gather influence, leverage, and strategic reach. Far fewer manage to translate those assets into sustained prosperity, institutional confidence, and long-term social payoff.

For Turkiye, this distinction is no longer theoretical. By the mid-2020s, the country has crossed the threshold from reactive middle power to proactive regional actor. Influence has been accumulated across defense, diplomacy, logistics, and security. What remains unresolved is whether Turkiye’s internal system is capable of holding, multiplying, and stabilizing the gains generated externally — or whether those gains will flatten into a prolonged plateau.

Absorption capacity is not a single institution, reform package, or policy choice. It is a systemic property. It reflects how efficiently value moves from the outside to the inside, from opportunity to structure, from momentum to permanence.

One of the clearest constraints on Turkiye’s absorption capacity is not lack of activity, but leakage. External engagements generate contracts, rents, and strategic advantages. Yet too often these gains remain short-term, fragmented, or poorly reinvested. Value circulates quickly, but accumulates slowly. The result is a familiar paradox: high visible dynamism paired with persistent concerns about sustainability.

This leakage is not merely financial. It is temporal. When planning horizons shorten — whether due to inflation volatility, regulatory uncertainty, or shifting expectations — actors rationally prioritize immediacy over durability. In such an environment, power produces motion rather than structure. Things happen, but they do not settle.

Human capital presents a similar challenge. Turkiye’s demographic scale and technical capability remain genuine advantages, yet the system struggles to retain individuals precisely at the moment when their productivity peaks. This is not simply a story of brain drain. It is a story of broken compounding. Education and early-career formation are often successful; mid-career retention and late-stage innovation are less so. As a result, accumulated skill exits the system just as it becomes most valuable.

This creates an invisible ceiling. Power continues to expand outward, but its internal payoff stagnates. The state remains influential, but society grows impatient.

Institutional capacity is often discussed in binary terms: either a country undertakes sweeping reform, or it stagnates. This framing is misleading. What matters more than regime overhaul is institutional density — the presence of enough functional, predictable mechanisms to reduce friction without destabilizing the broader political equilibrium.

Absorption improves when courts resolve disputes within known timeframes, when regulatory decisions follow recognizable logic, when specialized institutions are shielded from constant recalibration. None of this requires dramatic political rupture. But all of it requires consistency. Without it, even successful external ventures struggle to translate into internal confidence.

Macroeconomic stability plays a quieter but equally decisive role. Inflation does more than erode purchasing power; it erodes belief. When actors cannot trust signals, they shorten their horizons. Investment becomes speculative, savings defensive, and ambition cautious. Even strong export performance and geopolitical wins fail to offset the psychological drag of instability. Power may grow, but belief lags behind.

The consequence of these dynamics is not collapse, but plateau. Plateau states are dangerous in subtle ways. They retain influence, preserve military relevance, and command attention abroad, yet struggle to deliver rising per capita prosperity at home. Over time, this gap breeds tension — not between the state and the world, but between the state and its own society.

Turkiye’s risk over the next fifteen years is not decline. It is arrested ascent. A situation in which the country becomes too important to ignore, yet insufficiently prosperous to feel settled. History shows that such states remain powerful, but brittle.

Absorption capacity determines whether power compounds quietly or dissipates noisily. It decides whether influence becomes habit, and habit becomes structure. By 2040, Turkiye’s rank will be determined less by the scale of its projection than by the efficiency of its internal conversion.

The next article turns outward again. Because no rising power tests its absorption capacity in isolation. External friction arrives precisely when internal conversion begins to matter.

References ​

1. Acemoglu, D., & Robinson, J. A. (2012). Why Nations Fail. Crown Publishing.
2. Rodrik, D. (2011). The Globalization Paradox. Oxford University Press.
3. Farrell, H., & Newman, A. (2019). Weaponized Interdependence. International Security.
4. World Bank. (2020). Institutions for Development. World Development Report.

