| Summary/Abstract |
Since the ascendancy of the Justice and Development Party (AKP) in 2002, Turkey has critically reappraised its foreign‐policy priorities. Led by President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan, the Turkish political establishment has reset its conventional pattern of foreign‐policy behavior by distancing the country from the West in favor of better connections to other regions. Turkey has not abandoned its long‐cherished aspiration of European Union (EU) membership, but its top leadership has demonstrated that the Turks are no longer willing to pay any demeaning cost in order to achieve that erstwhile goal. Moreover, Turkish leaders have sometimes even gone out of their way to criticize certain Western politico‐economic as well as cultural policies, no matter that their country is still an active member of the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO).
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