EUDIMENSIONS Local Dimensions of a Wider European Neighborhood: Developing Political Community Throu

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EUDIMENSIONSLocal Dimensions of a Wider
European Neighborhood Developing Political
Community Through Practices and Discourses of
Cross-Border Co-Operation

• Center For Black Sea and Central Asia (KORA)
• Middle East Technical University (METU)
• Ankara/ TURKEY
• November 2007

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About the Study

• This presentation reflects the preliminary
  findings of the fieldwork conducted within the
  framework of the EUDIMENSIONS Project. In the
  first stage of the fieldwork, we conducted 20
  in-depth interviews (including basic interviews)
  The sample includes 14 gender and womens
  organizations, 4 human rights organizations and 2
  environmental organizations. The fieldwork was
  conducted both in Ankara and Istanbul.
• Sampling criteria All organizations are chosen
  from the NGO Directory in Turkey.Those who are
  not included in this directory but known to be
  active in their respective fields are also
  included into the sample. We are also informed by
  the experts working on gender and womens
  studies, environment and human rights.
• All NGOs are those whose activities are mainly
  concentrated on their respective fields. This
  means that other types of organizations who
  previously dealt with issues related to gender,
  human rights and/or environment on project basis
  are not included into the sample.

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Outline of the Presentation

• 1) background information on NGOs
• 2) civil society and cooperation
• 3) civil society, neighborhood and EU
• 4) perceptions on the EU and Europeanness

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Themes

• Within the framework of these four headings in
  the interview guide, we identified following
  headings as subtopic.
• -main types of activities
• - major sources of funding and financial
  difficulties
• - relations with media
• - views on the role of civil society in Turkey
• - state and civil society relations
• - patterns of cooperation among civil society
  organizations at local level
• - international/transnational cooperation
• - cooperation with neighboring countries
  including Greece
• - perceptions about Europeanness
• - perceptions about the EU and Turkeys
  membership to the EU
• - impact of the EU on civil society development
  in Turkey

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The List of Interviews

• Womens Organizations
• Flying Broom
• Turkish Mothers Association
• Amargi Womens Cooperative
• Filmmor Womens Cooperative
• Womens Solidarity Foundation
• Capital City Womens Platform
• Association of Republics Women
• IRIS Equality and Observation Group
• Womens Entrepreneurs Association of Turkey
• Womens Rights Association Against Discrimination
• Womens Library and Information Center Foundation
• The Foundation for Contemporary Women and Youth
• The Association for the Protection of Women and
  Solidarity
• Kirkörük Cooperative for Combating Violence
  Against Women

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The List of Interviews

• Human Rights Organizations
• Kaos GL Association
• Human Rights Association
• 3.Human Rights Foundation of Turkey
• 4. Organization for Human Rights and Solidarity
  for Oppressed People

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The List of Interviews

• Environmental Organizations
• Nature Association
• The Foundation for the Promotion and Protection
  of the Environment and Cultural Heritage

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Background Information on the Womens Movement
and Womens NGOs in Turkey

• Womens movement in Turkey dates back to the
  Ottoman Empire but it is often referred as
  newsocial movement starting from late 1980s.
  Womens movement in Turkey can be described as
  the most active, powerful and organised one among
  other types of civic activism after the 1980s. As
  of 2007, there are around 800 womens
  organizations in Turkey. It is possible to
  classify womens organizations as feminists,
  secularist and faith-based. Womens organizations
  are mainly working on following issues violence
  against women, womens entrepreneurship, womens
  human rights, culture, arts and communication,
  womens shelters, legal reforms for gender
  equality, political participation and
  representation, poverty, education and Turkeys
  membership to the EU. One of the peculiarity of
  the womens NGOs in Turkey is that they become
  more project- oriented rather than expressing
  their views through mass movements, civic
  activism, meetings and protests. The EU and its
  related funds are one of the main reasons of this
  shift.

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Background Information on Human Rights Movement
and Human Rights Organizations in Turkey

• The earlier Turkish human righst organizations
  were formed by groups made up of political
  activists, trade unionists, members of student
  associations of the 1960s and 1970s (Ergun
  Cali, 2006). By the end of 1980, domestic NGOs
  developed a strong network that included
  international governmental agencies and
  non-governmental organizations and reporting and
  monitoring methods of addressing violations of
  civil and political human rights. The 1990s also
  witnessed diversification and proliferation of
  human rights activism in Turkey (Cali, 2006)

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Background Information on Environmental Movement
and Environmental Organizations in Turkey

• Environmental movements of the pre-1980
  represent the embryonic stage of environmental
  activism in Turkey during which problem
  identification and consciousness raising took the
  centre stage. In 1970s participation level and
  political efficacy of the environmental
  organizations remained low. The Ministry of
  Environment was established in 1991 and after the
  HABITAT II Conference in 1996, 67 environmental
  NGOs formed the Environmental Caucus of Turkey.

