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International Area Studies Review
[ Article ]
International Area Studies Review - Vol. 29, No. 2, pp.113-134
ISSN: 2233-8659 (Print)
Print publication date 30 Jun 2026
DOI: https://doi.org/10.69473/iasr.2026.29.2.113

Why Fossil Fuels Endure: Structural Constraints on Türkiye’s Green Energy Transition

Göktuğ Kıprızlı*
Assistant Professor, Department of International Relations, Karadeniz Technical University, Trabzon, Türkiye and Visiting Researcher, Institute of European Studies and International Relations, Comenius University in Bratislava, Bratislava, Slovakia

Correspondence to: *Email: goktugkiprizli@ktu.edu.tr

Abstract

This article examines the institutional obstacles to the green shift in Türkiye. Based on the theoretical approach that combines state capitalism, path dependency, national innovation systems, and policy-feedback mechanisms, it explains how the tax revenues, education-labour market misalignments, and pre-leading status of the defence sector strengthen a crowding-out process that undermines green innovation and human-capital investments. The article not only provides the concept of fiscal lock-in as an insufficiently discussed and a vital aspect of fossil path dependency, but it also highlights indirect carbon rents in non-rentier states as a key process of policy inertia. It synthesises political economy and innovation system views, which adds to the literature on fossil lock-ins and energy transition governance. It also calls for a broader understanding of policy priorities beyond techno-fixes and insists on the need to capture structural aspects of a rapid energy transition, like fiscal policy, human capital trends, and innovation systems, to understand the inertia affecting a rapid transition of the energy mix.

Keywords:

Energy transition, State capitalism, Fossil lock-in, Policy feedback, Innovation systems

AI Acknowledgment

Generative AI or AI-assisted technologies were not used in any way to prepare, write, or complete essential authoring tasks in this manuscript.

Declaration of Conflicting Interests

The authors declared no potential conflicts of interest with respect to the research, authorship, and/or publication of this article.

Funding

The author(s) received no financial support for the research, authorship, and/or publication of this article.

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