Paper Titles & Abstracts

The study of EU conditionality and its effects on democratization have been a popular research area especially since the 1990's. The "democracy effect" of EU membership had been demonstrated during the 1970's and 80's with the accession of previously authoritarian countries into the EU. The cases of Central and East European countries were different since they passed through a quite long period of preparation for eventual membership to the EU. The Copenhagen criteria have been lampposts that guided the reform process in these countries. The same may be also said of Turkey, a country which was under the same obligation to fulfil the political aspects of the Copenhagen criteria if it wished to become a member to the EU. This process spurred a period of extensive reform which had the overall effect of democratising the political system. However, seven years after the start of accession negotiations, Turkey is still faced with serious criticisms regarding its democracy and human rights record. Its democracy is mainly criticised for the executive's authoritarian tendencies, existence of polarisation between government and opposition, lack of dialogue between political parties, and insufficient consultation mechanisms with civil society. These criticisms are also coupled with problems in basic human rights such as freedom of expression, freedom of the media and the independence, impartiality and effectiveness of the judiciary. It should also be added that Turkey is undergoing a period of transition with regard to its internal system where values of the Republic are being redefined and recalibrated. Against this background, the paper will aim to answer the question whether it would be appropriate to define Turkish democracy as a majoritarian democracy with insufficient representation by minority views and if so what this would mean in terms of the relationship between EU conditionality and democratisation.