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Main Types of Activities

• Womens Organizations
• Research
• Festivals
• Lobbying
• Fund Rising
• Public Protest
• Press conferences
• Project based activities
• Documentation and Publishing
• Organizing campaigns, meetings, conferences, etc.

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Main Types of Activities

• Human Rights Organizations
• Campaigns
• Press Releases
• Press Conferences
• Project-based activities
• Documentation and Publishing
• Human Rights Violations Reports
• Organizing meetings, conferences, seminars, etc.

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Main Types of Activities

• Environmental Organizations
• Research
• Lobbying
• Publishing
• Campaigns
• Summer Schools
• Educational seminars
• Project-based activities
• Organizing meetings, conferences, seminars, etc.

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Financial Resources and Difficulties

• Most of the civil society organizations in
  Turkey do not have equity capital and most of
  them and especially the most active one have
  financial difficulties. The membership fees are
  not regularly paid. Even if they are paid, they
  cannot meet the needs of NGOs. Sustainability
  becomes and remains as the main concern for the
  members of the organizations. In order to
  maintain the organizations, different strategies
  are adopted. Some organizations remain small and
  rely on membership fees, some prefer to get funds
  from several resources (including projects) and
  some rely on voluntarism. Foreign assistance and
  international funds are mostly preferred as the
  main resource of funding. Most of the
  organizations have project-based activities
  supported by the EU funds. Organizations,
  critical to state policies mostly womens
  organizations and human rights organizations-
  either cannot get state funds or do not prefer to
  do so. Moreover, some organizations get financial
  support from local administrations,
  governorships, state institutions and ministries,
  but this support is not institutionalized
  rather, based on individual preferences for the
  sake of favoring the EU policies i.e. to develop
  a partnership with civil society organizations.

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Relations with Media and Representation

• All civil society organizations have relations
  with media either through their members from the
  media institutions or through representatives of
  media who are known as being sensitive to NGOs
  activities. Some womens organizations described
  their relations with media as non-coherent in the
  sense that they are critical of womens
  representation in mainstream media. Some
  organizations have their own supporting media
  groups especially the left and adversary media
  groups are more inclined to human rights
  organizations and some of the womens
  organizations. The general view about media is
  that they would be more interested in sensational
  news than representation of civil societal
  activities. However, environmental organizations
  relations with media seem to be less problematic
  and their activities are widely covered in the
  media. They are seen as the best information
  providers on environmental issues.

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The Role of the Civil Society

• There is no agreed definition of civil society
  and its roles among the organizations. However,
  there are two main understandings depending on
  organizations political standing. The minority
  of the organizations interviewed -mostly
  secularist, nationalist organizations- defines
  the role of civil society as complementary to the
  state. The majority of the organizations however
  is uncomfortable of state and public opinion
  attributing a role of service provider to CSOs.
  They felt in a secondary status compared to trade
  unions, trade associations and chambers of
  commerce. This group of organizations actually
  defines the role of civil society as being
  critical of state policies and affecting them,
  producing alternative policies through reflecting
  the needs and views of the public. Most of the
  CSOs argue that the culture of civil society in
  Turkey is under formation and their ability to
  affect state policies and to shape public opinion
  remains weak.

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State and Civil Society Relations

• Almost all of the organizations have relations
  either with central and local administrations,
  public institutions or ministries and run joint
  actions aiming to affect decision making
  mechanisms, legal processes and state policies.
  In most cases they do not have relations with
  political parties. They are critical of state
  representatives attitude towards civil society
  and mention that there exist no permanent and
  institutionalized relations. They are either
  associated through issue-based, project-based
  activities or through confrontation especially on
  legal issues such as Turkish Penal Code as in
  the case of womens organizations- and the 301.
  article of Constitution as in the case of human
  rights organizations-.

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Civil Society Cooperation at the Local Level

• Common to all organizations is their cooperation
  with NGOs working on the same field and/or the
  same issue. Womens organizations have numerous
  issue-based joint actions and easily react to the
  rapidly changing agendas. Platforms such as
  Turkish Penal Code Womens Platform, Civic Code
  Platform formed by womens NGOs have been very
  successful. Recently the Constitution Platform
  was formed by womens organizations. Human rights
  organizations have close ties and they also work
  jointly under Human Rights Joint Platform (IHOP).
  Environmental organizations also cooperate with
  each other. Most womens NGOs have uneasy
  relations with local administrations and state
  institutions. Human rights organizations have
  close relations with unions whereas environmental
  organizations have good ties with local
  administrations and governorships.

