In 1963, Turkey and the European Union (EU) agreed on an Association Treaty. Turkey did not apply for EU membership until 1987 and this formal application was recognised at the EU summit in Helsinki as late as 1999. Political reforms in Turkey started in earnest after the Justice and Development Party (AKP) came to power in 2002, indicating a sincere interest in membership. As a result of these steps, the EU decided in 2004 to start negotiations; these began in 2005. Fairly soon thereafter, however, developments on both sides stalled and relations between the two deteriorated.
Civil-military relations in Turkey are changing as the country prepares for EU membership, and they will continue to change as accession draws closer. The contributors to this book have all been involved in the international project on governance and the military in Turkey, which ran from June 2004 until the end of May 2006. In this introduction, we will bring together some of the principal points they will make in the following chapters and add some observations and comments of our own.