 

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Article VI​

External Friction and Systemic Pushback:​

When the System Begins to Push Back (2025–2040)

There is a persistent misconception in power analysis: that resistance emerges when a state becomes aggressive. In reality, resistance emerges when a state becomes effective. The international system is remarkably tolerant of ambition, symbolism, even noise. What it does not tolerate is conversion — the moment when influence begins to harden into autonomy, and autonomy into precedent.

For Turkiye, the coming decade will not be defined by open confrontation or dramatic ruptures. It will be defined by something subtler and more corrosive: systemic pushback. Not the kind that announces itself with ultimatums, but the kind that operates through delay, conditionality, narrative pressure, and selective exclusion.

This is the stage Turkiye is entering.

The United States, contrary to popular belief, is not fundamentally opposed to Turkiye’s rise as a regional actor. Washington has lived with assertive middle powers before. What it resists is the emergence of actors that reduce dependency without severing formal ties. Turkiye’s problem is not divergence, but independence within alignment. This creates ambiguity, and ambiguity is intolerable for hegemonic systems.

As Turkiye’s defense industry matures, as its energy dependency declines, and as its regional engagements begin to reinforce one another rather than cancel out, friction will not come as a single shock. It will arrive as regulatory pressure, sanctions-lite mechanisms, bureaucratic slowdowns, and narrative framing designed to cap momentum rather than reverse it. The goal will not be collapse, but containment through friction.

Europe’s reaction will be different in tone but similar in outcome. The European Union does not fear a weak Turkiye, nor does it truly desire a strong one. What unsettles Brussels is a Turkiye that becomes structurally indispensable while remaining politically autonomous. Trade will continue. Capital will flow selectively. But institutional doors will remain half-open — never fully closed, never fully accessible.

This creates a peculiar asymmetry: high economic interdependence without political integration. Over time, this asymmetry becomes a lever. Standards, compliance regimes, and regulatory harmonization are deployed not to block Turkiye outright, but to slow its ability to set agendas. Europe’s pushback will not be loud. It will be procedural, legalistic, and exhausting by design.

Russia, by contrast, understands Turkiye in a different register. Moscow does not expect alignment; it expects hierarchy. The relationship functions as long as asymmetry is preserved. As Turkiye’s leverage increases — in the Black Sea, in the Caucasus, in energy transit — the Russian response will not be ideological but tactical. Lines will be drawn, tested, and occasionally enforced. Yet even here, pushback will stop short of rupture. Both sides understand the cost of escalation. What emerges instead is a tense equilibrium, cooperation shadowed by constant boundary negotiation.

China represents the most misunderstood source of friction. Beijing does not challenge Turkiye’s rise; it seeks to shape its trajectory. Dependency architecture, not confrontation, is the preferred instrument. Trade imbalances, technology asymmetries, and financial exposure are allowed to deepen quietly. The risk for Turkiye is not hostility, but gradual enclosure — a situation in which options narrow not because they are denied, but because alternatives fail to materialize.

Beyond the major powers, secondary actors will react less strategically and more emotionally. As Turkiye’s presence expands across multiple theaters, regional competitors will increasingly frame Turkish influence as destabilizing, revisionist, or excessive. These narratives matter not because they are accurate, but because they circulate easily. They provide the discursive backdrop against which larger powers justify restraint, pressure, or “concern.”

What matters most is timing. Systemic pushback does not intensify when a state becomes visible. It intensifies when three developments converge: first, when defense and security capabilities become largely indigenous; second, when energy vulnerability begins to recede; and third, when alternative diplomatic and economic networks start to look durable rather than experimental. Turkiye is approaching this convergence point.

This is not a warning sign. It is confirmation.

States that never encounter pushback rarely matter. States that misread pushback, however, often stumble. Overreaction leads to isolation. Underreaction leads to erosion. The challenge for Turkiye between now and 2040 is not to avoid friction, but to normalize it — to treat resistance as a structural feature of ascent rather than as an anomaly requiring dramatic response.

If Turkiye succeeds, external pressure will not derail its trajectory. It will simply shape the contours of its maturity.

