Europeanization and Civil Society

Turkish NGOs as Instruments of Change?

M. Ketola

• Publisher: Palgrave Macmillan
• Year: 2013
• Print ISBN: 9781137034519
• eBook ISBN: 9781137034526
• Topic: Social Sciences
• Subtopic: European Politics
• Index: Social Sciences

Do NGOs strengthen Turkey's efforts at Europeanization and democratization or do they use EU funding to serve other interests?This book offers a critical investigation of the relationship between Turkish NGOs and the European Union (EU) and a nuanced assessment of the opportunities and limitations to fashioning social change by funding NGOs.

1

Introduction

Civil society plays an intrinsic part in the European Union (EU) enlargement process, making Turkish civil society an important actor in Turkey’s pre-accession process for EU membership. This book aims to capture some of the main characteristics of this relationship between the EU and Turkish non-governmental organizations (NGOs),¹ and in so doing develops the following overarching argument. First of all, EU civil society policy, by its very nature, employs an external agenda for reform that rarely accommodates the nature of the domestic socio-political environment. Secondly, NGOs do not passively accept this agenda but operate as autonomous agents, often circumventing and resisting the aims and objectives of the externally conceived programme of civil society support. As such, the book intends to highlight the importance of informal domestic rules and norms that determine how NGOs choose to internalize the agenda introduced by EU civil society policy. Ultimately this interplay between the external and internal means that the outcomes of EU civil society funding in Turkey are inherently unpredictable.

In the current phase of the process, Turkey and the EU have engaged in a period of ‘harmonization’ where Turkey is committed to adopting the acquis² of the European Union. In other words, Turkey is facing a momentous process of change as it executes the required policy reforms. The role envisaged for civil society has much to do with an increased engagement in the policymaking arena, and as such civil society initiatives have largely concentrated on NGOs. The underlying expectations suggest that NGOs can facilitate the reform process by offering an avenue for dialogue with the public as well as an alternative party to be consulted during policymaking. Conceptually, this kind of behaviour by NGOs links up with notions of change that have been captured by the terms ‘Europeanization’ and ‘democratization’.

But how does such a vision relate to Turkish civil society that is both culturally and historically different from European civil societies? For some observers civil society in Turkey exists more in quantity than in quality (Şimşek, 2004, p. 252; Kalaycıoğu, 2004), referring to the fact that even though, numerically speaking, Turkish civil society has developed tremendously, the behaviour of civil society actors has been such that the qualitative impact on the processes of democratization and Europeanization remains limited. At the same time civil society has been identified as a key arena where both of these processes are expected to unfold (Göle, 1994; Keyman and Öniş, 2007; Keyman and Icduygu, 2003; Kubicek, 2005; Tocci, 2005). It is the apparent disconnect between the importance attached to civil society in theoretical and policymaking terms as an engine of transformative processes and the practical limitations for civil society to effectively manage this role that is of concern here. Does civil society in Turkey generate the kind of response that the Europeanization and democratization policies expect?

The chapters in this book engage with these questions. The relationship between the EU and Turkish civil society is poised between two sets of interests that possess an air of incommensurability. For the EU, Turkish civil society is one of the means to exact change required by the EU accession process. This policy of Europeanization, which aims at meeting accession conditions such as full compliance with the EU acquis, is realized through a unidirectional set of requirements that reflects the bureaucratic demands of ‘EUization’ and pays less attention to the reality of NGO existence on the ground Diez, Agnantopoulos and Kaliber, 2005, p. 2).

