Named "best book on Turkey" by CNN's Fareed Zakaria
Erdogan's Empire: Turkey and the Politics of the Middle East (2019), which details Turkey's foreign policy under Turkish president Recep Tayyip Erdogan and Ankara's evolving ties with the U.S., Europe, the Balkans, Central Asia, Africa, and the Middle East in the context of Turkish and Ottoman history, is the final book in the Cagaptay trilogy. The previous two editions of the trilogy are: The Rise of Turkey: The Twenty-First Century's First Muslim Power (2014), which describes the economic growth that Erdogan delivered in the last decade, and The New Sultan: Erdogan and the Crisis of Modern Turkey (2017), which sheds light on Turkey's domestic political crisis under Erdogan.
"Soner Cagaptay is an astute and honest chronicler of the mercurial Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan. His latest book, “Erdogan’s Empire,” is a comprehensive look at the Turkish leader’s “neo-Ottoman” foreign policy—and the way he has defiantly tried to reestablish Turkey as a standalone power by playing off Washington and Moscow and sabotaging his Arab rivals. By setting Erdogan against the backdrop of Ottoman-Turkish history, Cagaptay helps readers understand that breadth of his ambitions—and also why his policies have had such disruptive and sometimes toxic consequences for the United States. Americans, Israelis and Europeans may not like the headstrong, ruthless Erdogan, but after reading Cagaptay’s book, they’ll at least understand him."
David Ignatius
Columnist, The Washington Post
"Nations that were once great empires, such as Turkey, often have a malleable and exaggerated sense of their heyday. This, of course, comes with a readiness to be inspired, or even a vulnerability to be manipulated, by effective politicians that embody this narrative. Romanticizing the collapsed Ottoman Empire continues to shape Turkey’s citizens’ views of their place in the world."
