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1. A Year After Euromaidan: Pro-European Forces Wins the New Parliament

Author:
Olexiy Haran and Maria Zolkina
Publication Date:
05-2015
Content Type:
Journal Article
Journal:
Insight Turkey
Institution:
SETA Foundation for Political, Economic and Social Research
Abstract:
Mass protests in Maidan, the central square of Kyiv, during the bitter cold winter of 2013-2014, known as 'Euromaidan' or 'Revolution of Dignity' were non-violent for more than two months. The demonstrations began when, under Russian pressure, former President Viktor Yanukovych abruptly resisted in signing the long promised Association Agreement with the EU. However, when President Yanukovych, reputed for his corruption and authoritarian style, responded to the peaceful protests by violent repression, Euromaidan quickly moved beyond its initial slogans and demanded the president's resignation. In February 2014, after security forces started to shoot protesters, Ukraine became one of the only countries in the world where a hundred people died “under the EU flags” defending democracy and the European choice. In this context, according to the agreement signed on February 21, 2014, between the opposition and President Yanukovych, the parliament returned to the 2004 constitutional reform and, consequently, combined a parliamentary-presidential form of government. The 2004 constitutional reform had previously been unconstitutionally abolished by President Yanukovych in 2010 and its restoration was among the main demands of the Euromaidan.
Topic:
Government
Political Geography:
Europe and Ukraine

2. Guests And Hosts: European Retirees In Coastal Turkey

Author:
Canan Balkir and İlkay Südaş
Publication Date:
05-2015
Content Type:
Journal Article
Journal:
Insight Turkey
Institution:
SETA Foundation for Political, Economic and Social Research
Abstract:
As a country in transition from emigration to immigration, Turkey hosts many diverse migrant groups, creating a very dynamic research field to explore. Amongst them, European retirees have settled in the coastal Turkish Riviera. This paper tries to understand the perspectives of both retired EU migrants and local hosts on migration and settlement processes. After briefly describing the geographical distribution of EU citizens in Turkey, the paper focuses on the demographic characteristics and socio-economic integration of retired migrants in Antalya, the most popular destination in Turkey.
Topic:
Economics
Political Geography:
Europe and Turkey

3. Negotiating Modernity and Europeanness in the Germany-Turkey Transnational Social Field

Author:
Susan Beth Rottmann
Publication Date:
05-2015
Content Type:
Journal Article
Journal:
Insight Turkey
Institution:
SETA Foundation for Political, Economic and Social Research
Abstract:
In conversation with recent work on transnational social fields, this article explores how Germany and Turkey are linked through a “set of multiple, interlocking, networks of social relationships” . The article examines how the social field affects migrants returning from Germany to Turkey. Specifically, it describes how the transnational social field emerges through a concrete set of economic, political and cultural exchanges. It also illustrates that the social field is a space of imaginations of Germany and Turkey, reflecting and producing citizens' uncertainties about the “Europeanness”. For German-Turkish return migrants, the transnational social field exacerbates conflicts with non-migrants and fosters anxieties about migrants' “Germanization” and loss of “Turkishness.” Ultimately, this research shows that Turkish citizens remain deeply concerned about the meaning of modernity, Muslim citizenship in Germany, and Turkey's current and future position in Europe.
Topic:
Economics
Political Geography:
Europe, Turkey, and Germany

4. Stuck on the Way to Europe? Iranian Transit Migration to Turkey

Author:
Judith Zijlstra
Publication Date:
05-2015
Content Type:
Journal Article
Journal:
Insight Turkey
Institution:
SETA Foundation for Political, Economic and Social Research
Abstract:
This article discusses Turkey's increasing role as a country of immigration by using the case study of Iranian migration to Turkey. While Turkey predominantly functions as a transit country for Iranians on their way to the West, this article will focus on a small group of Iranian migrants who went to Turkey with the purpose of transit but eventually settled down in the country. At the same time, the article investigates the concepts of “transit” and “settlement” among a growing group of Iranian students who entered Turkish universities in recent years. In which ways can these students be compared to other Iranian migrants in Turkey? And to what extent are Turkey's institutions for higher education becoming an easy channel for migrants looking for ways to leave their home country?
Topic:
Migration
Political Geography:
Europe, Iran, and Turkey