Turkish NGOs, however, are not passive recipients of these policies. Domestic pressures and issues interweave with the opportunities brought about by EU funding. Precisely because a gap exists between the EU and NGO expectations, the latter are compelled to search for locally meaningful responses to the opportunities and challenges that EU funding poses. NGOs expect their contribution to be taken seriously, in the sense of being more than mere vehicles that can be used to complete projects. They expect to be treated more as equal partners who bring something unique to the partnership and should have more influence in determining the ‘what’ and ‘how’ elements of projects. Their reactions are determined by these expectations together with the domestic political context. Whether NGOs deem these expectations to be met is at least partly determined by the capacity of the NGO to rise to the challenge of managing EU-funded projects. Under these circumstances, civil society actors generate a variety of reactions and responses. This point of view offers a different way of understanding Europeanization as a local process where the EU-led practices are internalized by domestic actors in their modes of operation. In this way Europeanization can unfold differently from ‘intended Europeanization’ (Ioakimidis, 2001, p. 74), spawning unintentional consequences as local actors attach different meanings and understandings to the processes of change they are witnessing.

The book aims at understanding how these differences materialize and how they are negotiated. It does so through a series of interviews with civil society activists, EU bureaucrats and Turkish officials who have been involved in the EU funding processes, exploring how civil society actors behave and why certain practices occur. This research scrutinizes the tension that inevitably exists between the need to design broad policy objectives and the everyday practices of the recipients of such policies. The new systems that are introduced by these policies – the system of EU civil society funding being the focus here – need to be (and are being) internalized and mediated before they acquire meaning at the local level. This understanding places certain conditions on and limitations to what can be achieved by an externally designed policy intervention.

The primary focus of this study is NGOs that work on rights-based issues, such as human rights, women’s rights, youth rights and child rights. The majority of the organizations researched in the context of this book have been advocacy NGOs, working on such rights-based issues and located in Istanbul, Ankara and Diyarbakir: the three main hubs of EU civil society funding.

Europeanization

As others have observed, Europeanization is not a theory in itself. Rather it is a phenomenon, a puzzle that requires explanation (Graziano and Vink, 2008; Radaelli, 2004). Thus, using the aforesaid arguments to make sense of EU–NGO relations in Turkey leads to a particular explanation of what is meant by Europeanization. There are three broad perspectives. First, at its broadest, Europeanization alludes to the relationship between norms, policies, rules and regulations that exist at the European level, and those that are present at the national level. This type of Europeanization is often cited in the context of EU accession negotiations, referring to a top-down process in which EU directives and policies are being adopted by nation states (Kazamias and Featherstone, 2001). Second, and alternatively, Europeanization can be seen as a process of domestic pressures feeding into the decisions of national actors, which in turn may guide the forms of governance at the European level. These two sources of influence are likely to interact, working as a two-way process that determines the final form Europeanization takes (Kazamias and Featherstone, 2001, p. 6). Third, Europeanization can be seen as a purely domestic process, where local actors, local problems and local discourse engage with European variables, and where the outcomes feed directly back into the domestic environment (Radaelli, 2004). The key point of difference here is that domestic reactions are not purely reactions to European influences. What is common to all three perspectives, something inherent in the very word Europeanization, is the underlying focus on change.

Each of these three perspectives retains some relevance to the case of EU civil society funding in Turkey. EU funding is anchored to the Copenhagen Criteria, which set forth the political, economic and policy requirements for all new member states and form the backbone of a top-down, technical process of Europeanization. At the same time the NGOs that receive EU funding are embedded in and informed by the domestic political and cultural practices. The pressures and influences that derive from the local context feed into the decisions NGOs make within the funding framework. Finally, NGO behaviour spills over to areas that cannot be understood solely by reference to EU-imposed Europeanization or by NGO reactions to Europeanization-related policies. NGOs are able to operate in a variety of ways, utilizing EU funding and other normative forms of Europeanization in their domestic activities, yet without outcomes that may be considered explicitly Europeanizing.

