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MIDDLE EAST TODAY
Exploring Emotions in
Turkey-Iran Relations
Affective Politics of Partnership
and Rivalry
Mehmet Akif Kumral

Middle East Today
Series Editors
Fawaz A. Gerges
Department of International Relations
London School of Economics
London, UK
Nader Hashemi
Center for Middle East Studies
Josef Korbel School of International Studies
University of Denver
Denver, CO, USA
The Iranian Revolution of 1979, the Iran-Iraq War, the Gulf War, and
the US invasion and occupation of Iraq have dramatically altered the
geopolitical landscape of the contemporary Middle East. The Arab Spring
uprisings have complicated this picture. This series puts forward a critical
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realities of the region, focusing on original research about contentious
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Muslim Brotherhood; and the Israeli-Palestine conflict. Other themes of
interest include Iran and Turkey as emerging pre-eminent powers in the
region, the former an ‘Islamic Republic’ and the latter an emerging
democracy currently governed by a party with Islamic roots; the Gulf
monarchies, their petrol economies and regional ambitions; potential
problems of nuclear proliferation in the region; and the challenges
confronting the United States, Europe, and the United Nations in the
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radicalism, democracy, human rights, and Islam as a political force in the
context of the modern Middle East.
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Mehmet Akif Kumral
Exploring Emotions in
Turkey-Iran Relations
Affective Politics of Partnership and Rivalry
Mehmet Akif Kumral
Independent Scholar
Balıkesir, Turkey
Middle East Today

ISBN 978-3-030-39028-0 ISBN 978-3-030-39029-7 (eBook)
https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-39029-7
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To Zehra and Ömer,
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Preface
This monograph is a long-term study of a dyadic case in international rela-

tions. By looking at the psycho-historical transformation of Turkey-Iran
diplomatic interactions, this study illustrates the analytical purchase of
examining inter-state neighborhoods as complex emotional, affective and
normative processes unfolding within a relational spectrum of partnership
and/or rivalry. For this purpose, the author draws inter-disciplinary
insights from international emotions researches, social psychology, rela-
tional pragmatics and other cognate fields. The book combines key find-
ings and weaves conceptual threads from seemingly disparate theoretical
literatures on international politics of neighborhood, emotional exchange
and trans-governmental interactions. A holistic research framework is
developed to analyze how relational modalities of partnership and rivalry
are co-extensively configured by emotional entanglements, affective
arrangements and normative tendencies. Put it more precisely, this research
delineates the nexus of “emotionality,” “affectivity” and “normativity” in
the political-diplomatic making of neighborhood relationships. Emotional,
affective and normative reconceptualizations of international interactions
provide a synthesizing angle to understand how relational structures and
practices are established among historical neighbors.
From this perspective, four empirical chapters explore the relational his-
tory of emotions and reconstruct affective norms of political neighbor-
hood in Turkish-Iranian interactions. Through historical-historiographical
enquiring and psycho-social researching of emotional themes in Turkey-
Iran official diplomatic relations, political rules of (dis)engagement are
exposed periodically. The historical treatment begins by the end of the
vii
viii PREFACE
First World War in Nov. 1918 and finishes in Nov. 2018 since the United
States has withdrawn from the nuclear deal and intensified sanctions
against Iran. The century-long relational history is analyzed according to
the diplomatic stages of emotional entanglements and affective arrange-
ments in the Turkey-Iran neighborhood. In each period, the global con-
text and regional contours of trans-governmental interactions between
Turkey and Iran are revealed consecutively. Dyadic dynamics of collabora-
tive partnership and confrontational rivalry between these two contiguous
states are examined critically, since they have left continuing implications
for local (in)stability in the neighboring countries, most recently in Iraq
and Syria.
There are overarching questions that were posed to guide empirical
research: how has the neighborhood relationship been configured by
affective arrangements of Turkish and Iranian governments? Distinct from
legal laws and customary codes, were there emotional norms established
to govern economic exchanges and cultural interactions between Ankara
and Tehran? What was the psycho-social strength of dyadic neighborhood
norms? Were they stronger than international rules of regional influence
and global alignment? These relational questions reiterate scholarly signifi-
cance of the research endeavor, which calls for excavation of affective
neighborhood norms over the century-long history of the Ankara-Tehran
trans-governmental relationship.
The psycho-social research path undertaken by this book opens new
vistas to reconceptualize Turkey-Iran neighborhood relations. Compared
with other contemporaneous phenomena, the domestic politics of nation-
alism and modernization have considerably shaped trans-governmental
structures and practices between the two historical neighbors. Secular and
sectarian rules of domestic governance enormously influenced diplomatic
modes of feeling between Ankara and Tehran. Essentially, two main affec-
tive action tendencies have emerged on both sides of the Turkey-Iran bor-
der. The right-wing, hard-line conservative psychology is moved by, and
fuels, fear and anger to control social contours of the relationship. The
left-wing, soft-line liberal sentimentalism is driven by, and espouses, hope
and honor to rule over psycho-social interactions. Indeed, the relational
history has transformed in between these two emotional action tendencies.
The psycho-social history unfolding in the empirical chapters renders a
complex processual account of affective-normative exchange, emotional-
moral learning and local management of diplomatic ties between the two
nation-states. I identify four relational narratives that have captured
PREFACE ix
Turkish and Iranian hearts in some interesting ways: (1) returning back to
the primordial times of Turkish-Iranian relations, the foundational Özsoy
legend recast an eternal kinship between twin brothers. (2) Reminding the
imperial Ottoman-Safavid battle in 1514, the Çaldıran myth reproduced
an enduring sectarian conflict between the two states. (3) Referring to the
imperial peace accord of 1639, the Kasr-ı Şirin narrative has reinvented the
“law of primeval neighborhood” (kadim komşuluk hukuku) naturally gov-
erning the Turkey-Iran international relationship. (4) The cold shoulders
saga reconstructed the 1949–1978 period of regressive alignment in
Turkish-Iranian affairs.
Based on cross-episodic observations, I argue that the Çaldıran mythol-
ogy has left a longer psycho-social influence over the historical course of
Turkish-Iranian interactions. The 1514 tragedy has become the central
story of hard-line sectarianism, notwithstanding soft-line bilateral reac-
tions. By taking this tragic battle at its relational baseline, the sectarian
psyche informs isolationist policies in the Turkey-Iran neighborhood.
Regardless of its contentious storyline, the Çaldıran cliché captures neigh-
boring hearts so resonantly. It could serve various propaganda purposes.
The propagandist aims might even exploit popular emotions on both sides
of the border.
The Çaldıran memory came to surface in subtle forms of dyadic disgust
and confrontational exchange, as witnessed during the territorial disputes
of 1926–1930. Quite similarly, the dark days of 1996–1999, experienced
as diplomatic duels, have indicated the Çaldıran psychology deep seated in
the Ankara-Tehran social relationship. The reformative period of
1979–1988 has seen how sectarianism resurfaced in emotional norms of
fear. The affective rule of anxiety has led to reciprocal restraint and reluc-
tant engagement between Turkey and Iran. The Çaldıran psyche turned
more harmful, when it deeply entangled with affective anger. The politics
of antagonism, coupled with regional status ambitions, has driven posi-
tional rivalry in Turkish-Iranian neighborhood. This has been the rela-
tional case at revisionist times such as 1989–1995 and 2008–2018.
More recently, the Turkish side liked to deploy a new narrative. The
Kasr-ı Şirin story assumes that there exist old fences of neighborhood.
Turks and Persians have well-established customary rules and natural
norms to govern their interactions. The long-standing and relatively
peaceful character of relations with Iran has been perceived by Turkey as
the strength of neighborhood rules. These affective-normative practices
help to empower the relational structure of the Turkey-Iran neighborhood.
x PREFACE
I contend that the Kasr-ı Şirin story was invented as an emotional-

affective antidote against the nagging Çaldıran mythos. The euphoric
peace in 1639 has been taken as the zero point of the Turkey-Iran rela-
tionship. The presumed peacefulness of the trans-communal neighbor-
hood was tied to the strategic nature of territorial bordering between the
two countries. It seems that the trans-national trauma was not addressed
emotively. Instead of investing in collective happiness or joy, the Kasr-ı
Şirin truism has entangled with surface sentiments such as bilateral status
concerns and shared conservative compassion. I argue that this half-
hearted spirit has yet to overcome the Çaldıran challenge. Far from reha-
bilitating affective fences of neighborhood, let alone building the
long-needed confidential climate for cross-cultural integration, the con-
structed consciousness of Kasr-ı Şirin has only helped to justify interactive
collaboration between Ankara and Tehran, when indeed the two capitals
were stuck in sectarian confrontation, configured consecutively over
neighboring Iraq, and then Syria. The lack of sectarian trust still incites
regional rivalry in Turkey-Iran exchange relations.
Good neighbors help, but not hurt, each other. The Ankara-Tehran
political neighborhood demonstrated a mixed historical record. Both
good and bad practices have shaped complex rules of the Turkey-Iran
international game. Notwithstanding their domestic differences, the
Turkish and Iranian nation-states have developed a political culture of
peaceful coexistence. Yet, their struggle for regional influence in the
Middle East has not abated. As two non-Arab political entities, Turkey
and Iran sought to carve rival geopolitical spheres in neighboring Arab
countries, namely, Iraq and Syria. Over the last decades, the enduring con-
ditions of war in Iraq and Syria have increased the risks of military conflict
between Turkey and Iran. So far, it seems that Ankara and Tehran have
mutually managed to control their rivalry in the Middle East. Some of the
relational damages were controlled, and some of them repaired. The his-
torical condition of fences reflects signs of good and bad neighborhood.
Cases of altruistic political assistance have been rare. On the other hand,
both sides learned to refrain from overtly harming each other. The recip-
rocal reluctance not to directly hurt each other does not preclude the
reemergence of a local confrontation any time sooner or later. Affective
empathy and altruistic normative commitment have not been established
on both sides of the Turkish-Iranian border. Neighboring governments
have not yet achieved deontological (emotional-moral) norms of sincere
PREFACE xi
cultural friendship. Dyadic partnership is still based on self-interests, lack-

ing a truly collective intention to sustain mutual economic development.
Viewed from Hegelian and Onufian metaphorical standpoints, the two
neighboring “political houses” mutually governed their social-
psychological relationship as they have faced significant challenges from
within and without. Mirroring and shadowing on each other’s fences for
decades, the two neighboring political houses display both similarity-
closeness and difference-distance. Complex psycho-social forces concur-
rently push and pull Turkish-Iranian political houses toward and against
each other. Ultimately, ambivalent emotional rules governed their neigh-
borhood relationship. “Good” and “bad” affective management left
mixed relational signs of erosion, reparation and restoration in the histori-
cal fences of the Turkey-Iran neighborhood.
Over the course of their affective relational history, Ankara and Tehran
have collectively displayed “deep acts” of heart management in a
Hochschildian sense. At least, common affective norms have proved rela-
tional resilience, as they helped address recurrent political-military threats,
such as the transboundary Kurdish uprisings that emerged during the for-
mative eras (1918–1945, 1946–1979) and the cross-border terrorist infil-
trations of the PKK militants ongoing in the reformative and revisionist
periods, respectively (1980–2000, 2001–2018). The joint local manage-
ment of scaling crises has shown the strength of relational “feeling rules”
in the Turkish-Iranian neighborhood.
Ankara and Tehran had covered a long way to build collective confi-
dence. However, the dyadic emotional management has remained far
from achieving a full-fledged sympathetic relationship based on rules of
amity, sincerity and trust. Even though both sides could not generate
shared feelings of confidence, the evolution of their relationship displayed
rules of mutually managed distrust. The trans-governmental emotional
commitments embedded into the culture of neighborhood have prevented
the Turkey-Iran relationship from slipping into the political dangers of
direct deadly conflict and overt military warfare.
Governing of distrust, in and of itself, could not guarantee conditions
for sustainable dyadic partnership. Common fear and collective anger have
only led to ad hoc collaboration. Joint needs and dual desire have driven
the gradual enhancing of economic exchange relations. Reciprocal bids for
local influence have fed sectarian suspicion and resulted in growing of
regional rivalry. Overall, the affective politics of neighborhood has trans-
formed in between episodes of dyadic collaboration and regional
xii PREFACE
c onfrontation. As historical neighbors, Turks and Iranians have developed

non-legal codes to govern their complex political interactions. Emotional-
moral structures and practices have transformed the Turkey-Iran partner-
ship and rivalry in the tough neighborhood of the Middle East.
As a matter of fact, the historical puzzle of “tough neighbors” is topi-
cally salient, since it also provides relevant insights for resolving the persis-
tent policy paradoxes in Turkish and Iranian global relations. How hearts
are managed among Turks and Iranians creates social-psychological impli-
cations for the making of global politics in the foreseeable future. Until
very recently, Turkish leaders have liked to deploy a historical narrative
that elevated the primordial nature of the political neighborhood between
Ankara and Tehran. More often than not, the Kasr-ı Şirin myth is invoked
to underline the normative longevity of the Turkish-Iranian relationship.
To a great extent, the Ottoman-Qajar border agreement of Kasr-ı Şirin
(1639) is reified politically; in a way it is portrayed as the prehistoric foun-
dation of relational norms, to make a clear case for temporal comparison
with other international events in world history, most formidably the for-
mation of the United States in 1774. Quite tellingly, this political narrative
deliberately speaks to the American hearts, among other international
actors. Indeed, this story is still important and relevant for Washington, as
well as other prominent capitals equally interested in Turkish-Iranian affairs.
As of Nov. 2018, the American political controversy still lingered on
how to further repudiate Tehran through punitive relational measures. It
became clear that the affective politics of American conservatism has ruled
over the international nuclear deal formerly reached with Iran. Once
again, the relative endurance of relational peace in the Turkish-Iranian
borderlands was represented by Ankara as a psycho-social asset for soft
power reproduction that might in turn help to balance against the hard
enforcement of comprehensive material sanctions by the United States.
Time would exactly tell whether affective norms would truly “trump”
over other real forces operating around the Turkish-Iranian neighborhood
in the Middle East. Perhaps, the invisible soft strength of deontological
neighborly norms might be a hard historic reality that could be endured
invincibly. That is to say, dyadic transformation of emotional-moral “habi-
tus” in the Turkish-Iranian neighborhood would most likely create real
relational implications for regional and global politics.
As a whole, the book follows these empirical and argumentative lines.
In four case study chapters, I make a theoretically informed contribution
to the empirical literature. While analyzing the emotional themes e mergent
PREFACE xiii
in empirical texts, argumentative interventions are made minimal, so as to

