A Historical Materialist Reading of the Contested Relations between Greece and Turkey

Abstract

ABSTRACT This article examines the contested relationship between Greece and Turkey from a historical materialist approach. It seeks to explain the very essence of this contestation rather than merely focusing on its surface forms. While doing this, we eschew intra-Marxist theoretical debates not to exceed the research scope. The article argues that the foreign policies of Greece and Turkey have indeed been subject to considerations of the dominant bourgeois classes in both countries that have been stimulated as well as bound by Euro-Atlantic imperialism. It considers the relative comparative advantages of Greece and Turkey’s relational and possessional capabilities. It puts forward that the historical materialist approach has better explanatory power and offers an alternative reading. It elaborates upon the tense relations between the two countries, showing the interwoven connections with imperialism at national and international levels. It underlines how the contestation between Greece and Turkey has been encouraged and delimited by Euro-Atlantic imperialism.