The sixth and final meeting of the 2025–2026 Term of the GRF Young Professionals Program, which aims to provide a platform for young professionals equipped with the resolve, background, and experience to contribute to the future of Türkiye and the world, was held on September 26, 2026, at Yapı Kredi Plaza D Block. The meeting explored the transformation of global politics, the implications of artificial intelligence for international relations, and the broader social and political consequences of the attention economy.

The program opened with remarks by GRF President Ambassador (R) Timur Söylemez, who shared his assessments of the current trajectory of global politics, the transformation of the international system, and Türkiye’s foreign policy agenda.

The meeting continued with Dr. Ali Çınar, part-time lecturer at Boğaziçi University, who drew in part on his experience in the United States to discuss the current and prospective implications of rapid advances in artificial intelligence for international relations, state capacity, and global power dynamics. Against the backdrop of an increasingly close relationship between technological and geopolitical competition, the discussion considered the new opportunities and challenges that artificial intelligence presents for states and other international actors.

In the second part of the meeting, Aslıhan Begüm Gökçınar Ateşağaoğlu, Director of Corporate Communications and Brand Management at Istanbul Metropolitan Municipality Subsidiaries, delivered a presentation titled “The Attention Economy: Technology, Social Bonds and the Future of Democratic Order.” Starting from the scarcity of attention in an environment of information abundance, the presentation examined the growing transformation of attention into a measurable and monetizable resource. The discussion addressed the effects of digital platforms on individual behavior and social relations through such themes as the commodification of attention, loneliness and changing forms of belonging, algorithmic visibility, disinformation, and the democratic public sphere. Particular emphasis was placed on understanding the attention crisis not solely as a matter of individual choice or self-control, but within the broader technological, economic, and institutional structures that shape it.

The principal reference materials for the meeting included Chris Hayes’ The Sirens’ Call, Noreena Hertz’s The Lonely Century, Jenny Odell’s How to Do Nothing, Vincent F. Hendricks and Camilla Mehlsen’s The Ministry of Truth: BigTech’s Influence on Facts, Feelings and Fictions, and Johann Hari’s Stolen Focus. The preparatory materials also included Daniel Immerwahr’s New Yorker article “What If the Attention Crisis Is All a Distraction?”, Herbert A. Simon’s foundational work on the economics of attention, and selected academic studies on collective attention, digital platforms, and democratic governance.