5. The Rise of China and Chinese International Relations

Author:
Emilian Kavalski
Publication Date:
05-2015
Content Type:
Journal Article
Journal:
Insight Turkey
Institution:
SETA Foundation for Political, Economic and Social Research
Abstract:
The discussion of China's growing prominence in international life has attracted the increasing attention of policy-makers, the public and scholars alike. Usually sidelined by the mainstream, such interest in China's role and position in global politics has grown exponentially in the context of the deepening concomitant economic, social and political crises across Europe and North America – which, until very recently, were considered the traditional locales of power and influence in world politics. Indicative of the emerging weight and significance of non-Western actors on the global stage, the trend set by China seems to challenge the conventional framework of the study and practice of International Relations (IR).
Topic:
International Relations and Economics
Political Geography:
China, Europe, and North America

6. Dynamics of Energy Governance in Europe and Russia

Author:
Sreemati Ganguli
Publication Date:
04-2014
Content Type:
Journal Article
Journal:
Insight Turkey
Institution:
SETA Foundation for Political, Economic and Social Research
Abstract:
Dynamics of Energy Governance in Europe and Russia Relations between Europe and Russia in the post-Cold War era constitute a fascinating area of study, as it involves many interlinked socioeconomic and political issues. Significantly, the events that shaped the political landscape of contemporary Europe, i.e., the reunification of Germany and collapse of the Soviet domination of East Europe, were precursors to the disintegration of the Soviet Union. The book under discussion focuses on the issue of energy governance in Europe and Russia, which is significant as both Russia and Europe share a flourishing codependent energy trade relation and the issue touches on many areas of common bilateral concern- political, economic, technological, environmental, bureaucratic and legal. The book has twelve chapters, divided in three thematic sections, apart from Introduction, Conclusion and Afterword. It represents a culmination of debates exchanged through the Political Economy of Energy in Europe and Russia (PEEER) network and approaches the entire issue through the theoretical approach of International Political Economy. Essentially, the book aims to focus on multiple actors and institutions that shape the policy processes of energy governance in Europe and Russia, in the context of an interlinked and interdependent global, regional and local scenario. In the first section on “Transnational Dynamics” the focus is on legal issues. Tatiana Romanova discusses EU-Russian energy relations in the context of legal approximation (Article 55 of the EU-Russian Partnership and Cooperation Agreement), noting two particular focal points – the improvement of the energy trade scenario and the clean energy agenda. Daniel Behn and Vitally Pogoretskyy analyze the system of dual gas pricing in Russia and its impact on EU imports. They raise an important debate between the Statist and Liberal approaches by questioning the consistency of this system with WTO regulations. For Anatole Boute, the export of European foreign energy efficiency rules to non-EU countries, especially Russia, has the potential to become the cornerstone of the EU's new energy diplomacy, to meet the challenges of a secure energy supply from Russia, and to mitigate bilateral climate concerns. M. F. Keating, on the other hand, deals with the connection between and possible harmonization of global best practices (to systemically use competition, regulation and privatization to reform the energy sector) and the EU's energy security agenda.
Topic:
Cold War and Governance
Political Geography:
Russia, Europe, and Germany

7. Picknick mit den Paschas: Aleppo und die levantinische Handelsfirma Fratelli Poche (1853-1880) Mafalda Ade

Author:
Metin Atmaca
Publication Date:
04-2014
Content Type:
Journal Article
Journal:
Insight Turkey
Institution:
SETA Foundation for Political, Economic and Social Research
Abstract:
Picknick mit den Paschas: Aleppo und die levantinische Handelsfirma Fratelli Poche (1853-1880) Studies on the Europeans who lived in the Ottoman Empire have been mostly conducted through the Ottoman and European state archives. Few works on the social history are based on private papers, such as Beshara Doumani's work, Rediscovering Palestine: Merchants and Peasants in Jabal Nablus, 1700-1900 (Berkeley and Los Angeles: University of California Press, 1995). As scholars of the Ottoman social history focus on the ethnic and religious minorities, foreigners, merchants, peasants, and women, such archives have become more precious than ever in order to reconstruct the story of understudied subjects. Ade's book takes its power from this background, as she skillfully uses the private archives of Poche and Marcopoli families, which were discovered in the 1990s. Comprised of two separate folios, the trade firms of both families kept chronologically archived accounting books, daily payments, warehouse books, and deadline records of payments from 1853 until 1921. Apart from family papers, there are memoirs, the archives of European vice-consulates, accounting and trade books, and documents from state archives in Aleppo, Istanbul, Paris and Nantes. After the Ottomans took over Aleppo, the city became a trade terminus for the mercantile coming from the Asia and a maritime link for European merchants. In a few decades time, most European consular representations and trade companies moved their centers from Damascus and Tripoli to Aleppo, which became the third largest urban center in the Ottoman realm after Istanbul and Cairo. Aleppo was not only in the middle of the empire but also a major city in the Arab territories on the cultural boundary of the Turkish and Arab population, which was made up of Kurds, Arabs, Turks, Christians, Jews and Bedouins. The city kept its status as one of the most active trade centers in the Eastern territories of the Ottoman Empire until late 19th century.
Topic:
Reform
Political Geography:
Europe, California, and Palestine

