Turkey and the European Union

Facing New Challenges and Opportunities

Firat Cengiz,Lars Hoffmann

• Publisher: Routledge
• Year: 2013
• ISBN:
  9781134074624
• Edition: 1
• Topic: Law
• Subtopic: International Law
• Index: Law

In recent years, Turkey has become an ever more important actor on the international stage. However, Turkey-EU relations still remain in a state of flux. The EU and Turkey seem to have moved apart in their political aspirations after Turkey's EU accession talks faced a stalemate over the Republic of Cyprus' EU accession as a divided island. Likewise, both Turkey and the EU have recently faced new socio-political realities, such as the Eurozone crisis, the Arab Spring and the Turkish government's shifting foreign policy towards the Middle East region. Such developments have rendered EU membership potentially a less desirable prospect for an increasingly self-confident Turkey.

In light of these recent events, this book explores the evolving challenges and opportunities facing the more than 50-year old Turkey-EU relationship. This volume focuses particularly on the role of the Cyprus issue, the potential for closer Turkey-EU cooperation in the aftermath of the Arab Spring, the impact on Turkish citizens and politics, as well as the concept of Europeanization, especially in relation to Turkey's democratic reform process. In drawing together perspectives from the disciplines of international relations, political science and law, this book offers a unique, interdisciplinary outlook towards the changing role of Europe in Turkey's political discourse.

This book will be of interest to researchers and students of Turkey-EU relations, EU external relations Law, Europeanization and Turkish and Middle Eastern politics.

1 The European Union, Turkey and the Cyprus Problem: the Failure of a Catalyst

George Kyris

Introduction

The Cyprus problem has always been a ‘cornerstone’ of Turkish foreign policy. For years, Ankara took an inflexible stance towards the prospects of solution. The solution is understood here as the compromised form of a negotiated solution for a united Cyprus as a bizonal, bicommunal federation to which both communities and the international world are formally committed. However, the recognition of Turkey as a candidate for EU membership in 1999 was meant to profoundly impact the country’s position on the inter-communal dispute in the island. With the resolution of the Cyprus problem included in its accession conditionality, Turkey made a spectacular shift of policy and supported the UN Plan for the Comprehensive Settlement of the Cyprus Problem (‘the Annan Plan’), the UN-proposed blueprint for the reunification of the island based on a loose federation. Despite the support of Turkish Cypriots, who saw reunification and EU integration as the way out of their international isolation, the Annan Plan was rejected by the Greek Cypriots, who had safeguarded their EU entry as the Republic of Cyprus (RoC). As a result, Cyprus acceded to the EU as a divided country. After that, the impact of the EU on Turkey’s strategy towards Cyprus has changed significantly. Due to a variety of issues related to the EU and most importantly its less clear EU accession prospects, Turkey has displayed less flexibility compared with the pre-Annan era. This investigation of the ‘Europeanization’ of Ankara’s Cyprus policy in this post-2004 era is the aim of this chapter.

The first part of this chapter introduces the conceptual framework of Europeanization. The second part reflects on the importance of the Cyprus problem for Turkey and on how Brussels affected Ankara’s stance towards the dispute in the years leading up to the EU accession of Cyprus. In the third and main section, the various issues that shape the EU’s influence on Turkey’s position on the problem are discussed: these include the outcome of the Annan Plan referendums, the Greek Cypriot stance towards the dispute and Turkey, Turkey’s progress in EU accession and, lastly, rising Turkish Euroscepticism. Lastly, a conclusion summarizes the main arguments of the chapter, which largely draws on the analyses of official documents, policy discourse and elite interviews.

Europeanization and foreign policy: a conceptual framework

Notwithstanding the suggested ‘many faces of Europeanization’ (Olsen 2002), the majority of the literature seeks to explain Europeanization as a process via which the EU impacts domestic setting. In a seminal work, Ladrech terms Europeanization as a:

process re-orienting the direction and shape of politics to the degree that European [Union] political and economic dynamics become part of theorganisational logic of national politics and policy-making

(Ladrech 1994: 69)

Indeed, this chapter follows the widespread understanding of Europeanization as the process via which the EU impacts domestic politics, policy and polity (Ladrech 1994; Börzel 1999; Wallace 2000; Hix and Goetz 2001; Töller 2010). With an increased focus on change (Featherstone 2003), Börzel and Risse (2002) have attempted a useful categorization of the degree of change produced at the domestic level between absorption (minimal degree of change), accommodation (modest degree of change) and, lastly, transformation (large degree of change). This chapter focuses on policy change and, in particular, the impact of the EU on the Cyprus issue as a major foreign policy matter for the EU candidate Turkey.

