Hostname: page-component-84b7d79bbc-tsvsl Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-07-30T14:49:15.508Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

Moving in from the Margins? Turkey in Europe

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  28 February 2024

Caglar Keyder
Caglar Keyder*
Affiliation:
Department of Sociology, Bogazici University and Department of Sociology, State University of New York, Binghamton
Get access Rights & Permissions [Opens in a new window]

Abstract

Historically Turkey has been the ‘other’ for Europe. Turkish identity has taken shape via an ambivalent relationship with an idealized Europe. There was resentment due to the perception of exclusion, but also an intense desire to belong. As the project of official association with the European Union progressed, each of the partners had to ask questions about the meaning of culture and identity. At first there was a conviction that the prospect of entry would never turn into reality. The entrenched state elite in Turkey could therefore go through the steps with impunity. However, after the 1990s, new Turkish social groups, independent of the state elite, took the project more seriously, and embarked on serious democratization, as promised in various agreements with the EU. At the same time the Union experienced a similar reversal, with Brussels envisaging Turkey's accession as a real possibility. This new alignment of forces led to an intense debate on the topics of European identity and the frontiers of Europe. If the EU opts for a more constitutional and less cultural representation of the meaning of Europe - thereby implying that its borders could extend even further in the future - then Turkey's accession may well take place.

Type
Research Article
Information
Diogenes , Volume 53 , Issue 2 , May 2006 , pp. 72 - 81
Copyright
Copyright © ICPHS 2006

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

Armbruster, Heidi, Rollo, Craig and Meinhof, Ulrike (2003) ‘Imagining Europe: Everyday Narratives in European Border Communities’, Journal of Ethnic and Migration Studies 29(5): 885–900.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Brewin, Christopher (2003) ‘A Changing Turkey: Europe's Dilemma’, Journal of Southern Europe and the Balkans 5(2): 137–145.Google Scholar
Delanty, R. (1998) ‘Social Theory and European Transformation: Is there a European Society?’, Sociological Research Online, 3(1). <http://www.socresonline.org.uk/socresonline/3/1/1.html>CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Gunes-Ayata, Ayse (2003) ‘From Euro-scepticism to Turkey-scepticism: Changing Political Attitudes on the European Union in Turkey’, Journal of Southern Europe and the Balkans 5(2): 205–222.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Huntington, Samuel (1996) The Clash of Civilizations and the Remaking of World Order. New York: Simon and Schuster.Google Scholar
Jung, Dietrich and Piccoli, Wolfango (2001) Turkey at the Crossroads. London: Zed Books.Google Scholar
Keyder, Caglar (1993) ‘The Dilemma of Cultural Identity on the Margin of Europe’, Review: winter.Google Scholar
Keyder, Caglar (1997) ‘Whither the Project of Modernity? Turkey in the 1990s’, in Bozdogan, S. and Kasaba, R. (eds), Rethinking the Project of Modernity in Turkey. Seattle: University of Washington Press.Google Scholar
Keyder, Caglar (2005) ‘A History and Geography of Turkish Nationalism’, in Birtek, F. and Dragonas, T. (eds), Citizenship and the Nation-State in Greece and Turkey. London: Frank Cass.Google Scholar
Önis, Ziya (2003) ‘Domestic Politics, International Norms and Challenges to the State: Turkey–EU Relations in the Post-Helsinki Era’, in Carkoglu, Ali and Rubin, Barry (eds), Turkey and the European Union: Domestic Politics, Economic Integration and International Dynamics. London: Frank Cass.Google Scholar
Poulantzas, Nicos (1975) The Crisis of the Dictatorships: Portugal, Greece, Spain. London: New Left Books.Google Scholar
Sjursen, Helene (2000) ‘Why Expand? The Question of Justification in the EU's Enlargement Policy’, ARENA Working Papers, WP 01/6.Google Scholar
Sofos, Spyros A. (2000) ‘Reluctant Europeans? European Integration and the Transformation of Turkish Politics’, South European Society and Politics, 5(2): autumn.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Tully, James (2002) ‘The Kantian Idea of Europe: Critical and Cosmopolitan Perspectives’, in Pagden, Anthony (ed.), The Idea of Europe from Antiquity to the European Union. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.Google Scholar