The promised territories: the production of branded housing projects in contemporary Turkey

Cities in Turkey, following the neoliberal restructuring of the country, have undergone a process of transformation in the last decade at a greater pace than experienced in previous periods. Through these processes, while new territories have been constructed, previous formations have been dismantled. While some of these constructed territories are abstract (e.g. Nomenclature of Units for Territorial Statistics [NUTS] regions), some are tangible and physically defined such as branded housing enclaves. Branded housing projects produce territories in the form of housing enclaves, which provide key services and facilities within their confines exclusively for project residents. By 2013, the number of branded housing projects located in Istanbul alone numbered 852 with the number of units provided by these projects amounting to 7.7% of the total housing stock the city (Sarıçayır 01/21/2014). This paper argues that these territories are co-produced by political society and civil society (in Gramscian terms): while political society regulates and directly contributes to the production of these territories through public actors involved in the branded housing projects, civil society contributes through the production of social consent for such developments. The article discusses the role of political society and civil society in the production of branded housing projects by focusing on the case of Emlak Konut GYO (Real Estate Partnership) projects developed in Istanbul between 2003 and 2014. Firstly, the role of political society is discussed through the roles of TOKI (Housing Development Administration of Turkey) and Emlak Konut GYO as major public actors in the development of these territories; and secondly, the role of civil society is discussed through excavating the traces of production of social consent for branded housing projects in news articles published on Emlak Konut GYO projects between 2003 and 2014. The paper concludes that branded housing projects are emerging as spatial territories in contemporary Turkey as a result of hegemonic struggle through political society and civil society

Ethnic identity and perceptions of the police in Turkey: the case of Kurds and Turks

Drawing on the literature on minorities’ and ethnic groups’ perceptions of the police, this article investigates the differences between Kurds and Turks in terms of their perceptions of the police in Turkey. We conducted survey research using a nationally representative sample of 1804 people. Multivariate regression analysis revealed that Kurds in Turkey have a more negative perception of the police than Turks, regardless of their gender, education, income, party affiliation, and sectarian identity. It is concluded that the historical relationship between Kurds and the Turkish state has had a decisive effect on how Kurds perceive the police

Attitudinal orientation to party organizations in Turkey in the 2000s

The Turkish party system experienced a serious blow in the early 1980s, when the military government in power closed down all the former legal political parties. Therefore, little evidence of strong psychological ties between voters and the political parties they supported at the polls is expected. This essay draws upon existing literature on voting behavior to develop four hypotheses to explain partisan affiliations of Turkish voters. Each of the hypotheses is then put to empirical tests, using data collected by means of a nationally representative survey. The four independent variables used in the four hypotheses are the role of parents' party identification (socialization), ideological orientations, economic expectations, and the ethnic identities of voters. Socialization emerges as a major determinant of partisan affiliation with the relatively older Republican People's Party (CHP) and Nationalist Action Party (MHP), while identifiers with the governing Justice and Development Party (AKP) take few cues from their parents and pay more attention to the economic performance of that party in government. Ideology seems to play a major role in determining the psychological orientations of those who feel attached to the CHP versus the AKP or the MHP but little role in differentiating AKP from MHP voters. Ethnicity only plays a role in partisan affiliation with the MHP

The Greek Military Regime (1967-1974) and the Cyprus Question — Origins and Goals

This article employs the concept of military professionalism and its attributes to explain the Greek praetorian regime\u27s handling of the Cyrprus problem. Upon examining the relevant data it was found that for strategic considerations the U.S. and NATO sought to achieve a negotiated solution to the cyprus problem which would have amounted to double Enosis. It was also found that professional needs created a dependency of the Greek. military on NA TO for arms, sophisticated training, and support which let them view participation in NATO as indespensable. As a result, the Greek military confused the interests of their nation with those of the Atlantic Alliance and sought to solve the Cyprus problem on the basis of NATO\u27S interests even though such a solution went contrary to the national aspirations of Greece

It’s a long way to Copenhagen?. CEPS Policy Briefs No. 96, 1 March 2006

Turkey, which officially started negotiations for EU membership in October 2005, currently has a lower per capita income than that of any of the EU-25 countries – about at the level of Romania and Macedonia. With the right institutions and policies, Willem Buiter, Professor of European Political Economy at the European Institute of the London School of Economics and Political Science, argues that Turkey could become a true tiger economy. But with the institutions and policies of the second half of the 20th century, it could end up a mangy cat instead of a tiger. This policy brief is motivated by some rather optimistic official reports and especially by the World Bank’s recent Country Economic Memorandum for Turkey, Promoting Sustained Growth and Convergence with the European Union

"The Myths of Turkish Influence in the European Union". University of Illinois EUC Working Paper Volume 6, No. 2, 2006

Among the many objections to Turkish membership in the European Union lie claims that Turkey will be a powerful actor in the future EU, with a population as large as or larger than Germany. Many also claim that this power will have negative effects on the EU. We examine such claims analytically, influenced strongly by spatial models of EU policy-making. We find that Turkey's preferences lie sufficiently outside the EU mainstream so that it will have little influence in day-to-day policy-making under the assent, codecision, consultation, and cooperation procedures (or the common procedure in the rejected constitutional treaty). Its influence may be more evident in areas such as the CFSP or JHA, where unanimity remains the normal procedure. Still, Turkey's veto power here is no different from that of other, much smaller countries. Furthermore, veto power can only block changes and cannot be used to pull the EU into undesirable new directions. Even this veto power can be avoided if the EU-25 establishes whatever policies they desire prior to Turkish membership, forcing Turkey to accept a fait accompli. Despite these limitations to its power, Turkey may have some influence in purely intergovernmental settings such as negotiations over new treaties that might occur some decades hence

Defining the Nation: Kurdish Historiography in Turkey in the 1990s

This article examines Kurdish historiography in Turkey in the 1990s. It centres on the question how the national community is historicised via central myths, especially for the pre-Islamic periods. As a source basis writings of members of the intellectual elite which are published in newspapers are used. This article argues that identity in the Kurdish society is currently mainly constructed around an ethnic history, which assumes Kurdishness to be constant and which is based on a dichotomy between barbarism and civilisation. The discursive space for this historiography is mainly determined by Turkish national discourse in its popular version. Finally, a comparative outlook with the Iraqi case is suggested