preserve analytical neutrality. Through minimalist interferences, I let tex-
tual evidences of emotionalities speak for themselves. The tracing of psy-
cho-social history has focused on the relational configuration of emotional
entanglements and affective arrangements in key episodes. Following
practical approaches of emotions historians, chronicles are taken as pri-
mary resources to analyze the phenomenal entanglement of psycho-social
sentiments and the affective arrangement of relational psyche in Turkish-
Iranian affairs. Before closing each episodic chapter, I summarize the
emotional-affective dynamics of partnership and rivalry in the Turkey-Iran
neighborhood relationship.
Emotional-affective patterns of collaboration and confrontation are
reviewed around relational events. In terms of ontology, relational exami-
nation is somewhat different from the psychological analysis of decision-
making. Relational psychology moves beyond embodied evidences of
actual feeling in human practice. By assigning ontological priority to the
history of relationships, psycho-social analysis foregrounds residual, non-
embodied emotional constellations, and latent, derivative affective impli-
cations. From this research perspective, international relationships are
co-constituted by emotional discourses and affective contexts. The changes
in psycho-social practices and structures mutually shape relational con-
tours of historical phenomena. Here, the international inquiry seeks to
uncover how emotional entanglements and affective arrangements co-
extensively configure history of relational events.
The Conclusion chapter of this monograph aims to relocate the overall
relational history on the ground of psycho-social theory. Here, I return to
conceptual arguments of the Introduction chapter to extend empirically
grounded theoretical propositions on the affective-normative politics of
international neighborhood. Here, my analytical purpose is both critical
and comparative. First, I aim to better delineate cross-episodic threads in
the psycho-social history of the Turkey-Iran neighborhood. Second, I
seek to provide further conceptual insights and to make a more generaliz-
able theoretical contribution to the literature on international emotional-
affective phenomena. Building on critical and comparative observations, I
make important theoretical interventions and offer a tentative proposal for
further research in comparative case studies. As the final point, I recom-
mend building of more holistic meta-theoretical frameworks to reconcep-
tualize the categorical nexus of narrativity, emotionality, affectivity,
normativity and relationality.
xiv PREFACE
This project has long been in the making. The initial research ideas have
been crystallized during the “Turkey and Its Neighbors” course that I
taught in spring 2017. I have developed important conceptual notions
and empirical threads during my last semester in Tokat, Gaziosmanpaşa
University. The students’ significant intellectual interest in the subject
matter motivated me to think more critically and comparatively on the
historical habituation of neighborhood cultures around Turkey’s immedi-
ate periphery. Moreover, the ISA panels have informed this study in vari-
ous ways. Without further ado, I would like to kindly thank the ISA panel
chairs and discussants, namely, Özgür Özdamar, Vera van Hüllen, Lenore
G. Martin, Fred Chernoff and Steven F. Jackson. Their constructive com-
ments have encouraged me to move forward in the exploration of emo-
tions in Turkey’s Middle Eastern neighborhood relations. My thanks also
go to the anonymous Palgrave reviewers who have made succinct sugges-
tions to help improve the manuscript. Last but not the least, the Palgrave
editorial team has done an excellent job in steering the way for this publi-
cation. The usual academic disclaimers apply for my book as well.
Translations from the Turkish texts are made by me. Errors of scholar-
ship are mine.
Above all, my family provided memorable support in adapting myself
to full-time research and writing mode, after long years in professional
positions. At times of urgent need, my mother helped me keep on track
and work patiently until the very end. Without her, the academic pursuits
would not bring such valuable fruits for me. Equally, I have always felt the
wholehearted backing of my father and brother. I dedicate this book to
our family, particularly to the coming generations.
Balıkesir, Turkey Mehmet Akif Kumral

Contents
1 Introduction: Historical Psychology of Turkey-Iran

Neighborhood Relations 1
2 The Formative Emotional Climate of Turkish-Iranian

Relations (1918–1945) 69
3 The Affective Atmosphere of Ankara-Tehran Alignment in

Cold War (1946–1979)119
4 Reformative Psychology in Turkey-Iran Interactions

(1980–2000)183
5 Psycho-Social Revisions in Turkey-Iran Neighborhood

(2001–2018)239
6 Conclusion: Overall Findings and Research

Recommendations307
Index333
xv
Abbreviations
AIOC (Anglo-Iranian Oil Company)

AKP/AK PARTi Justice and Development Party (Adalet ve Kalkınma Partisi)
ANAP Motherland Party (Anavatan Partisi)
AP Justice Party (Adalet Partisi)
ASEAN Association of South East Asian Nations
CAATSA Countering America’s Adversaries Through Sanctions Act
CENTO Central Treaty Organization
CHP Republican People’s Party (Cumhuriyet Halk Partisi)
CIG Central Iraqi Government
̇
CIP ̇
Islamic Republican Party (Cumhuriyetçi Islam Partisi)
CISADA Comprehensive Iran Sanctions, Accountability, and
Divestment Act
CUP Committee of Union and Progress
D-8 Developing Eight Countries’ Organization for Economic
Cooperation
DCA Defense Cooperation Agreement
DP Democrat Party (Demokrat Parti)
DYP True Path Party (Doğru Yol Partisi)
EC European Community
ECO Economic Cooperation Organization
EEC European Economic Community
EU European Union
FETÖ Fethullahist Terror Organization (Fethullahçı Terör Örgütü)
HLCC High-Level Cooperation Council
ILSA Iran and Libya Sanctions Act
IRGC Iranian Revolutionary Guards Corps
ISIS Islamic State in Iraq and Syria (or DEASH)
xvii
xviii Abbreviations
JCPOA Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action

JEC Joint Economic Commission
KDP Kurdistan Democratic Party
KRG Kurdistan Regional Government
LN League of Nations
MBK Committee of National Unity (Millî Birlik Komitesi)
MHCP Muslim People’s Republican Party (Müslüman Halkın
Cumhuriyetçi Partisi)
MHP Nationalist Movement Party (Milliyetçi Hareket Partisi)
̇
MIT ̇
Turkish National Intelligence Organization (Millî Istihbarat
Teşkilatı)
MKO Mujahedin-e Khalq Organization
MSP National Salvation Party (Millî Selâmet Partisi)
NATO North Atlantic Treaty Organization
NSC National Security Council
OIC Organization of Islamic Conference/Cooperation
OPEC Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries
PJAK Party for a Free Life in Kurdistan (Partiya Jiyana Azad a
Kurdistane)
PKK Kurdistan Workers’ Party (Partia Karkaren Kurdistan)
PUK Patriotic Union of Kurdistan
PYD Democratic Union Party (Partiya Yekîtiya Demokrat)
RCD Regional Cooperation for Development
RP Welfare Party (Refah Partisi)
SAVAK Iranian National Intelligence and Security Organization
(Sazman-e Ettela’at va Amniyat-e Keshvar)
SEATO South East Asia Treaty Organization
SNSC Supreme National Security Council
TMFA Turkish Ministry of Foreign Affairs
TOBB Turkish Union of Chambers and Exchange Commodities
(Türkiye Odalar ve Borsalar Birliği)
UN United Nations
UNGA United Nations General Assembly
UNSC United Nations Security Council
US United States of America
USSR Union of Soviet Socialist Republics
YPG People’s Protection Units (Yekîneyên Parastina Gel)
List of Tables
Table 1.1 Emotional-affective configurations of modal interactions in

inter-state neighborhoods 5
Table 2.1 Formative psycho-social constellations in Turkey-Iran
neighborhood114
Table 3.1 Cold War climate in Turkey-Iran transactions 177
Table 4.1 Reformative sentiments in Turkey-Iran interactions 232
Table 5.1 Recent psycho-social revisions in the Turkey-Iran
neighborhood294
Table 6.1 Psycho-social history of Turkey-Iran neighborhood relations 311
Table 6.2 Tentative outline for future research in comparative
case studies 323
xix
CHAPTER 1
Introduction: Historical Psychology

of Turkey-Iran Neighborhood Relations
Canonical writings tell us that modern history of Turkey-Iran relations has

been shaped by security considerations. Ankara and Tehran could hardly
escape from strategic challenges embattling the regional countries (Brown
1984: 197–277; Walt 1987; Ehteshami and Hinnebusch 1997; Hansen
2000). In line with their common “middle-power” characteristics, Turkey
and Iran pursued resembling regional policies, dubbed as “omni-balancing”
(David 1991), to eliminate simultaneous internal and external threats to
their national security and/or state survival (Olson 1998). As a corollary to
their similar security calculations, Turkish and Iranian regimes have dis-
played traditional patterns of geopolitical behavior in regional affairs.
Strategic assessments are still common among scholars and historians ana-
lyzing Turkey-Iran relations (Olson 2000; Ehteshami and Elik 2011). In
these portrayals, balancing of power/threat and aligning of interests over
the Kurdish issue are taken for granted as shaping regional dynamics in
Turkey-Iran relations (Olson 2004; Elik 2011; see also Hentov 2012 and
Charountaki 2018).
Available analyses on Turkey-Iran relations, such as those referenced
above, mostly provide geopolitical readings of events within the broader
history of the Middle East. By and large, conventional security approaches
predominate the theoretical framework of historical studies on the subject
matter. To a certain extent, strategic studies have covered important
aspects of Turkey-Iran relations. However, these past perspectives have
failed to fully grasp complex, deeper dynamics of social-psychological
© The Author(s) 2020 1

M. A. Kumral, Exploring Emotions in Turkey-Iran Relations,
Middle East Today, https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-39029-7_1
2 M. A. KUMRAL
exchange in Ankara-Tehran interactions. I argue that the primary reason

for this failure has emanated from the analytical preference centering on
“patterns of state behavior” rather than “modalities of inter-state relation-
ship.” By starting from unit-level behavioral assumptions, one would have
ontological difficulty in building concise conceptual categories and theo-
retical propositions on modes of relationship that emerge out of inter-
actions among those atomistic units. Relational and processual viewpoints
(Emirbayer 1997; Emirbayer and Goldberg 2005; Jackson and Nexon
1999, 2013; Dépelteau 2018; Fuhse 2018) provide analytical alternatives
to resolve those critical problems. By looking from relational and proces-
sual angles, and focusing on the level of relations instead of unit-state
behaviors, we would be better equipped to deal with impending theoreti-
cal and empirical challenges of interpreting the history unfolding between
Turkey and Iran. In many ways, this relational history presents persistent
“pathological” (or perhaps pathos-logical) puzzles that still confound the
international scholarship. Consider the connotations of confusing remarks
extracted from a scholarly work on this topic, in which Turkey-Iran rela-
tions were viewed through the prism of middle-power statehood:
As the discussion in previous chapters indicates, the relationship between

Iran and Turkey can be characterized as one of mistrust and this largely
depends on the past experience and social memory of both the Turkish and
Iranian peoples. Though both societies have been faced with the collective
amnesia of religious and secularist apostasy, the relationship of conflict and
cooperation make up their sub-conscious mindset … This research pre-
sumes that Iranian-Turkish trade volume has the potential to reach US$ 100
billion should both neighbors manage to overcome the aforementioned
pathologies … Should they be successful in building a constructive relation-
ship with regard to their respective economies, security management and
energy infrastructures, these two regional heavyweights will be able to bring
peace and stability on a regional level. (Elik 2011: 174–176)
This sample excerpt is representative of perplexing conceptualizations

quite common in other works as well. It is an astonishing observation that
how ambivalent affective-normative categorizations could be used arbi-
trarily, without thorough conceptual engagement with theories of social
psychology and emotions. Examples include but not limited to some
canonical titles portraying Turkey and Iran as “essential friends and natural
enemies” (Çetinsaya 2003), “friendly competitors and fierce rivals”
(Ayman 2014), “not quite enemies but less than friends” (Akbarzadeh
1 INTRODUCTION: HISTORICAL PSYCHOLOGY OF TURKEY-IRAN… 3
and Barry 2017) or “the best of frenemies” (Tahiroğlu and Ben Taleblu
2015). As some scholars saw, conceptual oversimplifications (Stein and
Bleek 2012) and cursory identifications (Hentov 2012) do not capture
“uneasy” and “complicated” nature of interactions between two historical
neighbors (Özcan and Özdamar 2010). Put in other words, the historical
complexity of Turkey-Iran neighborhood relations calls for more system-
atic psycho-social research.
These preliminary inter-textual evidences constitute a prelude for revis-
iting Turkey-Iran diplomatic relations and grounding this history-
historiography onto the theoretical canvas of international psychology and
emotions. This new research space has not been an uncharted territory.
Past portrayals still provide significant points of departure for psycho-
social reinterpretation of historical interactions between Ankara and
Tehran. There are emotional-affective themes found between the lines of
prior research. These treatments establish thematic puzzles to be resolved
through further theoretical and empirical investigations.
As a matter of fact, this book departs from the past puzzling conceptual
ground and moves toward more concise analytical horizons. I adopt a
pragmatic (discursive-contextual) variant of relational approaches to reex-
amine available historical/historiographical data and reinterpret emotional-
affective implications of co-extensive partnership and rivalry between
Turkish and Iranian governments. For these aims, I provide a compact
conceptual framework and comprehensive empirical analyses on past states
of psycho-social exchange and relational modalities of rule-making in
Turkey-Iran interactions. The affective-normative contours of Turkey-Iran
neighborhood relationship help to better understand historical trajectories
of international transformation and regional (dis)order in the Middle East.
The inquiry has been designed and conducted by following “prag-
matic” procedures of data collection and analyses proposed by “grounded
theory” approaches (Timonen et al. 2018; Charmaz 2017; Tucker 2016).
The methodological framework has been adopted from historical-textual
approaches advanced in critical studies of emotion and affect in interna-
tional relations, social sciences and humanities (Koschut 2017a, 2018a, b,
c, 2019; Rosenwein 2002, 2010; Chatterjee et al. 2017; Wetherell 2015;
Rice 2008). Along these lines, the book aims to make theoretically
informed empirical contribution to the growing emotions literature in
international studies (Markwica 2018; Hutchison 2016; Hall 2015; Ross
2014; Fierke 2013; Eznack 2012; Zarakol 2011).
4 M. A. KUMRAL
As a broadly defined topic of key interest, the psycho-social implica-

