Riccardo Gasco

Riccardo Gasco is a PhD Candidate in International Relations at the University of Bologna, Department of Political and Social Sciences. His doctoral research examines Turkey’s foreign policy behavior as a regional power navigating between NATO and Russia. Drawing on neoclassical realism and Foreign Policy Analysis, his project analyzes Turkey’s alliance strategies, strategic autonomy, and balancing acts in key conflict scenarios including Syria, Libya, Ukraine and Nagorno-Karabakh.

His broader research interests include alliance politics, regional power dynamics, transatlantic relations, Turkish-Russian relations, and the evolution of the international order in a multipolar era. He employs a mixed-method approach combining process tracing, discourse analysis, and elite interviews.

Riccardo is currently Foreign Policy Program Coordinator at IstanPol Institute and a Visiting Fellow at the Istanbul Policy Center. In addition to academic publications, he regularly contributes policy briefs and commentary on Turkish foreign policy and Middle Eastern geopolitics.