Bahar Rumelili

Bahar Rumelili is Professor and Jean Monnet Chair at the Department of International Relations. Her research to date has focused on international relations theory, contributing, in particular, to constructivist theories of identity and ontological security theory, processes of European identity construction, conflict resolution, and the interaction between the EU and Turkish politics and civil society. She has been the primary investigator in three research projects funded by the EU and one funded by TUBITAK. Most recently, she has published on implications of anxiety and uncertainty in international relations, international hierarchies shaped by global performance indices, historical myths that shape anti-Western discourse in Turkey, and gender performances in Turkish diplomacy.

She is the author of Constructing Regional Community and Order in Europe and Southeast Asia (Palgrave, 2007) and the editor of Conflict Resolution and Ontological Security: Peace Anxieties (Routledge 2015). Her articles have appeared in journals such as European Journal of International Relations, Review of International Studies, Cooperation and Conflict, Journal of Common Market Studies, Security Dialogue, and Journal of International Relations and Development. She is the 2009 recipient of Turkish Academy of Sciences’ Distinguished Young Scientist Award and the 2014 recipient of Turkish Scientific and Technological Research Council’s Incentive Award.

Recent and Select Publications

Rumelili, B. (2023) “COVID-19: Uncertainty in a mood of anxiety” International Relations, 37(1), 149-155.

Aydin-Duzgit, S., Rumelili, B., and Topal, A. E. (2022) “‘Challenging anti-Western historical myths in populist discourse: re-visiting Ottoman Empire–Europe interaction during the 19th century” European Journal of International Relations, 28(3), 513-537.

Rumelili, B and Towns, A. (2022) “Driving Liberal Change? Global Performance Indices as a System of Normative Stratification in Liberal International Order” Cooperation & Conflict, 57(2), 152-170.

Rumelili, B. (2021) “[Our] Age of Anxiety: Existentialism and the Current State of International Relations” Journal of International Relations and Development, 24, 1020-1036.

Rumelili, B. (2020) “Integrating Anxiety into International Relations Theory: Hobbes, Existentialism, and Ontological Security” International Theory, 12 (2), 257-272.

Main sub-Fields:

International Relations

European Studies

Research Interests

International Relations

Theory Ontological Security Studies

European Identity

European Foreign Policy

Greek-Turkish Conflicts