tions of inter-state neighborhood practices and regional/local rule-making
structures have not been thoroughly inquired (Chyzh 2017). Quantitative
analyses of big data fall short of assisting case-specific conduct of inquiry
on neighborly relations (Zhukov and Stewart 2013). Lacking sufficient
data, qualitative researchers still seek more comprehensive applications of
neighborhood concept in comparative cases covering (geo)political sociol-
ogy and social psychology of borderlands (McConnell 2011; Doevenspeck
2011). In due course, affective-normative rules of dyadic-regional interac-
tions among neighboring states have been investigated in a limited fashion
(Williams and Nguyen 2018; Allen, Bell and Clay 2016; Johnson et al.
2011). That is to say, there is a further intellectual need and scholarly
space to broaden conceptual research and deepen empirical analyses on
historical transformation of “neighborhood effect” in various locales of
world politics (Gartzke 2003; Gleditsch 2002; Rasler and Thompson 2000).
Taken as the topic of a long-term, single case study, the Turkey-Iran
dyad reiterates the analytical purchase of examining inter-state neighbor-
hoods as complex social-psychological processes unfolding within a rela-
tional spectrum of rivalry and/or partnership. In any case, the relational
history of inter-state neighborhood indicates “managed hearts”
(Hochschild 1983/2012) in stages of world politics and international
diplomacy. Emotional practices, “feeling rules” and affective-normative
structures (Hochschild 1979) mutually transform psycho-social history of
trans-governmental neighborhood relations. By tapping further insights
from historical sociology and psychology of international and regional
relations (Hymans 2010; Mercer 2010; Ross 2006; Reus-Smit 2002;
Barnett 1998, 2002) and psycho-social researching of emotions (Smith-
Lovin and Winkielman 2010; Barrett 2009; Berezin 2009; Russell 2009;
Turner and Stets 2006; Lively and Heise 2004; McCarthy 1994), this
book reinterprets affective politics of rule-making (Hall and Ross 2015;
Onuf 1989, 1994, 2014, 2017; Banerjee 1991, 2015; Acharya 2011;
Duffy and Frederking 2009) in the case of Turkey-Iran neighborhood
interactions.
Researching how emotion discourses and affective contexts have trans-
formed the Turkey-Iran historical neighborhood requires relational analy-
ses. To meet that demand, this book distills distinctive insights from
constructivist studies on international rule-making, cross-fertilizes them
with psycho-social inquiring of emotional exchange in official-public
diplomacy and fuses them with affective-phenomenal analyses of historical
Table 1.1 Emotional-affective configurations of modal interactions in inter-state

neighborhoods
Discursive-emotional Sentimental-normative Contextual- Relational
entanglements interaction tendencies affective modalities
arrangements
Soft-line Positive emoting Productive mutuality Respect- Progressive

discourse Love-hope Shared solidarity engagement partnership
Honor-trust Collaborative
Compassion-care atmosphere
Hard-line Negative emoting Punitive reciprocity Reprisal- Regressive
rhetoric Anger-hate Status competition containment rivalry
Fear-anxiety Confrontational
Envy-jealousy climate
partnership and rivalry in dyadic-regional neighborhood interactions. This

study develops a composite (micro/textual-macro/contextual) frame-
work to analyze relational transformation of emotional-discursive practices
and affective-contextual structures in international politics of neighbor-
hood. The modal research template for relational analysis is summarized in
Table 1.1.
The relational modules in this template are based on prototypical clus-
tering of core emotions in human interactions (Shaver et al. 1987). The
hypothetical scheme applies non-discrete modeling of “core affects”
(Barrett 2006a, b, 2009) and “affective circumplex” (Russell 1980, 1991,
2003, 2009). By blurring the emotion-affect nexus, these modal typolo-
gies circumvent disciplinary divisions established in social sciences and cul-
tural studies. This analytical proposal builds on conceptual advances in
cognate fields such as relational affective pragmatics (Slaby 2019; Kopytko
2004), cultural sociology (Emirbayer and Goldberg 2005; Baerveldt and
Voestermans 2005; Moon 2013), discursive psychology (Edwards 1999;
McAvoy 2015; Wetherell 2015), political psychology (Skonieczny 2018;
Brodersen 2018; Clément et al. 2017; Koschut 2017b; Wolf 2017, 2018;
McDermott et al. 2017; De Rivera et al. 2007; Bar-Tal et al. 2007) and
critical emotion-affect studies (Kahl 2019; Slaby and von Scheve 2019).
In terms of methodology, this outline helps to examine discursive entan-
glements of “emotionality” (Denzin 1983; Ahmed 2004; Leep 2010) and
contextual arrangements of “affectivity” as “open-textured” and “situ-
ated” webs of meaning, which historically configure pathways of
6 M. A. KUMRAL
ormativity and performativity within relational structures and practices

n
(Slaby and Röttger-Rössler 2018: 1–11).
International neighborhood relationships provide novel cases to trace
textual evidences of “emotional entanglements” and contextual cues of
“affective arrangements.” International neighborhoods are relational
structures and practices mutually constituted by “emotional communi-
ties” ruling in power. Emotional diplomatic cultures shape affective-
normative making of politics among neighboring governments.
Emotional-affective structures and practices of rule-making in Turkey-
Iran relations have implications for the Middle Eastern neighborhood and
the larger world (Brown 2014; Ayoob 2011; Hen-Tov and Haykel 2010;
Kinzer 2010). As a matter of fact, social-psychological transformation of
dyadic partnership and regional rivalry in Turkey-Iran neighborhood rela-
tions has been conceptually untheorized, empirically unaddressed and
hence analytically underspecified. On these topics of academic-scientific
interest, we can only find tiny bits and pieces of intellectual information
disseminated in several sites of scholarly interaction (Özcan 2004; Middle
East Technical University 2005; Karacasulu and Karakır 2011; Jenkins
2012; Ayman 2012; Demiryol 2013; Renda 2014; Keyman and Sazak
2015; Sinkaya 2016). Regarding these subject matters, the inter-textual
corpus is largely scattered around here and there, lacking to afford cumu-
lative knowledge about comprehensive reality. The inter-textual thematic
analysis (Braun and Clarke 2006) of these historical-historiographical
accounts enables to offer a more holistic picture. My research goal is to
tackle with this analytical task.
In this chapter, I provide a conceptual framework to emphasize theo-
retical significance of the research topic. Theoretical framework of this
inquiry helps to identify conceptual connections between relatively dis-
tinct literatures in international relations research, like constructivist social
psychology, dyadic-regional neighborhoods, rules and rule complexes and
their configurative constellations with core emotions (master feelings) in
communicative practices and dialectical interactions. The theoretical part
provides conceptual tools for empirical investigation conducted in the fol-
lowing chapters.
Empirical chapters are divided into four so as to capture significant
evidence that shed light on dyadic transformation of Turkey-Iran relations
in distinct historical periods. In these chapters, I review the historical-
historiographical corpus to distill relevant analytical insights. The second
chapter excavates the formative (1918–1945) era of rule-making in the
Turkish-Iranian neighborhood. The third chapter looks at Turkey-Iran

relationship during the Cold War period (1946–1979). The fourth c hapter
inquires the volatile times of 1980–1989 and 1990–2000 in Ankara-
Tehran exchange relations. The fifth chapter covers two turbulent episodes,
2001–2010 and 2011–2018, and analyzes recent developments in Ankara-
Tehran interactions. Empirical chapters seek to understand relevant inter-
textual data to reveal psycho-social continuity and emotional-affective
change in Turkey-Iran neighborhood game. Four empirical chapters are
followed finally by the Conclusion chapter. In this final chapter, overall
findings and research recommendations are presented.
Conceptual Framework: Constructivist Insights

from Cognate Fields
Symbolic interactionist school of social psychology observes emotional

phenomena as “a meaningful object to be interpreted, controlled, used, or
managed by social actors” operating within cultural-normative structures.
These approaches treat emotions as intervening and intermediary variables
between micro (agential-discursive feelings) and macro (structural-
affective context) level inquiry. In these holistic analyses, emotional explo-
rations help “to link macro factors to micro factors, micro to macro factors,
or both.” Collective micro-level symbolic interactions constitute a macro-
level cultural habitus and a normative network of rules within which the
context of the relationship forms structure of rule. Shared emotional expe-
riences create a social-psychological context through which human rela-
tions are built and sustained. Emotional norms help to establish, manage
and maintain psycho-social relations. In other words, “affective principles
or processes govern interaction” (Thoits 1989: 329–331).
All processes of social interaction are constituted by emotional-moral
rules and affective-normative rule of exchange. Main categories of social
exchange (such as love, status, information, services, money and goods)
are determined by human agents interacting in various affective-normative
contexts. Basic kinds of human relationships can be categorized by look-
ing at structures and practices of social exchange (Haslam 1994: 61–68).
Communal sharing relationships are based on equivalence and collectivity

membership in which individual distinctiveness is ignored (e.g., relation-
ships among close family members). Equality matching refers to egalitarian
relationships marked by in-kind reciprocity and balanced exchange
8 M. A. KUMRAL
(e.g., relationships between non-intimate room-mates). Authority ranking

relationships are asymmetrical, based on precedence, hierarchy, status,
command and deference (e.g., relationships within military organizations).
Market pricing relationships, finally, are based on proportionality, with inter-
actions organized with reference to a common scale of ratio values, such as
money; rational calculations of personal cost and benefit determine social
transactions (e.g., commercial relationships). (Haslam 1994: 61)
Close communal partnerships of equality and reciprocity entail egalitar-

ian exchange and collective sharing of affective-normative space, whereas
distant relational rivals compete for status and/or influence in their com-
mon psycho-social interactions. By and large, modes of relational engage-
ment are constituted along the social-psychological middle ground between
partnership and rivalry. Mutual socio-economic interest and socio-cultural
interdependence determine practical (emotional-moral) codes and prag-
matic (affective-normative) contours of interactive exchange. On the
extreme ends of relational continuum, social friendships may be driven by
“strong affection or feelings of joy”; cultural animosities “may result from
fear or anger; economic partnerships may thrive because they produce posi-
tive feelings such as confidence or pleasure. The context of exchange may
have a discernible emotional tone, invoke particular emotional rules”
(Lawler and Thye 1999: 217–218). Neighborhood relationships in gen-
eral, the Turkey-Iran case in particular, validate complex transformation of
psycho-social roles (partnership-rivalry) and emotional-affective rules.
Affective-normative dynamics of exchange condition and mediate social-
psychological making of interactions. Collective changes in social-
psychological states and inter-changing conditions of emotionality conjointly
shape contextual structuration of the relationship. Affective-normative
practices have an impact on and are influenced by identity (self-other) con-
ceptions, role (partner-rival) relationships, dyadic signaling performances
and collective social-psychological structures. Interactive management of
these multi-layered processes molds into socially “shared realities,” narra-
tives and myths, which in turn expose the episodic quality and historical
“longevity” of the relationship (Thoits 1989: 329–333). The long-term
history of Turkey-Iran neighborhood provides a compelling empirical
ground to analyze relational making of emotional rules and interna-
tional roles.
Social Psychology of Political Neighborhood: Relational Making

of International Roles and Rules
Viewed from psycho-social perspective of exchange, international prac-
tices and structures of emotion management present key topic of interest
for researchers. For analytical purposes, constructivist conceptualization of
“rules and rule” helps to interrogate communicative (discursive), contex-
tual (historical) and narrative (historiographical) structuration of emo-
tions in international relations. Complex international relationships can be
inquired by looking at political manifestation and public representation of
emotional-moral practices (constitutive rules) and affective-normative
structures (constitutive rule) of interactive exchange. At this point, theo-
retical foundations laid by Nicholas Onuf (1989, 1994, 2014, 2017)
deserve analytical elaboration. Post-Onufian conceptual findings (Banerjee
2015; Acharya 2011; Duffy and Frederking 2009; Banerjee 1991) help to
further investigate social-psychological making of “rules and rule” in
international relations.
As Onuf (2017: 10) recaps, making of rules and rule is “the natural
condition of humanity … Since rules are everywhere, rule is everywhere,
including … the relations of nations.”
There is a general rule, indeed an iron law, for social existence: Where there
are rules, there is a condition of rule … Our conduct, singly and together, is
always, if not consciously or actively, a matter of choosing whether to follow
rules, or not. We typically choose to follow rules, and effectuate rule, for all
sorts of compelling reasons. When we do not, we anticipate adverse conse-
quences. (Onuf 2017: 10)
Rules system and systems of rule “make it possible for agents to act:
they give us choices, they tell us who we are and who others are, they tell
us which social goals are appropriate, and ultimately they tell us what we
should do.” Intersubjective “social rules fundamentally influence the
coordination of action” in the political realm. We can conceive political
practices in “world politics as a set of pragmatic rules” and social struc-
tures as international establishment of systemic rule. Continuity and
change in “both social structure and social interactions can be analyzed
according to the rules invoked and/or challenged by the meaningful
actions of agents.” Discursive-affective commitments and normative-
contextual intentions mutually shape practices of rules and structures of
rule (Duffy and Frederking 2009: 326–330).
10 M. A. KUMRAL
As reiterated by Onuf (2014), we can treat international “norms” and