8. he Story of Islamic Philosophy

Author:
Sajjad H. Rizvi
Publication Date:
04-2014
Content Type:
Journal Article
Journal:
Insight Turkey
Institution:
SETA Foundation for Political, Economic and Social Research
Abstract:
The Story of Islamic Philosophy You cannot judge a book by its cover – or even its title. Now and then, a work comes along that forces us to take notice of what the author means by giving his work a particular title. Certainly, those who pick up The Story of Islamic Philosophy might expect a conventional history of the philosophical endeavour in the world of Islam, starting with the translation movement and the appropriation of Aristotelianism and ending with the 'eclipse' of 'rational discourse' in medieval mysticism and obscurantism. The study of philosophy in Islam is rather polarised: the traditional academic field of 'Arabic philosophy' starts with the Graeco-Arabica and is very much in the mould of understanding what the Arabs owed to the Greeks and then what the Latins owed the Arabs. This book is a story of Aristotle arabus and then latinus, and hence it is not surprising that the story culminates with the ultimate Aristotelian, Averroes. Many Arab intellectuals, such as the late Muḥammad ʿĀbid al-Jābirī, have been sympathetic to such readings and wished to revive a sort of Averroist Aristotelianism in the name of reason and enlightenment. In particular, they wished to save the Arab-Islamic heritage from its 'perversion' by the Persians, starting with Avicenna and Ghazālī who initiated the shift from reason and discourse to mystagogy and 'unreason.' The models for this tradition of philosophy are the Metaphysics and the Organon of Aristotle. However, the Greek heritage was always much more than Aristotle – Plato and the thoroughly neoplatonised Aristotle were critical. If anything, a serious historical engagement with the course of philosophy in the late antiquity period, on the cusp of the emergence of Islam, demonstrates that philosophy was much more than abstract reasoning, discourse and a linearity of proof.
Topic:
Islam
Political Geography:
Europe and Arabia

9. Democratization and Relations with the EU in the AK Party Period: Is Turkey Really Making Progress?

Author:
Paul Kubicek
Publication Date:
02-2014
Content Type:
Journal Article
Journal:
Insight Turkey
Institution:
SETA Foundation for Political, Economic and Social Research
Abstract:
This brief commentary assesses the progress made by Turkey under the Justice and Development Party (the AK Party) toward European Union (EU) membership and democratization. While it acknowledges positive steps, it notes that the goals of EU accession and democratic consolidation remain elusive. One consideration is that the expectations or “goalposts” for both have moved so that, relative to the objectives of those supporting democratic freedoms and Europeanization, progress in Turkey has still been rather modest. While the democratization package of September 2013 offers some hope for democratization, it remains difficult to see substantial progress in terms of joining the EU.
Topic:
Development
Political Geography:
Europe and Turkey

10. Euro-Turks in the Contemporary European Imaginary

Author:
Raymond Taras
Publication Date:
02-2014
Content Type:
Journal Article
Journal:
Insight Turkey
Institution:
SETA Foundation for Political, Economic and Social Research
Abstract:
Do perceptions of Muslim communities differ among receiving European societies? Are attitudes towards Euro-Turks more critical than other groups? Do Euro-Turks feel marginalized and recognize social distance from the majority? This paper presents data from cross-national research projects to assess the social distance between national majority and Muslim minorities, in particular Euro-Turks. It also considers the extent to which religion, ethnicity, and culture help shape Islamophobia and anti-Turkish attitudes. Social distance is not treated as a proxy variable for discrimination or exclusion, but it serves as an indicator of the possible marginalization of Euro-Turks. Further, increasing social distance between majority and minority Muslim groups may also serve as a reliable indicator of a Europe in crisis, confronting its multiple conflicting identities.
Political Geography:
Europe