Strategic autonomy in Turkish foreign policy: Defense or offense?

Although the study of secondary state behavior has increasing scholarly attention, existing studies suffer from a serious defect: privileging defensive over offensive behaviors. This is mainly due to the problems of status-quo-bias and anarchy-centrism engulfing the discipline of International Relations. This leads scholars either to ignore offensive state behaviors or treat them as aberration. This could be corrected if the struggle for autonomy is taken as the primary motive behind state behaviors. Defensive and offensive state behaviors, then, can be given equal treatment. Defensive state behaviors aim to maintain whereas offensive state behaviors seek to expand autonomy. Secondary states may display risky offensive behaviors to expand their autonomy. I shall examine this argument against the empirical evidence provided by Turkish foreign policy after 2016. I argue that the policy of strategic autonomy determines Turkish foreign policy and in the context of this policy Turkey follows a leash-slipping strategy to expand its autonomy.