Given that the book is concerned primarily with the behaviour of the actors on the ground and their responses to Europeanization processes in Turkey, the study aligns with ‘sociological institutionalism’ (also called constructivist institutionalism). This is one of the three ‘new institutionalist’ approaches that are frequently applied to the study of Europeanization within European Studies (Kazamias and Featherstone, 2001; Eilstrup-Sangiovanni, 2006; Schimmelfennig and Sedelmeier, 2008).³ Sociological institutionalism emphasizes the importance of the informal rules and norms that influence decision-making. When an institution influences the behaviour of actors, this is not simply down to a threat of sanctions or conditionalities that may have been imposed. These actors must internalize the responsibilities placed upon them by the institution. It is a question of socialization, whereby actors internalize the new rules and norms. This in turn affects how they see their interests (Eilstrup-Sangiovanni, 2006, p. 395). Similarly, Diez (1999) describes Europeanization as an enabling concept, not as something that causes things directly. It energizes actors to act by creating certain conditions, but it does not prescribe a certain way of behaving. The decisions made by the actors involved ultimately determine the outcomes of Europeanization. The structures of European integration and Europeanization are not rigid but vague.

Donors and civil society

The focus on NGOs forms a subfield within civil society studies, looking at particular types of formal organizations that operate within the civil societal space, whose work often resonates strongly with donor objectives. The relationship between the EU and Turkish civil society can be best described as a variant of the donor–NGO relationship that is widely discussed in the literature on civil society. One defining element of these relationships is the existence of a facility for providing financial support. Quite often the growth of the NGO sector has been supply-driven, meaning that the organizations do not necessarily arise out of local needs and may not be the most suitable for the needs and requirements of the country in question (Ottaway and Carothers, 2000, p. 299). Donor priorities shift frequently, forcing NGOs to realign their interests in order to compete for funding (Howell and Pearce, 2001b). Yet, chasing the money trail may have a negative impact on the ability of advocacy NGOs to retain a reputation for independence, a quality that is considered a key ingredient in being able to influence a political process (Bratton, 1989; Edwards and Hulme, 1996; Hulme and Edwards, 1997; Ottaway and Carothers, 2000; Parks, 2008). The supply-driven nature of donor funding leads one to question what exactly is being achieved with the help of these funds, and how this relates to the stated aims of donor-funded programmes.

Democratization, often in connection with human rights initiatives, has become a critical part of the civil society funding rationale for international donor organizations. Within the conventional neo-Tocquevillean views of civil society (a theme Chapter 3 elaborates on), greater civil society activism is likely to lead to more accountable governance, more effective policy implementation and democratic reform (Mercer, 2002). The existence of civil society in itself is therefore taken as a positive sign of democratic development (Diamond, 1994; Putnam, Leonardi and Nanetti, 1994). It is labelled as ‘good’ and becomes conceptually distinct from the ‘bad’ state and market (Bebbington, Hickey and Mitlin, 2008, p. 6). Carothers (1997) points to a duality of purpose behind democracy promotion by donors. On the one hand, democratization is seen as an end in itself; it brings freedom and governmental accountability which will improve people’s lives. On the other hand, democracy is good for social and economic development and is therefore regarded as one component of a successful development programme. This latter purpose, Carothers suggests, has been more prevalent in donor programmes in Africa, where economic issues have taken priority (cf. Crawford, 1997, 2001). Policies aiming for democratization, therefore, tend to interlace with social and economic aims.

These kinds of donor efforts to engage NGOs have been criticized for being estranged from the political realities of the local context and civil society. Local civil society is, after all, the domain within which funded NGOs operate. Subsequent donor support instrumentalizes civil society, making it the means to an end, not an end in itself. This erodes the political edge of civil society as it becomes a vehicle for delivering goals conceived by the donors (Howell and Pearce, 2001a), and as Bebbington, Hickey and Mitlin observe, ‘NGOs are only NGOs in any politically meaningful sense of the term if they are offering alternatives to dominant models, practices and ideas about development’ (2008, p. 3). What is more, the donor goals often assume an air of universality, purporting a particular package of moral values and organizational forms as the only one available. Civil society becomes confined within the Western model of liberal individualism (Hann and Dunn, 1996, p. 3), a context in which the ideas of NGOs and projects become reified as the vehicle through which change can be delivered (Howell and Pearce, 2001b). Civil society has been ‘dusted off and deodorized to suit a variety of ideological, intellectual and practical needs’ (White, 1994, p. 370). Has civil society, as Chandhoke suggests, been a victim of its own success, where popularity has made it an overly consensual and flattened concept (2001), leading to overly superficial and generic donor strategies (Carothers, 1997)? These questions and concerns highlight the need for a different approach. Mindful of this, others consider civil society as a site of ‘struggle, multivocality and paradox’ (Glasius, Lewis and Seckinelgin, 2004, p. 10) and emphasize the need to pay careful attention to the informal and interpersonal practices present in civil society (Hann and Dunn, 1996).

