Turkey

Turkey sits at one of history’s most consequential crossroads: between Europe and Asia, Christianity and Islam, empire and nation-state. From the ancient civilizations of Anatolia to Byzantium and Constantinople, and from the Ottoman Empire to the modern Turkish Republic, the region has repeatedly served as a hinge where worlds collide, merge, and transform. Modern Turkey is the product of imperial collapse and radical reinvention. After ruling vast territories across three continents, the Ottomans gave way to a secular republic under Atatürk—one that sought to redefine identity, language, religion, and politics almost overnight. Today’s Turkey wrestles openly with that inheritance, balancing nationalism, Islam, democracy, authoritarianism, and geopolitical ambition. To understand empire, borders, religious coexistence, and modern state-building, Turkey is indispensable.

1. 1 Turkey remains a geopolitical hinge—between NATO and Russia, Europe and the Middle East, secularism and political Islam.
2. 2 Debates over nationalism, democracy, and authoritarianism in Turkey mirror global tensions playing out elsewhere.
3. 3 The Ottoman legacy continues to shape the Balkans, the Middle East, and North Africa in visible ways.
4. 4 Turkey’s control of key migration routes and waterways makes it central to European and global stability.
5. 5 Cultural memory—Byzantine, Ottoman, Islamic, and modern—coexists in daily life, making Turkey a living archive of world history.