The counterterrorism agreements of Europol with third countries: Data protection and power asymmetry

This article investigates empirically the impact of power asymmetry and interest formation in the European Union’s (EU) external relations with third countries in the context of the Europol data exchange and counterterrorism agreements. It focuses on three countries, namely the United States, Turkey, and Morocco, which each have a different level of counterterrorism cooperation with the EU. This article argues that the EU acts as a pragmatic actor with regard to Europol’s data exchange agreements with third countries, and that the power asymmetry between the EU and the third country under question determines the extent of the EU’s flexibility. If the power asymmetry favours the EU, then it insists on its data protection demands. Otherwise, the EU is more flexible towards its counterparts on data protection issues.     

Conquering versus democratizing the state: political Islamists and fourth wave democratization in Turkey and Tunisia

What do we learn from Turkey and Tunisia regarding the relationship between political Islamism and democratization? Variables identified by current research such as autonomy, “moderation”, and cooperation with secular actors can cut both ways depending on various political-institutional conditions and prerogatives. Particularly, the article argues that preoccupation with “conquering the state from within as opposed to democratizing it” has been a key priority and intervening variable undermining the democratizing potential of the main Turkish and Tunisian political Islamic actors – primarily the AKP and Ennahda. These actors have prioritized acceptance by and ownership of their respective nation states over other goals and strategies, such as revolutionary takeover or Islamization of the state and confrontations with state elites. This has led to a relative neglect of designing and building institutions, whether for Islamic or democratic transformation. Hence, while contributing to democratization at various stages, these actors have a predisposition to adopt and regenerate, reframe and at times augment the authoritarian properties of their states. Research should ask how secular and religious actors can agree on institutions of vertical and horizontal state accountability that would help to address the past and present sources of the interest of political Islamists in conquering rather than democratizing the state.     

Politics of Constituency Representation and Legislative Ambition under the Glare of Camera Lights

The introduction of legislative television as a transparency initiative has been welcomed in an increasing number of democracies. The impact of television cameras on parliamentary behavior, however, has received scant attention in systems where personal vote-earning attributes are thought to be of little importance (e.g., closed-list proportional representation). Additionally, studies examining this relationship relied exclusively on over-time variation in legislative behavior (i.e., before and after the introduction of television into parliament), which arguably has important deficiencies in demonstrating the true effect of legislative television. Capitalizing on a unique quasi-experimental setting, the present study aims to close these gaps in the literature by analyzing parliamentary activities in Turkey, where the legislative television was restricted to 3 days per week (Tuesday, Wednesday, and Thursday) in 2011 after almost two decades of continuous 7-day operation. Results based on original data sets of parliamentary activities from the pre- and postreform periods (2009–11 and 2011–13) indicate that the varying presence of television cameras exacerbated the effect of electoral and reputation-building motivations on parliamentary behavior, encouraging electorally unsafe and junior MPs to shift their constituency focus to the televised proceedings. The results offer important implications for the study of legislative transparency and constituency representation in party-list proportional representation systems.     

How the World Bank manages social risks: implementation of the Social Risk Mitigation Project in Turkey

This paper aims to assess the World Bank’s social risk management approach to poverty by focusing on the implementation details of the Social Risk Mitigation Project in Turkey, a World Bank project that depends on this approach. The paper looks at the approach through the concept of neoliberal governmentality, as an attempt to produce responsible poor citizens during a period when the responsibility for providing social services is transferred to the market and the family. By using field research it demonstrates that, with the intervention of local factors, several unintended consequences emerge in the implementation of a social risk management project. The article concludes that these outcomes, although not planned or intended, have all been instrumental in depoliticising poverty and the poor in the country. Moreover, in spite of all the problems and dissatisfaction, thanks to the Bank’s own portrayal, this project has contributed to the image of the Bank as a development institution that achieves successes in its fight with poverty.     

Turkish foreign policy in the post-Arab Spring era: from proactive to buffer state

Our globalising world is presently in a state of global turmoil. Risk, uncertainty, and insecurity are the terms that shape global/regional/national/local affairs and developments. The refugee crisis and the war against ISIL constitute the twin crises creating seismic impacts and consequences that in turn escalate risk and turmoil. Turkey is situated at the heart of these two crises, being very much affected by them and, therefore, perceived as a pivotal actor in the way in which the West is dealing with them. Yet, the West’s current instrumentalist and functionalist approach to Turkey as a buffer state designed to contain these two crises in the MENA does not offer an effective and sustainable solution to these crises, much less provide the stability and order that is direly needed in regional and global affairs.     

Turkish transformation and the Soviet Union: navigating through the Soviet historiography on Kemalism

Being founded in the wake of the First World War, both Turkey and the Soviet Union followed revolutionary modernizing pathways. At the outset, one could trace many similar patterns in their radical modernization paradigms; however, their development models as well as political and social orders were radically distinct, which became more obvious with the passage of time. The paper discusses the external interpretations of Kemalism by observing the Soviet perspectives on the inception and evolution of Kemalism. Paying more attention to diplomatic, geopolitical and economic complexities of the Turkish-Soviet relations, scholars have rarely problematized the Soviet Union perceptions of Turkish ideological transformations. In reality, since the early 1920s, different state institutions, intellectual schools of thought and research in the Soviet Union closely observed the domestic transformations in Turkey by providing valuable insights on the perspective and the implications of the Kemalist transformation. The article also looks at the question of how the incorporation of Soviet perspectives can enrich the historiography and our understanding of Kemalism.     

Regression Discontinuity diagnostics reveal statistical anomalies in Turkish elections

Using Regression Discontinuity diagnostics we document a number of statistical anomalies in the 2004 Turkish mayoral elections. The governing party that controls the parliament is much more likely to win close races than lose. Moreover, compared to close governing party losses, there is a sharp drop in turnout and contending party votes in close governing party wins. Finally, the parties that disproportionately lose very close races are exclusively ideological competitors of the governing party. Among the potential mechanisms that may create those anomalies, electoral manipulation seems to a plausible explanation. Those anomalies show that the outcomes of very close popular elections can be non-random and that the assumption of the continuity of the expected potential outcomes at the threshold could be violated. We discuss implications of our findings for Regression Discontinuity Designs and for understanding the consolidation of the right-wing electorate in Turkey during the last decade.     

Winds of Change? The June 2015 Parliamentary Election in Turkey

Held in an environment of growing social polarisation, fears of emergent authoritarianism, and economic challenges, Turkey’s June 2015 election ended the Adalet ve Kalk?nma Partisi’s (AKP’s) parliamentary majority, challenging its single-party rule for the first time in 13 years. This article first provides information on the background to the election, focusing on debates about the authoritarian tendencies of AKP, economic conditions, and the competition for the Kurdish vote. Then, a brief overview of the campaign period is presented, followed by an analysis of election results at the sub-national level. The article concludes with some preliminary discussion of the causes of the loss of AKP’s majority.