Shapers of the International System: Middle Powers and Their Role in Global Politics

This thesis examines the role middle powers play in the international system. Existing approaches define middle powers according to capabilities, behavior, motivations, or relationships with other powers. However, despite their differences, each points toward the same underlying phenomenon: middle powers perform the systemic role of ‘shapers’ i.e., states that modify, manage, or direct the operation of the international system without creating, dominating, or fundamentally reconstructing it. Accordingly, the thesis advances a synthetic approach to middle powerhood and introduces the RAM (Role, Auxiliary Role, Method) Model of Role Performance, linking the shaper role to the auxiliary roles of administrator, aggregator, and adjuster. Using a structured, focused comparative case study of Turkey, Azerbaijan, and Armenia, the thesis assesses whether states perform the role of shaper and thereby qualify as middle powers The findings demonstrate that Turkey and Azerbaijan successfully perform the shaper role across all three auxiliary roles, whereas Armenia does not. Consequently, Azerbaijan's role performance more closely resembles that of a conventional middle power than a conventional small state. These findings support a role-based conception of middle powerhood and a broader understanding of the international system as a distribution of roles rather than capabilities alone.