Digdem Soyaltin Colella
Digdem Soyaltin-Colella is the co-convenor and chair of the PSA Turkish Politics Specialist Group. She works as an Assistant Professor at the University of Aberdeen, UK. She is also a member of the global strategy reference group of Transparency International Berlin. She received her Ph.D. degree in Political Science at Freie Universität Berlin and worked as a post-doctoral fellow at Stockholm University Institute for Turkish Studies (SUITS). She holds MSc. in European Affairs from Lund University and M.Phil in Political Science from Central European University. Her research concentrates on the politics of corruption, mechanisms of state capture and regime survival, autocratic bureaucracies & illiberal governance, and Southeast European and Turkish politics. Email: digdem.soyaltin@abdn.ac.uk
Buğra Güngör
Buğra Güngör is the co-convenor and chair of the PSA Turkish Politics Specialist Group. He completed his Ph.D. in International Relations and Political Science at the Geneva Graduate Institute. He also holds a master’s degree in Conflict Analysis and Resolution from Sabanci University and a bachelor’s in Philosophy, together with a minor degree certificate in Political Science, awarded by Bilkent University. In addition, he has extensive experience with managing development and humanitarian projects commissioned by various UN agencies, IOs, and INGOs in Switzerland and Turkey. Dr. Güngör’s research interests include conflict processes, soft power, public diplomacy, foreign policy analysis, and Turkish foreign policy.
Begum Zorlu
Begüm Zorlu is the communications officer of the PSA Turkish Politics Specialist Group. She is a Visiting Lecturer in the department of International Politics at City, University of London. She recently completed an ESRC SeNSS Postdoctoral Fellowship examining Global South populism and the contestation of the international order. Her research centres on populist authoritarianism, democratic backsliding and opposition contention, examined comparatively across Turkey and Venezuela, alongside work on securitisation theory and drone diplomacy. Begüm is also a content producer at the Equality-Justice-Woman Platform, a feminist civil society initiative based in Turkey and both her journalistic and academic work can be seen at begumzorlu.com
Candaş Ayan
Candaş Ayan is the International Relations Officer of the PSA Turkish Politics Specialist Group. He received his M.Sc. degree in Political Science from Middle East Technical University (METU) in 2020, and his Ph.D. degree in Political Science from Hacettepe University in 2026, where part of his doctoral research was conducted at the University of Glasgow. He is currently a Dr. Research Assistant at Hacettepe University (Ankara, Turkey). Candaş’s broader research and teaching interests lie in the areas of securitization theory, critical security studies and citizenship, comparative politics of authoritarian populism, gender and women’s movements, disinformation, and qualitative methods with a focus on discourse analysis. His doctoral research compares the securitization of women’s movements in Turkey and India under authoritarian-populist rule.
PSA Turkish Politics Specialist Group 