“rules” as attributive references to the same phenomena constituting the
social world of relationships. With different conceptual names, both of
them refer to the same socially constructed and culturally conditioned
things and relational processes in our world. The human relations are made
possible and managed through social practices of rules and cultural struc-
turation of rule. International society, conceived as “the ensemble of rela-
tions among nation-states,” has been constituted not only by legal rules
and international law, but also by non-legal rules and customary conven-
tion. Constructivists seek to “show how [ruling] systems work.” They
“start with … rules to show how rule works.” In constructivist sense,
“kinds of rules” and “kinds of rule” intimate one another (Onuf 2014: 1–3).
In crux, Onuf identifies three interrelated types of rules and rule: rules
of “direction, instruction and commitment”; and rule of “hierarchy, hege-
mony and heteronomy (heterarchy).” By looking at his overall analyses,
Onufian typological kinds could well be reduced to two broad categoriza-
tions. This typical modification better serves for purposes of parsimony.
Rules of direction and instruction essentially indicate relationships of
“privilege (status-power)” emerging in hierarchical and/or hegemonic
rule. The social need and psychological value of these rules are constituted
through rulings of basic emotions such as fear, anger, shame and honor
(Onuf 1989: 120–126, 2014: 3–10).
On the other hand, rules of commitment mainly implicate uneven,
asymmetrical and poly-lateral “role” relationships structured by heterono-
mous rule. For these reasons, “heteronomy is least likely to be stable” and
hence poses challenges for role managers. Social-psychological manage-
ment of roles constitutes a general associative framework for all interac-
tants, be them collaborative partners or confrontational rivals. Role
relationships differ since “every agent is a unique social being.” However
interactive exchange of social commitments is based on a set of collectively
shared affective-normative rulings. This type of emotional-moral rulings
primarily depends on shared desires for reciprocal exchange and collective
sentiments of responsibility for mutual rights and duties. Social-
psychological implications of heteronomy are exposed through affective
(de)composition of feelings like trust, pride, pleasure and love (Onuf
1989: 120–126, 2014: 3–10).
Affective-normative and cultural making of roles, rules and rule displays
complex contextual patterns. International combinations of political rules
and rule, as conceived by Onuf, are co-extensive, complementary and
commensurable (Onuf 1989: 120–126, 206–227, 2014: 5).
Of all rules, commitment-rules are the most difficult to practice because

they require a correlative [role and rule] consciousness…commitment-rules
may be practiced to mutual advantage [of exchange] only if partners [of
interaction] impute an appropriate [role] and rule-consciousness to each
other. (Onuf 1989: 118)
Rules of change are always commitment-rules…Every time agents choose to
follow a rule, they change it—they strengthen the rule—by making it more
likely that they and others will follow the rule in the future. Every time
agents choose not to follow a rule, they change the rule by weakening it,
and in so doing they may well contribute to the constitution of some new
rule. (Onuf 1994: 14, 18)
Following these constructivist assertions, this book proposes a social-

psychological analysis of international interactions by re-focusing on polit-
ical “exchange of commitments,” which shape interactive configuration of
“role relationships” and contextual constellation of “rules and rule.” It
also seeks to apply these conventional notions to the customary category
of “neighborhood.” Following (post)Onufian arguments, this study rein-
states neighborhood as social-psychological community co-constituted by
emotional-moral practices of rules and affective-normative structures of
rule. Social-psychological relations among international neighbors are
defined by rules of interactive exchange and rule of communal commitment.
Emotional Exchange and Interactive Rulings Among

Neighboring States
Neighborhood relations entail emotional-affective arrangements, which
are structured by substantive needs and ideational values for social engage-
ment and psychological interaction. For both peoples and states neighbor-
hood is a complex social-psychological relationship co-determined by
local roles, contextual rules and rule. Here, due to limitations of space, I
refrain from reinstating philosophical foundations and narrative underpin-
nings of scholarly discussion on (de)merits of treating “states” and “peo-
ple” as if they are alike (Jackson 2004a, b; Neumann 2004). But the
discussion intimates important implications for understanding the concep-
tualization of neighborhood in peoples’ affairs and states’ conduct.
Within pragmatist philosophical spirit (Jackson 2009; Friedrichs and
Kratochwil 2009), I assume that the notion of neighborhood still exists in
lived experiences of peoples and practices of states. Pragmatist variant of
social psychology focuses on lived experiences, relational habitus of
12 M. A. KUMRAL
cultures, affective-normative structures and practices ruling among

interactants (Emirbayer and Goldberg 2005; Baerveldt and Voestermans
2005). Even under the sweeping currents of mass connectivity and global-
ization of digital space, neighborhood still constitutes a pragmatic cate-
gory for international research. Humans and states continue to arrange
emotional-moral practices and develop psycho-social structures in their
neighborhood. Peoples and states produce rules as they interact with their
neighbors. They also establish the rule of neighborhood. These public-
diplomatic practices reveal configuration of communicative rulings that
constitute reproduction and transformation of neighborhood in various
discursive-contextual cases.
International public realm is shaped by affective practices and struc-
tures. Making of emotions and international rules implies one another.
Without an inter-relational feeling, no inter-national role to be played, no
political commitment to be made, no rules and rule to inter-act. The power
of emotional rule seizes all actors and structures alike. States are no excep-
tion to the rule of emotions and feeling rules. They are also governed by
the rules of emotions and rule of feeling. The social psychology of inter-
national relations is constituted through “emotional diplomacy” and
“official emotions” (Hall 2015; Hall 2011). Social psychology approach
provides a critical angle to capture “states’ emotions” (Sasley 2011) and
helps to better understand making of “affective politics” (Hall and Ross
2015; Ross 2014; Hall 2012) in inter-state and transnational interactions.
At this point, Onuf’s categorization of human relationships helps to
foreground the notion of neighborhood norms in constructivist research
domain. By returning to classical philosophy of Aristotle, Onuf (2014)
provides conceptual analogies to understand international rule-making
among neighboring peoples and states forming the international society.
States, like people, live in social neighborhoods. The social nature of state
neighborhood can be better grasped by looking at analogical pictures con-
centrating on the households and their relations within the political society.
By their very nature, women and men are political. Therefore, house-
holds and their inter-relations are political. Within the households, durable
forms of familial roles endure in political rulings of human relations.
Fathers or mothers rule over the family (paternal/maternal hierarchy),
husbands and wives rule over each other (consensual hegemony). The rul-
ing among brothers implies heteronomy, which is like an interdependent
“commonwealth” (Onuf 2014: 9–12).
Individuals, households, neighbors and society are continuously

co-constituted through political structuration of rules and rule. These
performative-normative transformations are made possible through the
medium of political discourse and public language. “By making, following
and talking about rules people constitute the multiple structures of soci-
ety; through such rules societies constitute people as agents” (Onuf 1994:
1–6). Emotional-discursive makings of rules produce affective-contextual
structures of political rule in the world. That is to say, emotional-discursive
strategies and rhetorical maneuvers transform the affective communicative
context of political exchange in international neighborhoods.
A multitude of coterminous states (like peoples holding adjacent houses)
interact with their local neighbors. These political interactions establish
structures of social exchange and create affective-normative webs of psycho-
logical engagement in the neighborhood domain of international relations.
Normative notions of political parity and social reciprocity have always been
defining features of international neighborhood relations. Most interactions
of neighbors are shaped by mutually defined commitment rules. Normative
rule of neighborly exchange is structured on the basis of common needs and
values of nations and states.
The nation-state is a group entity composed of government and public.
State leaders and citizens feel in similar ways. In this regard, states can be
conceived as “psychological–emotional groups” identified with certain
psycho-social sense of belonging called “prototypical group emotions.”
The conceptualization of “states-as-groups with emotions” provides a
psycho-social theoretical leverage to inquire “prototypical” making of
“states’ emotions” and their “emotional identifications” in international
public space. State leaders would most likely be high primers in the mak-
ing of popular emotions (Sasley 2011: 465–468).
The view here is that persons with state authority and their allies in society
share a certain political culture. The logic of such cultures makes states not
only unitary decision-makers but integrated psychocultural subjects with
state-level identities, emotions, … and other components of subjecthood
[that] are not anchored in individuals. Rather, even in persons these
psychological functions arise from the inner logics of shared cultures. Some
special cultural meanings have psychological force … of the … inner logic of
the … foreign policy cultures, showing how emotions, identities, and
motives can arise from a culture’s descriptions of the state-self and others in
historical situations. A group of state leaders who share a culture will respond
to events deemed by that culture to implicate their state with common per-
ceptions, causal attributions, emotions, and motives. (Banerjee 1991: 19, 20)
14 M. A. KUMRAL
The political identity and history of subject-cultures emerge and are

sustained through dynamic processes of social structuration and psycho-
logical habituation. These contextual processes could be modeled in four
steps. First, subjects use social categories to construct “interpretations of
the situation” by looking at “the latest round of actions.” Second, these
situational constructs mold into social roles and cultural identities, com-
prised of emotions and norms. Third, emotions and rules transform
affective-normative structures of commitments for relational interchange.
Fourth, social-psychological exchange of commitments generates rounds
of interaction. Contextual combinations of social, psychological and cul-
tural interactions shape the historical reproduction of affective-normative
practices and structures (Banerjee 1991: 20–21).
Social “rules call for conduct consistent with their content” (Onuf
2017: 9). They constitute states as agents and make their international
interaction possible. Social rules of commitment entail four features: com-
munal foundation, collective instantiation, contextual configuration, con-
ditional vindication. “Two or more agents can form a community through
shared rules of interaction…communities of two agents, with each pair
sharing rules and instances through their interaction, can connect to form
social networks … A community perceives events collectively through the
instantiation of its rules … [which] must retain credibility” (Banerjee
2015: 281–283).
Credible political commitments are key for communal interactions
between the states. At the global level, credibility of commitments depends
on three interrelated components constituting the communal habitus or the
“life-world” of social interaction: rules (norms), roles (identities) and cul-
ture of exchange. Regional cultures of collective security and global rules of
influence create contradictory consequences for international actors and
normative structures (Duffy and Frederking 2009: 332–343). The global-
regional contours of international interactions create implications for local
rule-making among neighboring states (Acharya 2011). The non-legal,
informal rules of neighborhood indicate varying social-psychological “sig-
nals” of practical “commitment” and customary “compliance” to the inter-
national “network norms” observed in trans-governmental spaces of world
politics (Whitehead 2006: 695–702). In this sense, international politics of
neighborhood implies affective- normative localization of commu-
nal cultures.
International Politics of Neighborhood: Affective-Normative

Localization of Communal Cultures
As social agents, states also act in their local neighborhood. In this
communal-communicative setting of contiguity, neighbors co-extensively
interact for two contradictory ends: (1) to produce collective security-
stability and (2) to generate influence over local-regional spheres. The
former rule relies on communal responsibility, while the latter depends on
reciprocal respect. More often than not, competition for spheres of influ-
ence creates tension among neighbors. Rival geopolitical positions contra-
dict the rule of collective security and stability necessary for local-regional
partnership. That is to say, complex social-psychological structuration of
neighborhood relations creates ambivalent exchange of political commit-
ments swinging between collaborative partnership and confrontational
rivalry. Only credible commitments help to build mutual trust and com-
munal honor among political neighbors. Dual processes of moderniza-
tion—democratization and development—produce the transnational
“neighborhood effect” in various locales of world politics (Gartzke 2003;
Gleditsch 2002).
Neighboring states “act upon shared rules to change or preserve [social]
structures” within which they jointly operate. These dialogical and dialec-
tical structures of neighborhood are tied to political practices of rule-
making and role enactment by the state agents. The international inter-play
between rules and roles instantiates and assembles political-public “narra-
tives that become the identities of states, motivating their actions and
practices.” Rules and roles are enacted pragmatically through repeated
uses of discursive instruments like historical metaphors and analogies.
Historical structure of international interaction is reproduced or trans-
formed through reconstruction of political-public narratives, state identi-
ties and social-psychological rules (Banerjee 2015: 274–279).
The identity narrative then motivates action. In this way, shared rules turn
the human community that shares them into collective agents. This model
of structure and its reproduction are rooted in the requirement that rules
be vindicated for their continued instantiation … Rules instantiate them-
selves upon particular events and objects. Rules connect in networks to
each other, the context of one rule being formed by instances of other rules
… Over a historical sequence, rules operate and combine to form agents
and their practices, as well as structures that rise and fall … This process of
structuration gives rise to enduring social networks of agents connected by
16 M. A. KUMRAL
interdependent practices. This process also yields … succession of struc-

tures. Structures rise, unevenly, as new rules and practices join into the
reproduction process and some old ones drop out. Structures break down
when some rules are discredited, leading to a disruption of established
practices, causing the discredit of yet more rules. (Banerjee 2015: 274–275)
The structure of international neighborhoods can be determined by

typological measurements of proximity and connectivity. Geographical
proximity can be quantified by topographical contiguity (inter-border dis-
tance and/or inter-capital distance). Non-geographical proximity can be
qualified by looking at social-psychological channels of connectivity such
as ethnolinguistic bonds, trade ties, alignment linkages and trans-
governmental associations. Large-scale statistical data analyses have shown
that trans-governmental (and alliance) connectivity outperforms geo-
graphic proximity as international measure of neighborhood (Zhukov and
Stewart 2013). Geographical distinction of an international neighborhood
is easy to map, but lends little political evidence for sound analyses. Hence,
it is more “useful” to distinguish political “neighborhoods” by focusing
on the transnational connections emerging out of the “non-geographic
space.” The social-psychological conception of international space brings
better insights to unpack affective-normative puzzles of (good and bad)
neighborhoods in world politics (Williams and Nguyen 2018).
With these recent assertions in mind, this research foregrounds trans-
governmental politics of rule-making to explore social psychology of inter-
national relationships among state neighbors. This analytical focus distills
scholarly insights from political theory and sociology of rule-making and
“emotional management” of public relationships and policy making pro-
cesses by modern national governments (Pykett et al. 2017). Here, critical
conceptions of “governmentality” (Lemke 2016; Death 2013; May 2011;
Dolan 2010; Taylor 2009; Hindess 2005; Bonnafous-Boucher 2005;
Dupont and Pearce 2001) are revisited to chart non-geographic qualities of
political neighborhood relationships among nation-states. Extending on
these views, this study re-introduces “ trans-governmentality” as a concep-
tual tool to inquire relational codes of conduct between state neighbors.
One can conceive trans-governmentality as a holistic measure of neighbor-
hood quality at dyadic, regional and global levels. Trans-governmental
modes of rule-making shape social- psychological dynamics of political
neighborhood. Put in other words, international politics of neighborhood
is ruled by trans-governmentality.
The notion of trans-governmentality helps to better interrogate neigh-

