Students and academics of ABU showed great interest in the panel organized by our University’s Center for Strategic Economic and Political Research (SEPAM), titled “Understanding the US in an Age of Uncertainty”. Vice Rector Prof. Mehmet Aktan and SEPAM Director Asso. Prof. Cerem I. Cenker-Özek delivered the introductory speeches. Assoc. Prof. Dr. Ceren Uysal Oğuz from Akdeniz University and Prof. Dr. Ali Şevket Ovalı from Dokuz Eylül University were the speakers in this panel. Both speakers provided significant insights about the role of the US in today’s world. The event was moderated by Asist. Prof. B. Toygar Halistoprak, the Vice President of the Department of Political Science and International Relations.
SEPAM panel provided students with the opportunity to evaluate the current policies and future strategies of the United States, one of the most important actors in global politics. In her speech, Assoc. Prof. Dr. Ceren Uysal Oğuz presented an important analytical framework in which she compared the policies of the US President Donald Trump's second term of presidency with President Trump's first term of presidency. Assoc. Prof. Dr. Uysal Oğuz evaluated Trump's recent relations with Canada and Panama within this framework and made important inferences about the future.
Prof. Dr. Ali Şevket Ovalı's speech focused on US-Türkiye relations. Prof. Ovalı examined this relationship under three main periods: from the foundation of the Republic to the World War II, from the World War II to the end of the Cold War, and from the 1990s to the present. Prof. Ovalı drew attention to the key role played by American Presidents in the US part of the US-Türkiye relations, and he underlined the US Congress’s historically critical stance towards Türkiye. Prof. Ovalı pointed out increasing populism observed during the Trump’s second presidency, which relates to uncertainty and unpredictability in the US policy.
The Q&A session of the panel began after the speakers’ mind-opening analyses. Students asked the speakers questions on the new US administration, global and regional politics, and US-Türkiye relations. Following the Q&A session, Vice Rector Prof. Dr. Mehmet Aktan and Vice Dean of the Faculty of Economics, Administrative and Social Sciences Prof. Dr. Sefa Çetin thanked the speakers for their valuable contributions and presented them with plaques. SEPAM will continue to contribute to wider discussion on current global developments closely with such academic events in the future.
