Are geopolitics enough to understand the World?

A strong wind has moved the cornerstones of the established order such that things will never be the same again.

Today we are seeing a deepening economic crisis, global  pandemic , masses in the streets on every continent, ever-growing military conflicts, statues and national symbols torn from their pedestals.

The alleged “truths” of the established order are being toppled one by one.

The former powers-that-be have taken increasingly desperate actions in order to protect what they have left… But their actions are not enough to prevent these contradictions from surfacing.

Those who cannot grasp the system’s downfall run around meaninglessly like a decapitated chicken, and continue to repeat the slogans that have long since lost their validity and importance.

WHICH COMPASS?

As the old centers of power fall, a new world is arising to take its place; yet, there are still questions about what idea or system we will be able to use as a compass to guide us to our next destination.

While it is widely accepted that the main ideologies of the 20th century are now on their death beds, especially after the end of the Cold War, the geopolitical outlook, which suggests that the main factor in the political tendencies and in the international orientations are the geographical positioning of the countries. This idea has gained importance again not only in Turkey but also throughout the world.

The politics of rapprochement pursued by Turkey after 2015 with its neighbors, mainly Russia and Iran, were mainly based on this approach, and were successful to that extent.

Today, the same approach is tried to be applied in the Eastern Mediterranean.

On a global scale, geopolitics has proven accurate in understanding the basics of the struggle between the US, Russia, China, India, the EU, and other major powers.

But on the other hand, geopolitics have proven incapable of making a sense of the national characteristics of the countries, historical disagreements, and class struggle.

In 2011, those who had seen the Arab Spring movements in Tunisia and then Egypt looked at the issue from a geopolitical perspective in comparing it to the situations in Tunisia and Egypt, and ignored the factor of class differences in these social movements, only discussing which “external powers” had the influence on these movements. Unlike Syria and Libya, there was a factor of class differences with the social movements in Tunisia and Egypt.

The same analysts find it appropriate to put the social movements that took place among the Western imperialist centers, particularly in the United States today, into a narrow perspective of “a conflict between globalists and nationalists”.

On a national scale in Turkey, the same geopolitical approach is failing to determine the reasons for the AKP government, which had been clashing with the United States on certain points, to take actions such as the repurposing of Hagia Sophia, passing the multiple bar associations bill, renouncing the Istanbul Convention and adjusting the severance pay, which would disturb the national unity in the domestic policies.

The first thing to do for a power hoping to resist US imperialism is to take unifying actions, rather than polarizing ones on the homefront. However, steps are currently being taken in the opposite direction by the government, disturbing the social unity in Turkey, especially in the post-corona period.

THE RIGHT DIRECTION

The right way to understand global politics and find solutions to its contradictions are surfacing increasingly as the the world begins to resemble Dante’s Inferno, and this way is not solely based on geopolitics – it also requires a historic, social and most importantly, class-based approach.

Although it is true that geopolitics is essential in understanding the foreign politics, a holistic domestic politics requires appliny geopolitics together with class politics.

Without including both approaches, incorrect conclusions may result in invalid situations, even when being validated initially. In the intro of his book “Disordered World”, Amin Maalouf says that humanity has entered a new century “without a compass”, and he is correct in cerain aspects: imperialism has lost its compass and sunk into a swamp of its own making.

Humanity, on the other hand, has continued and will continue its long journey.

Class struggle and the geopolitical approach are the torches that will guide humanity during these difficult stages of our long journey…