borhood relationships in world politics. It is the relevant governments that
rule over the non-geographic spaces of the state and the political neighbor-
hoods. Inter-governmental space also includes channels of transnational
exchange (alignment and trade) and cross-cultural connections. The rela-
tionship between international neighbors is ruled by “govern-mentality.”
The relational governance is essentially a political management process
addressing transnational affairs at global, regional and dyadic levels of
neighborhood. Political structures and practices of rule-making shape pat-
terns of relational management among state neighbors. Governments
speak in the name of and act for the neighboring states. State neighbor-
hoods are constituted by trans-governmental structures of exchange and
practices of interaction. Inter-state neighborhood, as a political relation-
ship, entails forms of governance. Neighboring governments are desig-
nated institutions to manage those relationships. The trans-governmental
process requires relational rules. Without a political norm, there would
hardly be an international relationship. Besides, state relationships almost
inevitably implicate political management of hearts. Affective and norma-
tive dynamics concurrently shape trans-governmentality and social psychol-
ogy of inter-state neighborhood.
Political structures and practices of governmentality have a distinct
“emotional life.” Politics of relational rule-making operates through
“emotionalities,” which assume how to govern “particular ways of feeling
about the world.” Out of this social-psychological management process
“emotionalities of rule” emerge. Under political circumstances of “uncer-
tainty” and “insecurity,” the affective-normative domain of governance
displays complex rules of “emotionalization.” Hard-line/conservative and
soft-line/liberal “modes of governance” are constituted by affective regis-
ters. Valence-based positive and/or negative “popular affects” are mobi-
lized to shape a country’s normative context from within and without.
Rules of feeling are employed to create a certain climate conducive for
political administration. Hard-line/conservative right-wing mode of rul-
ing heavily relies on “fear,” “anger” and “distrust” to control political
“anxiety” and “resentment.” Soft-line/liberal left-wing mode of ruling
often invokes “honor,” “hope” and “trust” to build political “confidence”
and “respect.” Both kinds of governmental conducts are politically condi-
tioned by countervailing sentiments of sympathy (desire, love, amity) and
antipathy (disgust, hatred, animosity) developed toward significant others
located inside and/or outside. The emotional logics of governmental
18 M. A. KUMRAL
practices leave lingering implications for states’ conduct in domestic and

international realms (Campbell 2010).
These social-psychological conceptualizations are key to better delineate
inter-governmental politics of neighborhood in world affairs. International
neighborhood relationships are ruled by trans-governmentality. The modes
of relationship between state neighbors are constituted through emotion-
alities of political rule-making. Each political neighborhood has a distinct
affective-normative life story visible in historical texts and observable in
historiographical contexts. The emotional-moral lifeworld of a state neigh-
borhood transforms temporally. Trans-governmental structures and prac-
tices of rule-making shape social- psychological habitus of international
neighborhoods. The psycho-social life of a political neighborhood can be
conceived as the multi-modal constellation of relationality in global,
regional and dyadic locales. The temporal trans-governmentality of a
neighborhood is co-extensively configured by affectivity and normativity.
The affective-normative continuum of good and bad neighborhood epi-
sodes ranges between collaborative partnership and confrontational rivalry.
The transnational affective-normative analytics of governance is also appli-
cable to the world neighborhood as a whole. This brings us to the “puz-
zling conception of global neighborhood relationships” (Baxi 1996) ruled
by international customary codes and trans-cultural norms.
Customary Codes and Trans-governmental Norms

of Neighborhood in World Politics
The “law of neighborhood” has been historically customized in domestic
private and public spheres (Savaş 2014). As international relations have
developed, some of these customary laws have been transmitted into the
inter-state realm as well. Modern international rule-making structures
have set some “standards for the conduct” of political relations among all
neighboring nations. The United Nations (UN) has pioneered the making
of international law on political neighborhood. The UN Charter (1945),
in the preamble, has urged countries to “live together in peace with one
another as good neighbors.” The Article 74 has taken “the general prin-
ciple of good-neighborliness” as the normative basis governing interna-
tional interactions and the world politics.
Building on this historical breakthrough, the Joint Communiqué of
Bandung Conference (1955) explicated social-psychological foundations
of “good neighborliness” with these terms: “Free from mistrust and fear,
and with confidence and good-will towards each other, nations should
practice tolerance and live together in peace with one another as good
neighbors and develop friendly cooperation.” This terminology has been
later incorporated into various UN documents, which have been endorsed
to codify “the principles of good-neighborliness” and catalog the verities
of bad “un-neighborly conduct.” The international law of neighborhood
has accumulated through historical progress in codification and cataloging
(Sucharitkul 1996: 1–2, 15, 19).
The UN General Assembly (GA) has ratified key resolutions to manage
political relationships around the globe of neighborhood. Resolution
1236 was adopted in 1957. It reiterated the need for fostering “Peaceful
and Neighborly Relations Among States.” It reminded that states are
deemed equal “irrespective of their divergences or the relative stages and
nature of their political, economic and social development.” States are
notified to build “peaceful and tolerant relations … based on mutual
respect and benefit, non-aggression, respect for each other’s sovereignty,
equality and territorial integrity and nonintervention in one another’s
internal affairs” (UNGA 1957).
Resolution 1514 was adopted by unanimity in 1960. It called for total
de-colonization all over the world (Sucharitkul 1996: 3). Resolution 2129
(1965) has endorsed “Actions on the Regional Level with a View to
Improving Good Neighborly Relations Among European States Having
Different Social and Political Systems.” It delegated responsibility to “all
countries, great and small, to establish an atmosphere of co-operation and
security throughout the world.” In this regard, it has requested from “the
Governments of the European States to intensify their efforts to improve
reciprocal relations, with a view to creating an atmosphere of confidence
which will be conducive to an effective consideration of the problems
which are still hampering the relaxation of tension in Europe and through-
out the world” (UNGA 1965).
Resolution 2625 was adopted as a declaration in 1970. It stipulated five
fundamental principles of international law governing “Friendly Relations
and Cooperation Among States.” Every state is expected to perform the
following political duties: (1) to refrain from the threat or use of force, (2)
to settle international disputes by peaceful means, (3) not to intervene/
interfere in others’ domestic affairs, (4) “to co-operate with one another,”
(5) “to respect the principle of equal rights and self-determination of peo-
ples” and (6) “to respect the principle of sovereign equality of states.”
Resolution 3314 was adopted in 1974 to define acts of aggression, which
20 M. A. KUMRAL
involved the “sending by or on behalf of a State of armed bands, groups,

irregulars or mercenaries” (Sucharitkul 1996: 3–6, 11–12; UNGA 1970).
By the end of the Cold War, the UN “Sub-Committee on Good-
Neighborliness” has developed “the principle of anti-hegemony or anti-
hegemonism” which aims to prevent “states of any acts seeking to establish
zones of influence or domination.” In spite of the progress in codification,
neighborhood relationships are governed by state practices that constitute
customary norms and habitual rules. Over the codification process, the
conceptual scope of neighborhood has expanded. Geographical proximity
was no longer seen as the only range of neighborhood. Due to interna-
tional interdependence, the political norms of good-neighborliness have
extended far beyond the local borderlands and the frontier regions. As a
result of the post–Cold War international integration, the world has grad-
ually turned into a unified global neighborhood (Sucharitkul 1996: 7–10).
The “Sofia Declaration on Good-Neighborly Relations, Stability,
Security and Cooperation in the Balkans” was issued as an official docu-
ment by the UNGA in 1996. In parallel to the international peacemaking
efforts in the territories of former Yugoslavia, the regional countries of
south-eastern Europe, involving Turkey, have agreed to “enhance good
neighborly relations including confidence and security building measures”
among themselves and the larger international community. As reiterated
by the Bulgarian Prime Minister Jean Videnov, the Sofia Declaration has
demonstrated “the political will to open up new prospects to strengthen
regional stability, security and cooperation along the lines of good-
neighborliness” in the Balkans. He further asserted that “the new situa-
tion in Europe [has] freed of the spirit of confrontation and division,”
which in turn created “even broader opportunities for the development of
multilateral regional cooperation” and gave “rise to the hope that … [they
were] not far from the day when each country in the region [would] see
its neighbor first and foremost as a partner.” With this understanding, the
Balkan countries set forth their political aspirations with such objectives as
“development of economic cooperation through cross-border coopera-
tion, upgrading transport, telecommunications and energy infrastructures,
trade and investment promotion; development of humanitarian, social and
cultural contacts; cooperation in the field of justice, the combating of
organized crime, illicit drug and arms trafficking and the elimination of
terrorism” (UNGA 1996). The political commitment of the south-east
European countries to establish good neighborly relationships among the
Balkan states has been an important local step that has contributed to the
process of region-based law making in the post–Cold War era. Turkey

actively participated in international law making efforts that promoted
norms of neighborhood in the Balkans.
The UNGA adopted the resolution on “Development of Good-
Neighborly Relations among Balkan States” in 1997, which helped to
strengthen the normative basis of international peace building in the
region. The resolution has emphasized “the urgency of the consolidation
of the Balkans as a region of peace, security, stability and good neighborli-
ness.” For this purpose, “the need for strict compliance with the principles
of sovereign equality, territorial integrity or political independence, the
inviolability of international borders and non-intervention” into domestic
affairs was reaffirmed. At this point, “the relevant international organiza-
tions and competent bodies and organizations of the United Nations sys-
tem” were urged “to continue to support and assist the ongoing process
of development of good neighborly relations among the Balkan States”
(UNGA 1997). In this context, the European Union (EU) has also sought
to build normative order of “good neighborliness” and added a new polit-
ical conditionality for membership accession. The EU neighborhood pol-
icy called for peaceful conflict resolution and friendly cooperation in
international relations (Arıkan 2008).
As neighborhood relationships have proved their instrumental efficiency
in crisis management, the UN Security Council (SC) has become part of
the international law making process. The historical stage was set by the
crisis in Afghanistan. On 22 Dec. 2002, the “Kabul Declaration on Good-
Neighborly Relations” has been signed by Afghanistan and its neighbors.
With this declaration, the neighboring countries (including Iran) have dis-
played common “desire” for regional “peace and stability” and confirmed
collective “commitment to constructive and supportive bilateral relation-
ships based on the principles of territorial integrity, mutual respect, friendly
relations, co-operation and non-interference in each other’s internal
affairs.” UNSC Resolution 1453 has called on “all states to respect the
Declaration and to support the implementation of its provisions” (UNSC
2002a, b).
The customary practical codification of neighborhood norms has also
lingered over the crisis management in Iraq. At times of political need, the
neighborhood diplomacy has been utilized as an instrumental mechanism
for governing of the local emergency. However, it was no longer legal
dynamics of law making but international politics that has stimulated the
letter and spirit of complicated affective-normative relationships among
22 M. A. KUMRAL
state and non-state neighbors in the Middle East. The cross-border (non)
governmental “networks” have shaped complex social-psychological
“signs of compliance” to the “non-legal, informal rules” regulating the
international politics of neighborhood (Whitehead 2006: 695–702) in
the region.
Initially, it was the Turkish government that envisioned to implement a
regional diplomacy of neighborhood to prevent international military con-
flict looming over the horizon of Iraq. What began as a local process of
conflict prevention in Jan. 2003 would later turn into a diplomatic tool for
damage control. For various domestic and dyadic reasons, the regional
neighbors of Iraq have committed themselves to the collective rule-making
process achieved through consecutive inter-governmental meetings. The
trans-governmental politics among Iraq’s neighbors has been deeply
affected by “common fear” from cross-border instability arisen after the
US-led invasion. The regional diplomacy of neighborhood was aimed to
address sources of insecurity emanating from Iraq. The spillover impact of
trans-boundary terrorism has been a collective concern for Iraq’s neigh-
bors. Most of the neighboring governments have sought to manage their
likely security losses in a regional environment of heightening uncertainty.
In this regard, Ankara saw these meetings as a diplomatic venue to ease the
geopolitical tension between Washington and Tehran and Damascus (Balci
and Yesiltas 2006). Due to deteriorating security conditions in post-war
Iraq, the United States has joined the neighborhood meetings as well. The
international rule-making with Iraq’s “expanded neighbors” has helped
the US administration to revise its policies and re-build much needed affec-
tive-normative “confidence” in the Middle East, and even offered
Washington a social-psychological “opportunity to transcend America’s
obsessive preoccupation with Iran and Syria” (Pollock 2007).
To a great extent, the political expansion of neighbors’ diplomatic plat-
form has been influential in providing international input and trans-
governmental support for the UNSC decisions on Iraq. For example,
Resolution 1511 (16 Oct. 2003) acknowledged that “the situation in
Iraq” has continued “to constitute a threat to international peace and
security.” It affirmed that “the terrorist bombings of the United Nations
headquarters in Baghdad on 19 August 2003 … and of the Embassy of
Turkey on 14 October 2003” were “attacks on the people of Iraq, the
United Nations, and the international community.” International assis-
tance provided most proximately by “Iraq’s neighbours” would be “essen-
tial … for restoration of conditions of stability and security” and for
“maintaining law, order, and … combating terrorism.” It was also

requested from the regional-international neighbors that they should dis-
play political solidarity to observe immediate trans-governmental obliga-
tions and strengthen economic-financial cooperation “to help meet the
needs of the Iraqi people by providing resources necessary for the rehabili-
tation and reconstruction of Iraq” (UNSC 2003).
Since then the international community, broadly defined, has garnered
support to establish global networks of neighborhood assisting the Iraqi
government. The core group of Iraq’s immediate neighbors has assumed a
central role within trans-governmental networks of international assistance.
Since the United States had pledged military withdrawal from Iraq, the
regional support of contiguous neighbors has become much more impor-
tant in 2008. In this regard, UNSC Resolution 1859 (22 Dec. 2008) has
emphasized the importance of engagement with neighboring countries.
Accordingly, the resolution has endorsed the recent “Expanded Neighbors’
̇
Conferences held in Sharm El-Sheikh, I stanbul and Kuwait.” As a matter
of fact, Iraq was “still in need of regional and international support” so that
the Iraqi people continued to make progress “in their pursuit of peace,
stability, security, democracy and prosperity.” The Iraqi government’s dip-
lomatic letter to the UNSC, signed by Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki on
7 Dec. 2008, has signaled a strong political “commitment to living in peace
with its neighbors in a manner that contributes to the security and stability
of the region.” With the help of international and regional supporters,
“terrorist activities in and from Iraq” would be eliminated drastically. The
conditions of security and stability would in turn “reassure donors and
creditors” and allow Iraq to end international economic isolation caused by
long years of sanctions (UNSC 2008).
The case of Iraq has shown the significance of practical considerations
in customary codification of neighborly interactions in international law
making. At this point, we cannot talk of universalized laws of n eighborhood.
There are no peremptory norms, only selective normative implementa-
tions varying across historical cases. International organizations have
established themselves as institutional sites of rule-making among neigh-
bors (Chyzh 2017). Global and regional rules of neighborhood are regis-
tered somewhere between making of regressive fragmentation and
progressive integration. Local security fences and regional defensive “for-
tresses” go hand in hand with enhanced economic engagement to build
common (free and open) world market operating through collective cul-
tures of (post)capitalism. This means that the normative dynamics of
24 M. A. KUMRAL
international neighborhood would most likely be encompassed by a com-