The final article will bring the entire series together: internal absorption, external friction, and geopolitical reach synthesized into a single question — what kind of power Turkiye actually becomes by 2040, and whether that power is durable.

References​

1. Mearsheimer, J. J. (2001). The Tragedy of Great Power Politics. W.W. Norton.
2. Nye, J. S. (2011). The Future of Power. PublicAffairs.
3. Kupchan, C. (2012). No One’s World. Oxford University Press.
4. SIPRI. (2023). Global Security and Arms Transfers.

 

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Final Article ​

Turkiye 2040: Threshold, Friction, and the Limits of Systemic Power


By 2040, Turkiye will no longer be a peripheral actor. Its ascent has been neither accidental nor merely symbolic; years of strategic focus, technological investment, and regional engagement have positioned it as a threshold power. Yet power in itself is neither destiny nor guarantee. The central question is not whether Turkiye can rise, but whether that rise can persist without destabilizing itself or provoking insurmountable resistance.

The internal dynamics are ambiguous. Over the past fifteen years, Turkiye has strengthened its institutional frameworks, partially absorbed high-tech and defense gains, and expanded human capital in key sectors. However, the absorption capacity remains uneven. Skill retention in critical industries is imperfect, bureaucratic efficiency is inconsistent, and macroeconomic volatility continues to impose real constraints. These weaknesses are not hypothetical: they represent structural limits on how far and fast influence can be converted into durable prosperity.

Externally, Turkiye has entered a zone of systemic pushback that reflects recognition as much as resistance. The United States tolerates strategic autonomy only within boundaries defined by alliance architecture Europe engages economically while simultaneously constraining Turkiye’s capacity to set agenda across shared domains. Russia accommodates Turkiye’s regional activity but enforces boundaries where strategic interests intersect, particularly in the Black Sea and the Caucasus. China’s approach is quieter but China designs dependency architectures that subtly cage expansion. Each actor imposes friction that slows, shapes, or redirects Turkiye’s momentum — friction that is structural, systemic, and continuous.

Regionally, Turkiye has exercised influence across a spectrum of actors: Libya, Somalia, Syria, Azerbaijan, and other Turkic states. These relationships are not formalized federations or alliances, but they function as quasi-hinterlands, extending Turkiye’s reach without proportionate commitment. Yet such influence carries inherent tension. Overextension, misaligned expectations, or unforeseen instability in these zones can quickly translate into domestic pressure, trade disruption, or reputational costs.

The combination of internal constraints and external resistance produces a critical insight: power has a ceiling, and thresholds are fragile. Even as Turkiye approaches systemic relevance, the durability of that power is contingent on continuous calibration — of institutions, of economic strategy, and of diplomatic posture. Complacency or overreach could transform an ascendant trajectory into stagnation, or worse, a reversal.

A 2040 Turkiye is likely to occupy an unusual position. It will have the attributes of a systemic actor without the absolute scale of traditional great powers. Its military-industrial base, technological capabilities, and regional networks confer influence disproportionate to GDP alone. Yet that influence will be contingent, negotiated, and constantly challenged, both by internal limits and by the external system that has learned to tolerate but not fully accept autonomous actors in Eurasia.

This scenario underscores a broader lesson: the conversion of power into durable advantage is not automatic. Economic growth, defense sophistication, or regional influence are necessary but insufficient conditions. The architecture of absorption, the anticipation of friction, and the judicious management of thresholds define whether Turkiye’s position consolidates or plateaus.

In short, Turkiye’s 2040 reality is neither triumph nor failure. It is a state in a delicate equilibrium, a threshold power navigating systemic friction and internal consolidation. Its success will not be measured solely by GDP, exports, or military reach, but by the capacity to sustain influence without overextension, to convert potential into structure, and to negotiate systemic resistance without destabilizing itself.

That is the defining challenge — and opportunity — of the next fifteen years.

References​

1. Nye, J. S. (2011). The Future of Power. PublicAffairs.
2. Kupchan, C. (2012). No One’s World. Oxford University Press.
3. Allison, G. (2017). Destined for War. Houghton Mifflin Harcourt.

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