Talking Past while Needing One Another: The Complex and Ambiguous Relationship between the EU and Türkiye

Year 2024, Volume: 33 Issue: 2, 187 - 204, 24.10.2024

Damla Cihangir Tetik , Thomas Diez

https://doi.org/10.26650/siyasal.2024.33.1422435

Abstract

The Republic of Türkiye was one hundred years old by October 29, 2023. This also means 100 years of the Turkish Republic’s foreign policy and diplomacy, 100 years of engagement with Europe, and an ambiguous relationship between the EU and Türkiye. In this paper, we argue that the relationship has always been characterised by competing forces of alignment and distancing from both sides. Thus, instead of glorifying EU-Türkiye relations or deploring their demise, in this study, we want to point to the ambiguities of the relationship around five themes in which both cooperation, harmonisation and conflict, divergence occur the most: identity, integration, economy, society, and security. We believe that these are both the main forces behind and affected by Türkiye’s 100-year-old Europeanization process. In conclusion, we attempt to clarify that specific historical junctures and circumstances have benefitted different sides in their struggles against each other, and the result is a complex web of entanglements and ruptures that defies reductionist characterisations as “pro-“ or “anti-European” in the past and today as well. Yet, we explain that Türkiye and Europe are entangled too deeply to completely break apart and too diverse to be attached to a clearly delineated joint future.

Keywords

European Union, Türkiye, EU-Türkiye Relations, Turkish Foreign Policy, Turkish Politics

Birbirine İhtiyaç Duyarken Geçmişi Konuşmak: AB ve Türkiye arasındaki Karmaşık ve Muğlak İlişki

Abstract

29 Ekim 2023 itibariyle Türkiye Cumhuriyeti yüz yılını geride bıraktı. Bu aynı zamanda, Türkiye Cumhuriyeti dış politikasının, diplomasisinin, Avrupa ve AB ile süregelen muğlak ilişkisinin yüz yılı demek. Biz bu makalede Türkiye ve Avrupa arasındaki son yüz yıllık ilişkinin iki tarafta çekişen farklı güç odaklarının yer yer uyumlaşması ama bazen de birbirlerine mesafe koymaları şeklinde karakterize edildiğini iddia ediyoruz. Bu nedenle, bu çalışmada, AB-Türkiye ilişkilerini övmek ya da gelinen noktaya hayıflanmak yerine hem işbirliğinin hem de çekişmenin en fazla olduğu şu beş farklı alanda ilişkinin muğlaklığına işaret etmek istiyoruz; kimlik, bütünleşme, ekonomi, toplum ve güvenlik. Bu alanların hepsinin Türkiye’nin yüz yıllık Avrupalılaşma sürecinin arkasındaki ve süreci etkileyen temel faktörler olduğuna inanıyoruz. Sonuç olarak, özel tarihsel kesişim noktalarının ve koşulların farklı taraflara birbirlerine karşı yürüttükleri mücadelede faydalar sağladığını ve bunun sonucunun geçmişte ve günümüzde dahi “Avrupa yanlısı” veya “karşıtı” şeklinde var olan indirgemeci karakterleştirmelere kafa tutan karmaşık bir zorluklar ve uyuşmazlıklar ağı olduğuna açıklık getirmeye çalışıyoruz. Ayrıca, Türkiye ve AB’nin tamamen birbirlerinden kopamayacak kadar derin bir şekilde iç içe geçmiş olduklarını, ancak açıkça tanımlanmış ortak bir geleceğe baş koyamayacak kadar da birbirlerinden ayrı olduklarını açıklıyoruz.

Keywords

Avrupa Birliği, Türkiye, AB-Türkiye İlişkileri, Türk Dış Politikası, Türk Siyasal Hayat

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