bination of practical rules of “pluralism” and moral norms of “solidarism”
(Bellamy 2004: 51).
Overall, neighborhood norms would be shaped by trans-governmental
configurations of global, regional and dyadic network relationships. Social-
psychological structures and practices of international rule-making would
guide affective-normative interactions among political neighbors. In some
cases, state neighbors would be divided by strong physical fences, while in
some others political boundaries would be blurred by transnational net-
works (Duany 2011: 227–233). Good physical fences, particularly the
border fixity, may not guarantee safety among state neighbors. States’
social weaknesses and political failures might create enduring international
conditions for regional conflict and local war around world political neigh-
borhoods (Atzili 2012; Atzili 2006/07).
Due to migration movements, management of trans-cultural relations
would entail humanistic, liberationist and emancipatory theological visions
and strong psycho-social commitment to change the feeling rules toward
neighboring peoples. The solidarity of human neighborhood would over-
come the risks of inter-/intra-faith confrontations. International manage-
ment of hearts would ultimately define political fate of neighbors between
goodness and badness (Heyer 2010). In some sense, world neighbor-
hoods might also be conceived within “transnational geographies of the
heart” (Walsh 2018). The inter-communal and trans-cultural spaces, that
are “emotional geographies” (Davidson et al. 2016; Davidson and Milligan
2004; Anderson and Smith 2001), and “affective atmospheres” (Michels
2015) of human neighborhood would be engulfed by an ambivalent nor-
mativity swinging between “a series of opposites—presence and absence,
materiality and ideality, definite and indefinite” (Anderson 2009). That is
to say, “affective communities” (Hutchison 2016) of the global neighbor-
hood would implicate essential psycho-social contradictions “torn between
inclusive emotions and passions such as the ones related to empathy, soli-
darity, respect for others and peace, on the one hand; and, on the other
hand, exclusionary emotions and passions such as those connected to dis-
crimination and conflict” (Coicaud 2016: 404). The puzzling affective-
normative climate of global affairs would leave a conditioning impact on
regional and dyadic neighborhood relationships. The social psychology of
a political neighborhood is an empirical question, which could be revealed
by looking at particular relational cases through observation of historical-
historiographical data.
Empirical Basis of Research: Historical Surveys

and Historiographical Accounts
Historical surveys and historiographical accounts on Turkish-Iranian rela-

tions help to capture complex dyadic dynamics of social communication
and psychological interaction constituted by emotional norms of neigh-
borhood. The case in point is the thick descriptive application of concep-
tual categories to historicize mixed social characteristics and ambivalent
psychological trajectory of the Turkish-Iranian relations. Examples
include liminal conceptualizations such as “essential friends and natural
enemies” (Çetinsaya 2003), “friendly competitors and fierce rivals”
(Ayman 2014) and “not quite enemies but less than friends” (Akbarzadeh
and Barry 2017) or “the best of frenemies” (Tahiroğlu and Ben Taleblu
2015). Basically, these exemplars mark “uneasy” and “complicated”
nature of interactions between two historical neighbors (Özcan and
Özdamar 2010). The complex character of Turkish-Iranian exchanges
“resists” to conceptual oversimplification (Stein and Bleek 2012) and
cursory categorical identification (Hentov 2012). Therefore, this book
aims to reassess historical puzzles of rule-making in Turkey-Iran neigh-
borhood relations by reintroducing social-psychological evidence from
historiographical data. With this aim, it also makes a “novel” contribu-
tion to the comparative studies on history-historiography of Turkey-Iran
political interactions, which still call for “new” research frameworks
(Hazır 2015). The psycho- social/cultural components, emotional
dimensions and affective dynamics of Turkey’s foreign relations have not
been thoroughly investigated. At this early stage, there are some initial
interventions into the subject matter (see for example Zarakol 2011;
Sasley 2014; Saltzman 2015; Özlük 2016).
Social-psychological reexamination of historical-historiographical mate-
rial exposes how rules of (dis)engagement have been made possible
through core emotional-discursive codifications and combinations of
affective arrangements in Turkish-Iranian contextual constellations. These
studies also provide empirical evidence to reiterate local rule of affective-
normative structures reigning in Ankara-Tehran relations. By looking at
these scholarly treatments, we can dissect textual-contextual data particu-
larly associated with conceptualization of emotional-moral interactions
between Turkey and Iran.
26 M. A. KUMRAL
Methodological Design: Inquiring of Emotionalities