In other words, the reward of EU membership is contingent on the fulfilment of a long list of reforms. In comparison to the kind of donor–NGO relationship that is described in much of the literature (Mercer, 2002; Howell and Pearce, 2001a; Carothers, 2004), the relationship in Turkey, given the broader context of Europeanization and EU accession, has processes attached that are not present elsewhere. While the formal funding procedures are unidirectional (the EU determines project aims and decides on monitoring criteria), there are numerous opportunities for civil society actors to internalize and mediate the system of funding so that it gains meaning in the local context. In this way, the actor-oriented perspective offers interesting insights to the role played by civil society in this context. Furthermore, the impact of EU funding is not limited to those CSOs that receive funding. It also has an effect on the behaviour of civil society actors who are unable or refuse to apply for funding. Given the existence of such conditioning factors, the funding operation ultimately has uncertain outcomes. A complex web of interactions and responses arise from these dynamics and pull in various directions, making the outcomes of Europeanization unpredictable.

Structure of the book

Following the introductory comments made here, Chapter 2 visits the theories of civil society, outlining the main theoretical strands that help to explain not only the nature of civil society in Turkey but also the current debates that form the basis of the logic behind EU policies towards civil society. The chapter seeks to determine whether Western theoretical frameworks remain relevant when explaining what is taking place in Turkey and suggests that the way in which EU policy – grounded in Western frameworks of thinking about civil society – projects a range of normative assumptions onto Turkey differs greatly from the reality of civil society on the ground.

Chapter 3 delves deeper into the logic and motivations behind the EU’s interest in engaging with civil society actors in Turkey. By tracing through the chronology of policy documents that outline EU policy over the past 20 years, this chapter shows that the overall policy applied within the EU, in Turkey as well as in the broader Mediterranean, stems from the same logic that reflects an instrumental understanding of the role of civil society (i.e. it can be a vehicle for other policy goals), and a universal understanding of what is meant by civil society (i.e. civil society is more or less the same despite different cultural and historical contexts).

Chapter 4 presents an analysis of the evolution of Turkish civil society and captures the unique and idiosyncratic characteristics of civil society in the Turkish context. The historical linkage between civil society and the political project of secularization led to a bifurcation between secular civil society that functioned as the bulwark for the Turkish state, and the rest of civil society (representing, for example, religious and minority interests) that did not fit as comfortably within the secular mould. These divisions are sustained by NGOs, through the vociferous debate that is often carried out in essentialist terms. The absence of compromises, in turn, questions the ability of civil society to function as a resource for reconciliation and democratization.

Chapter 5 delves deeper into the role of NGOs as policy advocates. The argument that NGOs can contribute to the processes of democratization are largely premised on the ability of NGOs to effect changes in government policy. Additionally, by working together NGOs are able to build networks that persuade governments to amend their policies. A detailed look at NGO–government and NGO–NGO relations reveals that there appears to be a distinct gap betwe...

Table of contents

• Cover
• Title
• Copyright
• Contents
• List of Figures and Boxes
• Acknowledgements
• List of Acronyms
• 1 Introduction
• 2 Europeanization from a Civil Society Perspective
• 3 EU Civil Society Policy
• 4 Civil Society in Turkey
• 5 NGO Relationships
• 6 Civil Society Support in Turkey
• 7 Tracing the Impact of EU Policy on the Ground
• 8 Conclusion
• Notes
• Bibliography
• Index