Indeed, EU enlargement constitutes a fast-growing branch of the Europeanization literature, which aims to investigate how the process of accession has impacted candidate countries, with an added focus on conditionality (e.g. Grabbe 2001; Vachudova 2003; Glenn 2004). An important difference in conceptualizing Europeanization in the context of enlargement is that the process of EU-induced change has a much more ‘top-down’ character: when discussing the situation of the EU Member States, Europeanization is better understood as both a ‘top-down’ and ‘bottom-up’ process (Dyson and Goetz 2003: 20): a ‘circular’ rather than a unidirectional phenomenon (Goetz 2002), whereby EU Member States can ‘upload’ and ‘download’ policies at the same time (Connolly 2008), and shape and adapt to EU policy outcomes (Börzel and Risse 2002). In contrast, EU accession is better conceptualized as a predominantly top-down process, since the power asymmetry in favour of Brussels does not allow candidate countries to affect EU decision-making or the conditionality that becomes an avenue of their ‘Europeanization’.

This rather asymmetrical power equilibrium is also obvious in conditionality via which the EU might cause domestic change. Sedelmeier (2011) draws attention to the variable credibility of conditionality, which has two sides: on the one hand, candidates must be sure that meeting conditionality will bring the reward of EU membership (‘carrot’ of membership). On the other hand, the EU should also be explicit that failure to satisfy conditionality will lead to suspension of the promised reward (‘stick’). Besides, the credibility of the EU membership prize is also very important for the public support for EU accession, which seems to provide governments with additional room for Europeanization-induced reforms (Agh 1999: 841; Lippert et al. 2001: 1001–1002).

Lastly, the experience of EU enlargement is also very relevant to the socalled ‘goodness of fit’ thesis (Cowles et al. 2001; Börzel and Risse 2002; Featherstone and Radaelli 2003), which suggests that the bigger the ‘misfit’ between EU and national policies or structures the greater the degree of Europeanization-induced change is. For example, this was the case for the CEECs which joined the EU in the 2004 and 2007 enlargements, as well as Croatia, which became an EU member in July 2013. Discussing foreign policy, which lies at the centre of our investigation, Tsardanidis and Stavridis (2005: 220) suggest that Europeanization is best tested in ‘difficult cases’, in which foreign policy aims contradict the EU’s agenda; and that Europeanization is best conceptualized as a transformation of past national foreign policy priorities.

Europeanization is deployed to investigate the EU’s impact on the foreign policy of Turkey as a candidate for EU membership and, in particular, the Cyprus issue. Until now, the literature has extensively discussed how the promise of EU membership triggered a radical shift in Turkey’s policy on the Cyprus front, mostly manifested in more flexibility and support for reunification based on the Annan Plan (e.g. Çelenk 2007; Suvarierol 2003). Although there is indeed evidence of significant Europeanization of Turkish foreign policy in this regard, research seems to concentrate on the years leading up to the referendums on the UN-proposed plan. However, more recent years have seen a variety of new developments, not least the failure of the reunification plan and the EU accession of the RoC, coupled with a decreasing momentum in Turkey’s EU accession. For that reason, the post Annan era becomes particularly significant in understanding to what extent the ‘Europeanization’ of Turkish foreign policy continues in the same way and degree. The pre- and post-Annan eras are addressed respectively in the next two sections.

The pre-Annan era: the EU catalyst

Undoubtedly, the Cyprus problem has been a ‘totemic’ issue of Turkish foreign policy agenda. For years, the government of Turkey was inflexible towards the prospects of a solution (e.g. Kazan 2002). After Cyprus gained independence as the RoC – the partnership state between Greek Cypriots and Turkish Cypriots – ongoing inter-communal conflict led to the gradual division of the island into two administrative and territorial zones: the once bi-communal RoC is monopolized by the Greek Cypriots in the south, while Turkish Cypriots retired in the north under their secessionist State of the Turkish Republic of Northern Cyprus (TRNC), which was self-declared in 1983. To date, the international community does not recognize the Turkish Cypriot administration and continues to regard the now Greek Cypriot-led RoC as the legitimate government of the country. In contrast, Ankara has shown continuous support for the autonomous existence of Turkish Cypriots. This position often implicated the efforts for reunification based on a federative basis, as agreed by the two communities of the island and supported by the international community.¹ Despite this historical inflexibility, the prospects of EU membership led to a profound ‘Europeanization’ of Turkish policy towards the Cyprus issue.

