The Evolution of Turkish Asylum Policy Structures: The Effects of Europeanization and the Syrian Refugee Crisis

Abstract

Asylum policies have been one of the most important political controversies. Starting with the early 2000s, Turkish asylum policies and practices are associated with the Europeanization approach meaning the reformation of Turkish asylum law in line with EU acquis communautaire. Relationship between the European Union(EU) and Turkey accelerated with the decision for the launch of accession negotiations on 3 October 2005. During that time asylum matters have become particularly important for the EU as it was preparing itself for the big bang enlargement. On the other side, despite the weak possibility of membership, Turkey continued modifying its asylum law in accordance with the EU and international standards. However, Turkey did not lift the geographical limitation on the 1951 Refugee Convention. In 2015, Syrian refugees started arriving in the member states and the EU was unable to solve the refugee crisis in itself. Hence, the EU seek to make a deal with Turkey which become a sparkle for resurrection of the relations. The existing literature has focused either specifically on the EU-Turkey Deal or generally on the EU-Turkey relations. However, this thesis aims to find out to what extent asylum laws in Turkey have changed along with the accession negotiations with the European Union. The thesis will touch...