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Civil Society Cooperation at International Level

• Most of the organizations have relations with
  international organizations. Especially the ones
  working with professionalized staff and realizing
  project-based activities are more engaged with
  foreign organizations and run projects. Among
  womens organizations, feminist organizations
  have more joint projects with international and
  European organizations. Three of them are members
  of the European Womens Lobby. Human rights
  organizations and environmental organizations
  also have international ties. Most of them have
  realised activities with the EU member states,
  along with some neighboring countries such as
  Bulgaria, Iran and Armenia.

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Civil Society Cooperationwith Neighbouring
Countries and Greece

• Some of the organizations interviewed have
  joint actions mostly project based cooperation
  with neighboring countries including Iran,
  Albania, Armenia, Georgia, Greece and Bulgaria.
  Two of the organizations interviewed have joint
  actions with Greek NGOs. Womens organizations
  have ties with womens NGOs in Greece either
  through mutual visits or EWL. They are mostly
  open to cooperation activities with Greek NGOs
  but dont have any ties yet. In order to act
  cooperatively with Greece and other neighboring
  countries the choice of the issue and the partner
  organization is primary concern. And they prefer
  to act cooperatively, mostly with Greece, due to
  cultural similarities.

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Perceptions of Europeanness

• There exist three different approaches to define
  Europeanness one is positive, the other is
  negative and the third is critical. Europeannes
  is mostly associated with democracy, culture and
  life style by womens organizations. It is mostly
  criticised due to its association with being
  individualistic, interest-oriented, formalistic.
  The critical approach either defines Europeanness
  as a constructed identity or mentions that there
  exists no homegenous European identity. Human
  rights organizations are mostly critical to the
  concept of Europeanness. For them, its defining
  characteristics are religion and morality
  oriented definitions and it is exclusive. They
  consider Europeanness as a value system for
  human rights which is not exclusively possessed
  only by European countries. All organizations
  agreed on the fact that there should not be a
  single definition of Europeanness and it that
  changes in different cultures of European
  countries. Yet, Europeanness is associated with
  better living standards, advanced information
  technologies, better GNP, and being more advanced
  in terms of human rights, childrens rights and
  womens human rights.

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Impacts of European Union on civil society in
Turkey

• It is possible to claim that the EU has been
  influential on the development of civil society
  in Turkey. It introduced new vocabulary, new
  agendas and new discourses into the Turkish civil
  society. Some organizations directly associate
  the patterns of change with the EU, its bodies,
  funds and the European Commission. Some
  organizations emphasised other types of
  international activities namely intergovernmental
  organisations and American organizations. There
  is also a significant number of NGOs which are
  critical to the EU and do not prefer to have any
  ties with the EU.
• It is mentioned that Turkeys relation with the
  EU has opened up grounds for debate about new,
  critical and sometimes delicate issues.
  Moreover, a virtual improvement in terms of the
  states attitudes towards civil society, has been
  created through initiatives provided by the EU.

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Concluding Remarks

• There are some remarkable changing trends among
  civil society organizations. In the last two
  decades they have transformed from mostly being
  charity, volunteer-based organizations to
  organizations involved advocacy, fund-raising,
  networking, professionally conducted joint
  activities, and globally defined agenda setting.

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Concluding Remarks

• They become more and more specialized and
  professionalized in their own areas, developed
  their cooperative actions at both national and
  international level and EU funds have been
  influential in this process.
• The perceptions of CSOs about EU and
  Europeanness also differ according to their field
  of activities, financial resources, political
  preferences and organizational structure.
  Acknowledging the role of the EU in the promotion
  of civil society development and increasing
  cooperation among the NGOs, they still emphasize
  and rely on their own power, dynamism and
  struggle for change.

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Links Available in English for Civil Society in
Turkey

• http//www.stgm.org/eng/
• http//en.ucansupurge.org/
• http//www.filmmor.org/
• http//www.kagider.org/
• http//www.dogadernegi.org/english/
• http//www.cekulvakfi.org.tr/
• http//www.wwhr.org/
• http//www.ihd.org.tr/
• http//www.kedv.org.tr/
• http//www.tihv.org.tr/EN/
• http//www.ihop.org.tr/english/
• http//news.kaosgl.com/

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• Thank you very much for your attention