Competing Roles, Diverging Strategies Grand Strategy of Great Powers through the Lens of Role Theory

1. Introduction: Rethinking Grand Strategy Through Roles  2. Unresolved Debates in Grand Strategy  3. Theoretical Framework: Linking Grand Strategy and Elite Contestation  4. Measuring Grand Strategic Consensus Through Role Contestation  5. US Grand Strategy: Decline, Drift or Durable Hegemony?  6. China's Strategic Rise: From Cautious Ascent to Global Challenger  7. Russia's Revisionism: Reinventing Roles in a Hostile West  8. Conclusion: A New Avenue?

Biography

Çağla Kılıç is an Assistant Professor of International Relations at Bilkent University. Her research focuses on foreign policy analysis, role theory, and grand strategy. She received her PhD in Political Science from Arizona State University, where she was also a Fulbright PhD candidate. Her work has been published in the Journal of Global Security Studies. She has contributed to research projects funded by TUBITAK and the National Science Foundation (NSF), and she was awarded the Stephen G. Walker Fellowship in 2020.

"In Competing Roles, Diverging Strategies: Grand Strategy of Great Powers through the Lens of Role Theory, role theory is employed to identify continuity and change in the grand strategies of the United States, China, and Russia and their origins, respectively, within divergent role contestation dynamics of the democratic, one-party, and increasingly personalistic regimes that they represent."
Stephen G. Walker, Professor Emeritus of Political Science, Arizona State University

"This is a superb scholarship, with significant relevance to policy – the first application of role theory to the study of grand strategy for great powers to understand change. The volume develops a time-based typology and reveals how role-related patterns can transform grand strategy. This book is essential reading for scholars and practitioners."
Patrick James, Dornsife Dean’s Professor Emeritus of International Relations, USC

"This book is a significant contribution to the literature on great powers. With a rigorous methodology and through innovative theorizing, Çağla Kılıç explores the trajectory and distinct qualities of the U.S.’s, Russia’s, and China’s grand strategies. Her insightful study carries important implications for our understanding of these powers’ future strategies, their management of alliances, and the predicament of smaller powers."
Akan Malici, Professor of Politics and International Affairs, Furman University