Copenhagen school and securitization of cyberspace in Turkey

With a particular rise since the turn of the millennium, cyber-security become one of the most important security sector in contemporary security politics. Despite this, the convergence of cyberspace and security has mostly been analyzed within the context of technical areas and had been neglected in the political realm and international relations academia. The article argues that in line with developments in the domestic and international arena, the AKP government shifted towards the securitization of cyberspace. Secondly the article argues that there seems to be two waves of securitization and desecuritization within the case. The first wave starts from 2006 through the end of 2017 whereby cyber securitization took place within the subunit level and very much connected to political and societal sectors. This first wave particularly heightened after the 2016 attempted coup and the eventual collapse of the peace process with the PKK. The second wave came in the 2018 onwards and instead of securitization, there is a desecuritizationn of cyber attacks took place mostly at the unit level. In both waves, the desecuritization and securitization is constructed within the national security discourse. However in the first wave, a threat to national security is constructed and hypersecuritized particularly in relation to developments at the societal level. In the second wave, the emphasis is put on the strength of national security therefore the threats and cyber-attacks at the unit level that are originated from other states is downplayed in order to construct a national pride and strength. The main goal of this article therefore is to fill the gap in the Copenhagen school related to cyber security sector. The second aim is to fill the gap specifically in Turkey’s response to events in cyberspace and construction of a cybersecurity discourse and cultur