The EU’s influence on Ankara’s policy towards the Cyprus issue began with the application of the RoC, as represented by the Greek Cypriots, for EU membership in 1990. In those early stages of Cyprus’ accession, the EU seemed (indirectly) to strengthen Turkish intransigence. The application of the Greek Cypriots in the name of the country as a whole frustrated both Ankara and north Nicosia and hardened their position (see Çelenk 2007: 350; Suvarierol 2003: 58). In 1998, the opening of EU accession negotiations for the RoC but not for Turkey pushed Ankara to further intransigence; and it resulted in the signing of a joint declaration by Turkey and the Turkish Cypriots that provided for greater integration between them and attacked the legitimacy of Cyprus’ EU accession process:

… the EU membership of Cyprus can be taken up in discussions once the final political settlement is reached … as stipulated by the 1959 Zurich and London Agreements, Cyprus cannot join international political and economic unions to which Turkey and Greece are not members

(Republic of Turkey 2008)

Until that moment, the role of the EU in Turkey’s policy towards Cyprus was rather peripheral, given the low intensity of relations between Ankara and Brussels and the limited intentions of the latter to actively affect Turkey’s foreign agenda. However, the EU began to play a role in Ankara’s policy towards Cyprus, when Turkey was recognized as a candidate for EU membership (European Council 1999) subject to its contribution to the resolution of the Cyprus problem. This set the stage for a transformative process of Europeanization of Turkish foreign policy.

Turkey’s ‘ticket’ for EU membership was meant to change the role of the EU in Ankara’s stance vis-à-vis the Cyprus problem. Initially, Turkey stayed defensive. In reaction to the outcome of the Helsinki Summit, the then Turkish Prime Minister (PM) Bülent Ecevit stated that ‘existence of the TRNC is inevitable not only for Turkish Cypriots, but also for Turkey’s security’(Anatolia 1999). This support of the self-declared Turkish Cypriot State contradicted international efforts for reunification based on a compromise and a federal formula. Even after the start of fresh UN-supported negotiations between Greek Cypriots and Turkish Cypriots in 2002, the Deputy PM Mesut Yilmaz reconfirmed Ankara’s mantra that ‘there exist two different nations and two sovereign states in the island’ and reiterated that Turkey’s EU membership could not be associated with a settlement of the Cyprus problem (Turkish Daily News 2002a, 2002b). Nevertheless, a series of developments would put a dramatic end to this inflexible policy.

First of all, the rise of the AKP in late 2002 changed Turkey’s view of the Cyprus problem in relation to the EU. The new government put EU accession high on the list of its priorities and, therefore, supported resolution of the inter-communal dispute in Cyprus, which was included in the conditionality of EU accession. Indeed, this was a policy choice that yielded extensive public support, given the appeal that EU membership enjoyed (European Commission 2004b). As a result, shortly after the formation of the first AKP government, PM Recep Tayyip Erdoğan set the tone for a more flexible position declaring that ‘[he was] not in favour of the continuation of the policy that [had] been maintained in Cyprus over the past thirty to forty years’ (The Independent 2003).

In addition to the significance of EU accession for the newly elected government, a series of other factors contributed to a change in Ankara’s policy towards the Cyprus problem, some of which still directly relate to the EU. First, the clear parliamentary majority that the AKP secured allowed the party to make radical policy choices. A more flexible strategy was also welcome due to the strategic interest of Turkey in preventing a Greek Cypriotdominated State’s accession to the EU that could damage the country’s own European aspirations (Suvarierol 2003: 66) but also due to the growing Turkish Cypriot pro-solution attitudes (see also Christophorou 2005). At the same time, domestic scepticism against AKP’s potentially Islamic agenda led Erdoğan to prioritize Cyprus settlement in order to gain international support and, through that, fortify his domestic position (Oktay and Kinacioğlu 2006: 264). Lastly, Turkey’s improving ties with the EU Member State Greece also played a positive role, as Ankara recognized that better relations between the two sides of the Aegean would contribute to its EU ambitions (Barkey and Gordon 2001; Ker-Lindsay ...

Table of contents

• Cover
• Half Title
• Title Page
• Copyright Page
• Dedication
• Table of Contents
• List of contributors
• Acknowledgements
• Table of cases
• Table of statutes
• Introduction
• 1 The European Union, Turkey and the Cyprus problem: the failure of a catalyst
• 2 The Cyprus issue and Turkey's accession negotiations: catalyst effect or Gordian knot?
• 3 The Cyprus Challenge in Turkey-EU relations: heading towards the defining moment?
• 4 The Arab Spring and regional integration: can the European Union and Turkey co-operate?
• 5 Turkey in progress: foreign policy, geopolitics and democracy
• 6 Explaining the rise of Euroscepticism in the Turkish political elite
• 7 Free movement of Turkish citizens after the Soysal judgment
• 8 The AKP's shifting support for EU accession: secular constraints, organizational capacities and religious ideas
• 9 Rethinking conditionality: gender equality and the Kurdish issue in Turkey's EU accession framework
• 10 The domestic effects of Turkey's EU accession negotiations: a missed opportunity for Europe?
• 11 The European Union and political reform in Turkey: moving beyond conditionality
• Conclusions
• Epilogue
• Index