in Textual-Contextual Data
The constructivist historical sociology (Reus-Smit 2002; Barnett 2002;
Barnett 1998) provides a solid meta-theoretical (ontological-epistemological)
ground to inquire ideational (emotional-moral) implications in the realm of
world politics. The historical methodology is a viable tool to trace transfor-
mation of emotional norms in international neighborhood relations. Good
and bad neighborhood behaviors emerge in sequences of international inter-
actions and mold a normative history of relational “conventions” co-config-
ured by egoistic-strategic (material) desires and altruistic-“deontological”
(moral) concerns. The historical-historiographical case studies on normative
structures and practices help to measure continuity and change in the rela-
tional quality of inter-state neighborhood (Goertz and Diehl 1992). The
regional complexes of neighborhood are configured by political cultures of
amity and enmity in local interactions (Kelly 2007). Dyadic neighborhood
relations display complex historical patterns (Rasler and Thompson 2000),
swinging between psycho-social rivalry and/or partnership.
The dyadic relationships between political neighbors are transformed
through trans-governmental structures and practices. Inter-cultural con-
figurations of affective dispositions and constellations of emotional com-
mitments are found as constitutive psycho-social variables to qualitatively
measure historical transformation of neighborhood norms in political
texts and international contexts. States construct their neighbors and
fences as either good or bad. Neighborhood relationship reflects a political-
public imagination constructed mutually by social-psychological network
structures and communally shared affective-normative practices. Even
though the geographical-cartographical representations of their
neighborhood relationship remain same, neighboring states view them-
selves and their interactions quite distinctively. States conceive their neigh-
bors historically, which could be portrayed as a threat or a savior, a friend
or an enemy. Even the American-Canadian political relationship has been
constructed through “liminal” makings of good and/or bad fences in the
neighborhood (Baker 2010; Ronner and O’Connor 2001). Turning to
Turkey’s case, Ankara’s historical interactions with Moscow (Coş and
Bilgin 2010) and Damascus (Hinnebusch and Tür 2013) display ambigu-
ous affective-normative imaginations of psycho-social relationships among
neighboring states.
The international history tells us that state neighbors imagine their rela-
tionships in ambivalent patterns. Shifting “emotional-moral motivations”
shape complex affective-normative dynamics of political-behavioral
exchange among historical neighbors (Brodersen 2018). In many ways,
qualitative (historical-historiographical) foreign policy analyses, directed
toward particular neighborhood relationships, help to foreground psycho-
social theories of relationality in mutual making of inter-agency and inter-
action. The “grounded theory” approach builds on international history
to develop conceptually informed and empirically sound arguments within
the school of international relations. The “actor-specific” methodological
approaches grounded on particular psycho-cultural relationships offer
promising avenues to bridge the paradigmatic divides between theoretical-
historical domains, global and local levels, micro-agential and macro-
structural factors (Hudson 2005).
The mining of historical-historiographical data has been an established
approach in psycho-social studies. In this regard, the psy-disciplines have
utilized various strands of inter-textual research methodologies to observe
discursive-contextual implications of emotions (Edwards 1999; Lawler and
Thye 1999; Weigand 2004; Coupland et al. 2008; Rice 2008; Riad et al.
2012; McAvoy 2015; Wetherell 2015; Godbold 2015). Following these
approaches, this book adopts inter-textual thematic analysis (Braun and
Clarke 2006) as a methodological framework. The book focuses on the
analyses of main “emotional themes” (Cupchik 2016) emerging in histori-
cal surveys and historiographical accounts and investigates phenomenal-
contextual implications of “core affects” (Barrett 2009) that shape episodic
transformation of Turkey-Iran neighborly relations.
Over the recent years, the emotion research in social sciences and world
politics has accumulated a massive body of methodological literature
(Clément and Sangar 2018; Ariffin et al. 2016; Flam and Kleres 2015;
Parkinson and Manstead 2015). As matter of fact, a comprehensive treat-
ment of this vast literature is beyond the scope of this book. For this rea-
son, I act along the principle of parsimony and provide a synoptic review
highlighting main methodological viewpoints pursued during the produc-
tion of this book. Several significant book-length studies have enabled me
to conceive and complete this challenging task. By and large, these works
are aligned with the traditional school of history within the interdisciplin-
ary realm of social psychology. To begin with, this research tradition aims
to reinterpret the international diplomatic “history,” as well as neighbor-
hood politics, “through a social-psychological lens” (Volkan and Itzkowitz
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“Hello! Bud, the old reliable! Mr. Storrs! Yes; I had been hoping for
this!”
She gave a hand to each and looked up at Bruce, who towered
above her, and nodded as though approving of him.
“This is delightful! A new man! Marvelous!”
As she explained that she had been away since June and was only
just home, Bruce became aware that Henderson had passed on and
was standing by a tea table indulging in his usual style of raillery with
a young woman whose voice even before he looked at her identified
her as Constance Mills.
“You know Mrs. Mills? Of course! If you’d only arrived this morning
you’d know Connie. Not to know Connie is indeed to be unknown.”
Constance extended her hand from the divan on which she was
seated behind the tea table—thrust it out lazily with a minimum of
effort.
“Oh—the difficult Mr. Storrs! I’m terribly mortified to be meeting you
in a friend’s house and not in my own!”
“To meet you anywhere——” began Bruce, but she interrupted him,
holding him with her eyes.
“——would be a pleasure! Of course! I know the formula, but I’m not
a debutante. You didn’t like me that night we met at Dale Freeman’s,
and I was foolish enough to think I’d made an impression!”
“Let’s tell him the truth,” said Henderson, helping himself to a slice of
cinnamon toast. “Bruce, I bet a hundred cigarettes with Connie I
could deliver you here and I win!”
“Not a word of truth in that!” declared Constance. “Bud’s such a liar!”
Mrs. Torrence said they must have tea, and Henderson protested
that tea was not to be thought of. Tea, he declared, was extremely
distasteful to him; and Bruce always became ill at the sight of it.
“But when I told Connie you were bringing Mr. Storrs she said he
was terribly proper and for me not to dare mention cocktails.”
“Now, Helen, I didn’t say just that! What I meant, of course, was that
I hoped that Mr. Storrs wasn’t too proper,” said Constance.
“Proper!” Bruce caught her up. “This is an enemy’s work. Bud, I
suspect you of this dastardly assault on my character!”
“Not guilty!” Bud retorted. “The main thing right now is that we’re all
peevish and need martinis. What’s the Volstead signal, Helen?”
“Three rings, Bud, with a pause between the first and second.”
The tea tray was removed and reappeared adorned with all the
essentials for the concoction of cocktails. When the glasses were
filled and all had expressed their satisfaction at the result,
Henderson detained the negro butler for a conference on dice
throwing. He seated himself on the floor the better to receive the
man’s instructions. The others taunted him for his inaptitude. The
butler retired finally with five dollars of Bud’s money, a result attained
only after the spectators were limp with laughter.
“You’re a scream, Bud! A perfect scream!” and Mrs. Torrence refilled
the glasses.
She took Bud to the dining-room to exhibit a rare Japanese screen
acquired in her travels, and Bruce found himself alone with
Constance. She pointed to her glass, still brimming, and remarked:
“Please admire my abstemiousness! One is my limit.”
“Let me see; did I really have three?” asked Bruce as he sat down
beside her.
“I want to forget everything this afternoon,” she began. “I feel that I’d
like to climb the hills of the unattainable, be someone else for a
while.”
“Oh, we all have those spells,” he replied. “That’s why Prohibition’s a
failure.”
“But life is a bore at times,” she insisted. “Maybe you’re one of the
lucky ones who never go clear down. A man has his work—there’s
always that——”
“Hasn’t woman got herself everything—politics, business,
philanthropy? You don’t mean to tell me the new woman is already
pining for her old slavery! I supposed you led a complete and
satisfactory existence!”
“A pretty delusion! I just pretend, that’s all. There are days when
nothing seems of the slightest use. I thought there might be
something in politics, but after I’d gone to a few meetings and served
on a committee or two it didn’t amuse me any more. I played at
being a radical for a while, but after you’ve scared all your friends a
few times with your violence it ceases to be funny. The only real joy I
got out of flirting with socialism was in annoying my father-in-law.
And I had to give that up for fear he’d think I was infecting Shep with
my ideas.”
II
A tinge of malice was perceptible in her last words, but she smiled
instantly to relieve the embarrassment she detected in his face. He
was not sure just how she wanted him to take her. The unhappiness
she had spoken of he assumed to be only a pose with her—
something to experiment with upon men she met on gray afternoons
in comfortable houses over tea and cocktails. Mrs. Shepherd Mills
might be amusing, or she might easily become a bore. The night he
met her at the Freemans’ he had thought her probably guileless
under her mask of sophistication. She was proving more interesting
than he had imagined, less obvious; perhaps with an element of
daring in her blood that might one day get the better of her. She was
quite as handsome as he remembered her from the meeting at the
Freemans’ and she indubitably had mastered the art of dressing
herself becomingly.
He was watching the play of the shadow of her picture hat on her
face, seeking clues to her mood, vexed that he had permitted himself
to be brought into her company, when she said:
“I’m not amusing you! Please forgive me. I can’t help it if I’m a little
triste. Some little devilish imp is dancing through my silly head. If I
took a second glass——”
Bruce answered her look of inquiry with a shake of the head.
“Are you asking my advice? I positively refuse to give it; but if you
command me, of course——”
He rose, took the glass, and held it high for her inspection.
“The man tempts me——” she said pensively.
“The man doesn’t tempt you. We’ll say it’s the little imp. Mrs. Mills, do
you want this cocktail or do you not?”
“It might cheer me up a little. I don’t want you to think me stupid; I
know I’m terribly dull!”
She drank half the cocktail and bade him finish it.
“Oh, certainly!” he replied and drained the glass. “Now, under the
additional stimulus, we can proceed with the discussion. What were
we talking about, anyhow?”
“It doesn’t matter. Life offers plenty of problems. How many people
do you really think are happy—really happy? Now Bud’s always
cheerful; he and Maybelle are happy—remarkably so, I think. Helen
Torrence—well, I hesitate to say whether she’s really happy or not;
she always appears gay, just as you see her today; and it’s
something to be able to give the impression, whether it’s false or
not.”
“Yes; it’s well to make a front,” Bruce replied, determined to keep a
frivolous tone with her. “The Freemans enjoy themselves; they’re
quite ideally mated, I’d say.”
“Yes, they’re making a success of their lives. Dale and Bill are
always cheerful. Now there’s dear old Shep——”
“Well, of course he’s happy. How could he be otherwise?”
“You’re not taking me seriously at all! I’m disappointed. I was terribly
blue today; that’s why I plotted with Bud to get you here—I
shamelessly confess that I want to know you better.”
“Come now! You’re just kidding!”
“You’re incorrigible. I’m that rarest of beings—a frank woman. You
refuse to come to my house, presumably because you don’t like me,
so I have to trap you here.”
“How you misjudge me! I haven’t been around because I’ve been
busy; I belong to the toiling masses!”
“You have time for Miss Harden; you two seemed ever so chummy
on the golf course. Of course, I can’t compete with Millie—she’s so
beautiful and so artistic—so many accomplishments. But you ought
to be considerate of a poor thing like me. I’m only sorry I have so
little to offer. I really thought you would be a nice playmate; but——”
“A playmate? Aren’t we playing now?—at least you are playing with
me!”
“Am I?” she asked.
She bent toward him with a slight, an almost imperceptible
movement of her shoulders, and her lips parted tremulously in a
wistful smile of many connotations. She was not without her charms;
she was a very pretty woman; and there was nothing vulgar in her
manner of exercising her charms. Bruce touched her hand, gently
clasped it—a slender, cool hand. She made no attempt to release it;
and it lay lingering and acquiescent in his clasp. He raised it and
kissed the finger tips.
“You really understand me; I knew you would,” she murmured. “It’s
terrible to be lonely. And you are so big and strong; you can help me
if you will——”
“I have no right to help you,” he said. “It’s part of the game in this
funny world that we’ve got to help ourselves.”
“But if you knew I needed you——”
“Ah, but you don’t!” he replied.
Bud tiptoed in with a tray containing highball materials and placed it
on the tea table. He urged them in eloquent pantomime to drink
themselves to death and tiptoed out again. Bruce, wondering if he
dared leave, hoped the interruption would serve to change the
current of his talk with Constance, when she said:
“Shep speaks of you often; he likes you and really Shep’s ever so
interesting.”
“Yes,” Bruce answered, “he has ideas and ideals—really thinks about
things in a fine way.”
He did not care to discuss Shepherd Mills with Shepherd’s wife,
even when, presumably, she was merely making talk to create an
atmosphere of intimacy.
“Shep isn’t a cut-up,” she went on, “and he doesn’t know how to be a
good fellow with men of his own age. And he’s so shy he’s afraid of
the older men. And his father—you’ve met Mr. Mills? Well, Shep
doesn’t seem able to get close to his father.”
“That happens, of course, between fathers and sons,” Bruce replied.
“Mr. Mills——”
He paused, took a cigarette from his case and put it back. He was by
turns perplexed, annoyed, angry and afraid—afraid that he might in
some way betray himself.
“Mr. Mills is a curious person,” Constance went on. “He seems to me
like a man who lives alone in a formal garden with high walls on four
sides and has learned to ignore the roar of the world outside—a
prisoner who carries the key of his prison-house but can’t find the
lock!”
Bruce bent his head toward her, intent upon her words. He hadn’t
thought her capable of anything so imaginative. Some reply was
necessary; he would make another effort to get rid of a subject that
both repelled and fascinated him.
“I suppose we’re all born free; if we find ourselves shut in it’s
because we’ve built the walls ourselves.”
“How about my prison-house?” she asked. “Do you suppose I can
ever escape?”
“Why should you? Don’t you like your garden?”
“Not always; no! It’s a little stifling sometimes!”
“Then push the walls back a little! It’s a good sign, isn’t it, when we
begin to feel cramped?”
“You’re doing a lot better! I begin to feel more hopeful about you. You
really could be a great consolation to me if—if you weren’t so busy!”
“I really did appreciate your invitation. I’ll be around very soon.”
After all, he decided, she was only flirting with him; her confidences
were only a means of awakening his interest, stirring his sympathy.
She had probably never loved Shepherd, but she respected his high-
mindedness and really wanted to help him. The depression to which
she confessed was only the common ennui of her class and type;
she needed occupation, doubtless children would solve her problem
to some extent. Her life ran too smooth a course, and life was not
meant to be like that....
He was impatient to leave, but Mrs. Torrence and Henderson had
started a phonograph and were dancing in the hall. Constance
seemed unmindful of the noise they were making.
“Shall we join in that romp?” asked Bruce.
“Thanks, no—if you don’t mind! I suppose it’s really time to run
along. May I fix a drink for you? It’s too bad to go away and leave all
that whisky!”
The music stopped in the midst of a jazzy saxophone wail and Mrs.
Torrence and Henderson were heard noisily greeting several
persons who had just come in.
“It’s Leila,” said Constance, rising and glancing at the clock. “She
has no business being here at this time of day.”
“Hello, Connie! Got a beau?”
Leila peered into the room, struck her hands together and called
over her shoulder:
“Come in, lads! See what’s here! Red liquor as I live and breathe!
Oh, Mr. What’s-your-name——”
“Mr. Storrs,” Constance supplied.
“Oh, of course! Mr. Storrs—Mr. Thomas and Mr. Whitford!”
Bruce had heard much of Whitford at the University Club, where he
was one of the most popular members. He had won fame as an
athlete in college and was a polo player of repute. A cosmopolitan by
nature, he had traveled extensively and in the Great War had won
honorable distinction. Having inherited money he was able to follow
his own bent. It was whispered that he entertained literary ambitions.
He was one of the chief luminaries of the Dramatic Club, coached
the players and had produced several one-act plays of his own that
had the flavor of reality. He was of medium height and looked the
soldier and athlete. Women had done much to spoil him, but in spite
of his preoccupation with society, men continued to like George, who
was a thoroughly good fellow and a clean sportsman.
Whitford entered at once into a colloquy with Constance. Thomas,
having expressed his pleasure at meeting Bruce, was explaining to
Mrs. Torrence how he and Whitford had met Leila downtown.
“Liar!” exclaimed Leila, who was pouring herself a drink. “You did
nothing of the kind. We met at the Burtons’ and Nellie gave us a little
drink—just a tweeney, stingy little drink.”
The drink she held up for purposes of illustration was not
infinitesimal. Mrs. Torrence said that everyone must have a highball
and proceeded to prepare a drink for Thomas and Whitford.
“You and Connie are certainly the solemn owls,” she remarked to
Bruce. “Anyone would have thought you were holding a funeral in
here. Say when, Fred. This is real Bourbon that Jim had for years.
You’ll never see anything like it.”
“Bruce,” cried Henderson, “has Connie filled you with gloom? She
gets that way sometimes, but it doesn’t mean anything. A little of this
stuff will set you up. This bird, Storrs, always did have glass legs,” he
explained to Thomas; “he can drink gallons and be ready to
converse with bishops. Never saw such a capacity! If I get a few
more Maybelle will certainly hand it to me when I get home.”
Constance walked round the table to Leila, who had drunk a glass of
the Bourbon to sample it and, satisfied of its quality, was now
preparing a highball.
“No more, Leila!” said Constance, in a low tone. The girl drew back
defiantly.
“Go away, Connie! I need just one more.”
“You had more than you needed at the Burtons’. Please, Leila, be
sensible. Helen, send the tray away.”
“Leila’s all right!” said Thomas, but at a sign from Mrs. Torrence he
picked up the tray and carried it out.
“I don’t think it pretty to treat me as though I were shot when I’m not,”
said Leila petulantly. She walked to the end of the room and sat
down with the injured air of a rebellious child.
“Leila, do you know what time it is?” demanded Constance. “Your
father’s having a dinner and you’ve got to be there.”
“I’m going to be there! There’s loads of time. Everybody sit down and
be comfortable!” Leila composedly sipped her glass as though to set
an example to the others. Thomas had come back and Constance
said a few words to him in a low tone.
“Oh, shucks! I know what you’re saying. Connie’s telling you to take
me home,” said Leila. She turned her wrist to look at her watch—
frowned in the effort of focusing upon it and added with a shrug:
“There’s all the time in the world. If you people think you can scare
me you’ve got another guess coming. It’s just ten minutes of six;
dinner’s at seven-thirty! I’ve got to rest a little. You all look so
ridiculous standing there glaring at me. I’m no white mouse with pink
eyes!”
“Really, dear,” said Mrs. Torrence coaxingly, walking toward Leila
with her hands outstretched much as though she were trying to
make friends with a reluctant puppy. “Do run along home like a good
girl!”
Leila apparently had no intention of running along home like a good
little girl. She dropped her glass—empty—and without warning
caught the astounded lady tightly about the neck.
“Step-mother! Dear, nice step-mamma!” she cried. “Nice, dear,
sweet, kind step-mamma! Helen’s going to be awful good to poor
little Leila. Helen not be bad step-mamma like story books; Helen be
sweet, kind step-mamma and put nice, beautiful gin cocktails in
baby’s bottle!”
As she continued in cooing tones Leila stroked her captive’s cheek
and kissed her with a mockery of tenderness. Henderson and
Thomas were shouting with laughter; Constance viewed the scene
with lofty disdain; Whitford was mildly amused; Bruce, wishing
himself somewhere else, withdrew toward the door, prepared to
leave at the earliest possible moment. When at last Mrs. Torrence
freed herself she sank into a chair and her laughter attained a new
pitch of shrillness.
“Leila, you’ll be the death of me!” she gasped when her mirth had
spent itself.
“Leila will be the death of all of us,” announced Constance solemnly.
“Oh, I don’t know!” said Leila, straightening her hat composedly at
the mantel mirror.
“Too bad Leila’s ‘step-mama’ couldn’t have heard that!” sighed
Henderson.
“Now, Leila,” said Constance severely, “do run along home. Please
let me take you in my car; you oughtn’t to drive in the condition
you’re in.”
The remark was not fortunate. Leila had discovered a box of
bonbons and was amusing herself by tossing them into the air and
trying to catch them in her mouth. She scored one success in three
attempts and curtsied to an imaginary audience.
“My condition!” she said, with fine scorn. “I wish you wouldn’t speak
as though I were a common drunk!”
“Anyone can see that you’re not fit to go home. Your father will be
furious.”
“Not if I tell him I’ve been with you!” Leila flung back.
“Say, Leila!” began Henderson, ingratiatingly. “We’re old pals, you
and I—let’s shake this bunch. I’ll do something nice for you
sometime.”
“What will you do?” Leila demanded with provoking deliberation.
“Oh, something mighty nice! Maybelle and I will give you a party and
you can name the guests.”
“Stupid!” she yawned. “Your hair’s mussed, Helen. You and Bud
have been naughty.”
“Your behavior isn’t ladylike,” said Thomas. “The party’s getting
rough! Come on, let’s go.”
“Oh, I’m misbehaving, am I? Well, I guess my conduct’s as good as
yours! Where do you get this stuff that I’m a lost lamb? Even an
expert like you, Freddy, wouldn’t call me soused. I’m just little bit
tipsy—that’s all! If I had a couple more highballs——”
III
By a signal passed from one to the other they began feigning to
ignore her. Constance said she was going; Bud, Whitford and
Thomas joined Bruce at the door where he was saying good-night to
Mrs. Torrence. Leila was not so tipsy but that she understood what
they were doing.
“Think you can freeze me out, do you? Well, I’m not so easily friz!
Mr. What’s-your-name——” She fixed her eyes upon Bruce
detainingly.
“Storrs,” Bruce supplied good-naturedly.
“You’re the only lady or gentleman in this room. I’m going to ask you
to take me home!”
“Certainly, Miss Mills!”
With a queenly air she took his arm. Henderson ran forward and
opened the door, the others hanging back, silent, afraid to risk a
word that might reopen the discussion and delay her departure.
“Shall I drive?” Bruce asked when they reached the curb.
“Yes, thanks; if you don’t mind.”
“Home?” he inquired as he got her car under way.
“I was just doing a little thinking,” she said deliberatingly. “It will take
only five minutes to run over to that little cafeteria on Fortieth Street.
Some coffee wouldn’t be a bad thing; and would you mind turning
the windshield—I’d like the air.”
“A good idea,” said Bruce, and stepped on the gas. The car had
been built for Leila’s special use and he had with difficulty squeezed
himself into the driver’s seat; but he quickly caught the hang of it. He
stopped a little beyond the cafeteria to avoid the lights of the busy
corner and brought out a container of hot coffee and paper cups.
“Like a picnic, isn’t it?” she said. “You won’t join me?”
She sipped the coffee slowly while he stood in the street beside her.
“There!” she said. “Thank you, ever so much. Quarter of seven?
Forty-five minutes to dress! Just shoot right along home now. Would
you mind driving over to the boulevard and going in that way? The
air certainly feels good.”
“Nothing would please me more,” he said, giving her a quick
inspection as they passed under the lights at a cross-street. She was
staring straight ahead, looking singularly young as she lay back with
her hands clasped in her lap.
“Constance was furious!” she said suddenly. “Well, I suppose she
had a right to be. I had no business getting lit.”
“Well, strictly speaking, you shouldn’t do it,” he said. It was not the
time nor place and he was not the proper person to lecture her upon
her delinquencies. But he had not been displeased that she chose
him to take her home, even though the choice was only a whim.
“You must think me horrid! This is the second time you’ve seen me
teed up too high.”
“I’ve seen a lot of other people teed up much higher! You’re perfectly
all right now?”
“Absolutely! That coffee fixed me; I’m beginning to feel quite bully. I
can go home now and jump into my joy rags and nobody will ever be
the wiser. This is an old folks’ party, but Dada always wants to exhibit
me when he feeds the nobility—can you see me?”
Her low laugh was entirely reassuring as to her sobriety, and he was
satisfied that she would be able to give a good account of herself at
her father’s table.
“Just leave the car on the drive,” she said as they reached the
house. “Maybe I can crawl up to my room without Dada knowing I’m
late. I’m a selfish little brute—to be leaving you here stranded! Well,
thanks awfully!”
He walked with her to the entrance and she was taking out her key
when Mills, in his evening clothes, opened the door.
“Leila! You’re late!” he exclaimed sharply. “Where on earth have you
been?”
“Just gadding about, as usual! But I’m in plenty of time, Dada.
Please thank Mr. Storrs for coming home with me. Good-night and
thank you some more!”
She darted into the house, leaving Bruce confronting her father.
“Oh, Mr. Storrs!” The emphasis on the name was eloquent of Mills’s
surprise that Bruce was on his threshold. Bruce had decided that any
explanations required were better left to Leila, who was probably an
adept in explanations. He was about to turn away when Mills
stepped outside.
“We’re entertaining tonight,” he said pleasantly. “I was a little afraid
something had happened to my daughter.”
A certain dignity of utterance marked his last words—my daughter.
He threw into the phrase every possible suggestion of paternal pride.
Bruce, halfway down the steps, paused until Mills had concluded his
remark. Then lifting his hat with a murmured good-night, he hurried
toward the gate. An irresistible impulse caused him to look back.
Mills remained just inside the entry, his figure clearly defined by the
overhead lights, staring toward the street. Seeing Bruce look back,
he went quickly into the house and the heavy door boomed upon
him.
Bruce walked to the nearest street car line and rode downtown for
dinner. The fact that Mills was waiting at the door for his daughter
was not without its significance, hinting at a constant uneasiness for
her safety beyond ordinary parental solicitude. What Constance had
said that afternoon about Mills came back to him. He was oppressed
by a sense of something tragic in Mills’s life—the tragedy of a failure
that wore outwardly the guise of success.
In spite of a strong effort of will to obliterate these thoughts he found
his memory dragging into his consciousness odd little pictures of
Mills—fragmentary snapshots, more vivid and haunting than
complete portraits: the look Mills gave him the first time they met at
the Country Club; Mills’s shoulders and the white line of his collar
above his dinner coat as he left the Hardens’; and now the quick
change from irritation to relief and amiable courtesy when he
admitted Leila.
Henderson and Millicent and now today Constance had given him
hints of Mills’s character, and Bruce found himself trying to reconcile
and unify their comments and fit them into his own inferences and
conclusions. The man was not without his fascinations as a subject
for analysis. Behind that gracious exterior there must be another
identity either less noble or finer than the man the world knew....
Before he slept, Bruce found it necessary to combat an
apprehension that, if he continued to hear Mills dissected and
analyzed, he might learn to pity the man.
IV
That evening when Shepherd Mills went home he found Constance
seated at her dressing table, her heavy golden-brown hair piled
loosely upon her head, while her maid rubbed cold cream into her
throat and face. She espied him in the mirror and greeted him with a
careless, “Hello, Shep. How did the day go with you?”—the question
employed by countless American wives in saluting their husbands at
the end of a toilsome day.
“Oh, pretty good!” he replied. No husband ever admits that a day has
been wholly easy and prosperous.
She put out her hand for him to kiss and bade him sit down beside
her. He was always diffident before the mysteries of his wife’s toilet.
He glanced at the gown laid across a chair and surveyed the crystal
and silver on the dressing table with a confused air as though he had
never seen them before.
The room denoted Constance Mills’s love of luxury, and incidentally
her self-love. The walls on two sides were set in mirrors that reached
from ceiling to floor. The furniture, the rugs, the few pictures, the
window draperies had been chosen with an exquisite care and
combined in an evocation of the spirit of indolence. There was a
much be-pillowed divan across one corner, so placed that when she
enjoyed a siesta Constance could contemplate herself in the mirrors
opposite. Scents—a mingling of faint exotic odors—hung upon the
air.
She was quick to note that something was on Shepherd’s mind and
half from curiosity, half in a spirit of kindness, dismissed the maid as
quickly as possible.
“You can hook me up, Shep. I’ll do my hair myself. I won’t need you
any more, Marie. Yes—my blue cloak. Now, little boy, go ahead and
tell me what’s bothering you.”
Shepherd frowned and twisted his mustache as he sat huddled on
the divan.
“It’s about father; nothing new, just our old failure to understand each
other. It’s getting worse. I never know where I stand with him.”
“Well, does anyone?” Constance asked serenely. “You really mustn’t
let him get on your nerves. There are things you’ve got to take
because we all do; but by studying him a little and practicing a little
patience you’ll escape a lot of worry.”
“Yes,” he assented eagerly. “You know he just pretends that I’m the
head of the plant; Fields is the real authority there. It’s not the
president but the vice-president who has the say about things.
Father consults Fields constantly. He doesn’t trust me—I’m just a
figurehead.”
“Fields is such an ass,” remarked Constance with a shrug of her
shapely shoulders. “An utterly impossible person. Why not just let
him do all the explaining to your father? If any mistakes are made at
the plant, then it’s on him.”
“But that’s not the way of it,” Shepherd protested plaintively. “He gets
the praise; I get the blame.”
“Oh, well, you can’t make your father over. You ought to be glad
you’re not of his hard-boiled variety. You’re human, Sheppy, and
that’s better than being a magnificent iceberg.”
“Father doesn’t see things; he doesn’t realize that the world’s
changing,” Shepherd went on stubbornly. “He doesn’t see that the
old attitude toward labor won’t do any more.”
“He’ll never see it,” said Constance. “Things like that don’t hit him at
all. He’s like those silly people who didn’t know there was anything
wrong in France till their necks were in the guillotine.”
“I told you about that clubhouse I wanted to build for our people on
the Milton farm? I hate to give that up. It would mean so much to
those people. And he was all wrong in thinking it would injure the
property. I think it’s only decent to do something for them.”
“Well, how can you do it without your father?” she asked, shifting
herself for a better scrutiny of her head in the mirror.
“You know that little tract of land—about twenty acres, back of the
plant? I could buy that and put the clubhouse there. I have some
stock in the Rogers Trust Company I can sell—about two hundred
shares. It came to me through mother’s estate. Father has nothing to
do with it. The last quotation on it is two hundred. What do you think
of that?”
“Well, I think pretty well of it,” said Constance. “Your father ought to
let you build the clubhouse, but he has a positive passion for making
people uncomfortable.”
“I suppose,” continued Shepherd dubiously, “if I go ahead and build
the thing—even with my own money—he would be angry. Of course
there may be something in his idea that if we do a thing of this kind it
would make the workmen at other plants restless——”
“Piffle!” exclaimed Constance. “That’s the regular old stock whimper
of the back-number. You might just as well say that it would be a
forward step other employers ought to follow!”
“Yes, there’s that!” he agreed, his eyes brightening at the suggestion.
“If you built the house on your own land the storage battery company
wouldn’t be responsible for it in any way.”
“Certainly not!” Shepherd was increasingly pleased that she saw it all
so clearly.
She had slipped on her gown and was instructing him as to the
position of the hooks.
“No; the other side, Shep. That’s right. There’s another bunch on the
left shoulder. Now you’ve got it! Thanks ever so much.”
He watched her admiringly as she paraded before the mirrors to
make sure that the skirt hung properly.
“If there’s to be a row——” he began as she opened a drawer and
selected a handkerchief.
“Let there be a row! My dear Shep, you’re always too afraid of
asserting yourself. What could he do? He might get you up to his
office and give you a bad quarter of an hour; but he’d respect you
more afterwards if you stood to your guns. His vanity and family
pride protect you. Catch him doing anything that might get him into
the newspapers—not Franklin Mills!”
Relieved and encouraged by her understanding and sympathy, he
explained more particularly the location of the property he proposed
buying. It was quite as convenient to the industrial colony that had
grown up about the storage battery plant as the Milton land his father
had declined to let him use. The land was bound to appreciate in
value, he said.
“What if it doesn’t!” exclaimed Constance with mild scorn. “You’ll
have been doing good with your money, anyhow.”
“You think, then, you’d go ahead—sell the stock and buy the land?
It’s so late now, maybe I’d better wait till spring?”
“That might be better, Shep, but use your own judgment. You asked
your father to help and he turned you down. Your going ahead will
have a good effect on him. He needs a jar. Now run along and dress.
You’re going to be late for dinner.”
“Yes, I know,” he said, rising and looking down at her as she sat
turning over the leaves of a book. “Connie——”
“Yes, Shep,” she murmured absently; and then, “Oh, by the way,
Shep, I was at Helen’s this afternoon.”
“Helen Torrence’s? What was it—a tea?”
“In a manner of speaking—tea! Dramatic Club business. George
Whitford was there—he’s concentrating on theatricals. George is
such a dear!”
“One of the best fellows in the world!” said Shep.
“He certainly is!” Constance affirmed.
“Connie——” he stammered and took her hand. “Connie—you’re
awfully good to me. You know I love you——”
“Why, of course, you dear baby!” She lifted her head with a quick,
reassuring smile. “But for goodness’ sake run along and change your
clothes!”
V
When his guests had gone, Mills, as was his habit, smoked a cigar
and discussed the dinner with Leila. He was aware that in asking her
to join him on such occasions of state he was subjecting her to a
trying ordeal, and tonight he was particularly well pleased with her.
“They all enjoyed themselves, Dada; you needn’t worry about that
party!” Leila remarked, smoking the cigarette she had denied herself
while the guests remained.
“I think they did; thank you very much for helping me.”
Leila had charm; he was always proud of an opportunity to display
her to her mother’s old friends, whose names, like his own, carried
weight in local history. His son was a Shepherd; Leila, he persuaded
himself, was, with all her waywardness and little follies, more like
himself. Leila looked well at his table, and her dramatic sense made
it possible for her to act the rôle of the daughter of the house with the
formality that was dear to him. Whenever he entertained he and
Leila received the guests together, standing in front of Mrs. Mills’s
portrait. People who dared had laughed about this, speculating as to
the probable fate of the portrait in case Mills married again.
“I’d got nervous about you when you were so late coming,” Mills was
saying. “That’s how I came to be at the door. I’d just called Millicent
to see if you were over there.”
“Foolish Dada! Don’t I always turn up?” she asked, kicking off her
slippers. “I’d been fooling around all afternoon, and I hate getting
dressed and waiting for a party to begin.”
“I’ve noticed that,” Mills replied dryly. “Just what did you do all day?
Your doings are always a mystery to me.”
“Well—let me see—I went downtown with Millie this morning, and
home with her for lunch, and we talked a while and I ran out to the
Burtons’ and there were some people there and we gassed; and
then I remembered I hadn’t seen Mrs. Torrence since she got home,
so I took a dash up there. And Connie was there, and Bud
Henderson came up with Mr. Storrs and we had tea and Mr. Storrs
was coming this way so I let him drive me home.”
This, uttered with smooth volubility, was hardly half the truth. She
lighted a fresh cigarette and blew a series of rings while waiting to
see whether he would crossexamine her, as he sometimes did.

