Less than two months after his government hosted the NATO summit — which was framed as proof of Turkey’s pivotal role in transatlantic security — President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan has proposed full Turkish membership in the Shanghai Cooperation Organisation, an entity that has been described as being anti-NATO or a “rogue NATO.”The apparent contradiction was striking. Turkey has belonged to NATO since 1952 and remains a European Union candidate. In contrast, the China- and Russia-led Shanghai Cooperation Organisation, which has included Iran since 2023, projects an alternative, non-western vision of international order.This revives a familiar question: is Turkey pivoting from west to east? The question assumes a world divided into coherent blocs. In reality, partially overlapping and competing international orders co-exist, each with its own institutions, rules and visions of global authority. Turkey is simply asserting its autonomy by moving across their boundaries.A world of overlapping ordersThe post-Cold War vision of a single global order centred on western institutions is increasingly difficult to sustain. NATO co-exists with emerging power coalitions and regional or issue-specific partnerships. These orders overlap but are not easily reconciled. Their rules and political visions often conflict, allowing emerging and existing middle powers to participate in several of them without fully accepting the authority of any.While remaining embedded in NATO and economically connected to Europe, Turkey has cultivated deeper ties with Russia and China. A dialogue partner in the Shanghai Cooperation Organisation since 2012, Turkey has also sought a larger role across the Middle East, Africa, the Caucasus and Central Asia. This can appear inconsistent or merely tactical. But, as I argue in my new book Turkey, Geopolitics, and the Age of Populist World-Making, the country’s stance reflects a broader objective. It seeks to expand its freedom of action by preventing any single alliance from defining its international role. Erdoğan presents Turkey not as a peripheral country caught between rival worlds, but as a power capable of shaping the global system. This extends his domestic populist strategy onto the international stage. Just as the Turkish people are portrayed as having been silenced by entrenched elites at home, Turkey is represented as a nation denied its rightful status by western-dominated hierarchies globally.In my book, I call this “populist world-making” — an effort to recast international politics as a struggle between those who have historically controlled the global order and those whose agency and status have been repressed.‘Forum shopping’Erdoğan does not regard the Shanghai Cooperation Organisation as an alternative to NATO. He sees it as another arena for pursuing economic, political and strategic relationships without the West being the sole source of international authority. Turkey effectively shops among institutions, coalitions and diplomatic processes. It crosses supposedly fixed boundaries whenever this can expand its influence or reduce external constraints. The Shanghai Cooperation Organisation is the latest expression of this approach. In Libya, Turkey militarily supported the internationally recognized government and sharply criticized France and other NATO allies for backing its opponents. By contrast, the country pursued what I call “competitive co-existence” with Russia, which also supported the opposing faction: Turkey moderated its rhetoric and avoided direct clashes with Russian forces. Turkish-French rivalry extended into the African Sahel region, where Turkey boosted trade, aid and defence co-operation — including drone sales — by stoking the flames of the growing resentment of governments in the region about France’s military presence and post-colonial influence.In the eastern Mediterranean, Turkey aggressively challenged the French-supported co-operation among Greece, Cyprus and Israel on maritime jurisdiction and energy co-operation that it regarded as exclusionary.Syria provides an even clearer example of Turkey’s penchant for forum shopping. Turkey, in line with other NATO members, opposed Bashar al-Assad. But it worked with Russia and Iran through the exclusive Astana process to manage their conflicting objectives and de-escalate armed conflict in Syria.Despite supporting opposing entities and pursuing incompatible objectives, the three states created a diplomatic forum outside the western-led Geneva framework because it served their respective interests.Turkey’s complex relationship with Russia is part of the same trend. It opposed Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, armed Kyiv and closed Turkish waters to Russian warships. Yet it refused to join western sanctions and maintained close economic and diplomatic relations with the Kremlin. This enabled Turkey to help broker the Black Sea grain agreement and claim a diplomatic role — one that any state firmly aligned with one side or the other could not do.The message is clear: Turkey will not blindly align with NATO on every issue. Instead, it uses its positions across different alliances to maintain strategic autonomy and prevent any single bloc from dictating its actions.An ambition with limitsNonetheless, Turkey’s room to manoeuvre is constrained. Its economy depends heavily on European markets and western finance, and its security relies on NATO. Russia, China and Iran are partners in some arenas but competitors in others. Forum-shopping can expand Turkey’s autonomy, but also generate friction, mistrust and strategic over-extension. “Populist world-making” is therefore not a master plan but a political orientation — an attempt to convert diplomatic flexibility into status. Erdoğan rejects the premise that others should define Turkey’s choices. He’s seeking a better position within an existing order — and recognition as a power entitled to shape what comes next.Spyros A. Sofos receives funding from SSHRC.