Taking stock of the Europeanization of civil society in Turkey: the case of NGOs

Abstract

In this chapter, our aim is to take stock of the European Union’s impact on the development of civil society in Turkey by analyzing how Turkish nongovernmental organizations (NGOs) have been impacted by Europeanization processes. It is fair to say that until the early 1990s, due to the strong state tradition and an organic vision of society, civil society in Turkey had remained weak, dependent on and controlled by state institutions. Although domestic and global factors contributing to civil society development in Turkey since the early 1990s ought not to be disregarded, Turkey’s EU candidacy (1999-2005) and later the accession processes (2005 to present) served as catalysts in enhancing the autonomy, agenda-setting power, institutional capacity and legitimacy of NGOs in Turkey. In this chapter, we will outline the main processes through which the EU has impacted NGOs in Turkey and critically evaluate the overall impact. In this stock-taking exercise, we build on what is by now a fairly extensive literature on the Europeanization of civil society in Turkey (Diez et al. 2005; Göksel and Güneş 2005; İçduygu 2007; Grigoriadis 2009; Ergun 2010; İçduygu 2011; Börzel and Soyaltın 2012; Öner 2012). This literature is characterized by multiple, and at times incompatible, understandings of civil society in Turkey and of its Europeanization. Therefore, in the next section, we begin by situating our definitions of civil society and Europeanization in the context of these other existing definitions. Then, in the third section of the chapter, we outline the main processes through which Turkish civil society has been affected by the EU. The fourth section critically assesses the extent of Europeanization in Turkish civil society. In conclusion, we summarize our assessments.