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Exploring Emotions in Turkey Iran

Relations Affective Politics of

Women in the Cinemas of Iran and Turkey 1st Edition

Politics of Oil and Nuclear Technology in Iran 1st

Queer Politics in Contemporary Turkey 1st Edition Paul

Politics Ethics and Emotions in New India 1st Edition

Narrative Traditions in International Politics:

The Iran Nuclear Deal Non proliferation and US Iran

The Power of Emotions in World Politics 1st Edition

EU Turkey Relations Theories Institutions and Policies

Mehmet Akif Kumral

More information about this series at

Middle East Today

Cover illustration: LOMAKIN shutterstock.com

This monograph is a long-term study of a dyadic case in international rela-

I contend that the Kasr-ı Şirin story was invented as an emotional-­

cultural friendship. Dyadic partnership is still based on self-interests, lack-

c­ onfrontation. As historical neighbors, Turks and Iranians have developed

in empirical texts, argumentative interventions are made minimal, so as to

Balıkesir, Turkey Mehmet Akif Kumral

1 Introduction: Historical Psychology of Turkey-Iran

2 The Formative Emotional Climate of Turkish-Iranian

3 The Affective Atmosphere of Ankara-Tehran Alignment in

4 Reformative Psychology in Turkey-Iran Interactions

5 Psycho-Social Revisions in Turkey-Iran Neighborhood

6 Conclusion: Overall Findings and Research

AIOC (Anglo-Iranian Oil Company)

JCPOA Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action

Table 1.1 Emotional-affective configurations of modal interactions in

Introduction: Historical Psychology

Canonical writings tell us that modern history of Turkey-Iran relations has

© The Author(s) 2020 1

exchange in Ankara-Tehran interactions. I argue that the primary reason

As the discussion in previous chapters indicates, the relationship between

This sample excerpt is representative of perplexing conceptualizations

As a broadly defined topic of key interest, the psycho-social implica-

Table 1.1 Emotional-affective configurations of modal interactions in inter-state

Soft-line Positive emoting Productive mutuality Respect-­ Progressive

partnership and rivalry in dyadic-regional neighborhood interactions. This

­ ormativity and performativity within relational structures and practices

Turkish-Iranian neighborhood. The third chapter looks at Turkey-Iran

Conceptual Framework: Constructivist Insights

Symbolic interactionist school of social psychology observes emotional

Communal sharing relationships are based on equivalence and collectivity

(e.g., relationships between non-intimate room-mates). Authority ranking

Close communal partnerships of equality and reciprocity entail egalitar-

Social Psychology of Political Neighborhood: Relational Making

As reiterated by Onuf (2014), we can treat international “norms” and

Of all rules, commitment-rules are the most difficult to practice because

Following these constructivist assertions, this book proposes a social-­

Emotional Exchange and Interactive Rulings Among

c­ultures, affective-normative structures and practices ruling among

Individuals, households, neighbors and society are continuously

The political identity and history of subject-cultures emerge and are

International Politics of Neighborhood: Affective-Normative

interdependent practices. This process also yields … succession of struc-

The structure of international neighborhoods can be determined by

The notion of trans-governmentality helps to better interrogate neigh-

I contend that the Kasr-ı Şirin story was invented as an emotional-

c onfrontation. As historical neighbors, Turks and Iranians have developed

Balıkesir, Turkey Mehmet Akif Kumral

1 Introduction: Historical Psychology of Turkey-Iran

2 The Formative Emotional Climate of Turkish-Iranian

3 The Affective Atmosphere of Ankara-Tehran Alignment in

4 Reformative Psychology in Turkey-Iran Interactions

5 Psycho-Social Revisions in Turkey-Iran Neighborhood

6 Conclusion: Overall Findings and Research

Soft-line Positive emoting Productive mutuality Respect- Progressive

ormativity and performativity within relational structures and practices

Following these constructivist assertions, this book proposes a social-

cultures, affective-normative structures and practices ruling among