The Justice and Development Party (JDP Adalet ve Kalkinma Partisi) has launched a rapprochement policy toward the Alevis. The JDP's Alevi Opening has presented a unique case in Turkey's latest identity politics not only because Alevi claims for the first time came to be involved in political processes for official recognition and accommodation but also because the process was handled by a political party which is regarded to have retained Islamist roots in Sunni interpretation. This article explores ...

The article stems from empirical research conducted with a group of women living in Istanbul who have conservative life styles bounded by an Islamic worldview. It attempts to illuminate the negotiation and contestation between the official civil law and Islamic law. The findings demonstrate that women inherit and bequeath property in a social setting where their gender roles are defined by their adherence to Islam. We argue that in Turkey women's inheritance practices are not determined solely in ...

This article empirically investigates the impact of internal migration on women's empowerment in urban areas of Turkey. Based on data from a nationally representative household survey we find that migration exerts a positive impact in urban settings through improvements in educational attainment and labor market outcomes. Migration contributes to women's empowerment by raising their education levels and lowering the gap in schooling between men and women. Migration also allows migrants both men ...

This article aims to describe the achievements of the women's movement in the struggle against domestic violence in Turkey and the points of contention between the state and feminists regarding this issue. Our goal in analyzing the Turkish case of violence against women is to reflect on how women's organizations work with the state; what they demand from it; and how they respond to the complex situations and dilemmas of state funded women's shelters. The article is based on field research; we used ...

This article employs Turkey as a case study to explore the relationship between property ownership inheritance and women's empowerment. In Turkey as in much of the world men dominate ownership of property. This is despite the fact that women have had equal rights to own and inherit property since 1926. With the establishment of the Republic in 1923 came a series of reforms one of which replaced Islamic Sharia law with a secular civil law that was based on the Swiss Civil Code. The new law among ...

This study will address the EU-Turkey negotiations with the help of two level game by focusing particularly on domestic factors and their possible influences on governments in both Germany and Turkey. These domestic factors can be seen as a open-door policy of Merkel and the hung parliament in Turkey. From this perspective, the refugee deal and negotiations involves one of the fundamental foreign policy instruments: diplomacy. In order to clarify the deal in detail, bilateral talks and negotiations ...

This article examines the role that think tanks have played in the formulation of national security and a culture of security through field research conducted on fourteen think tanks located in Istanbul and Ankara. In addition to participant observation at the think tanks twenty-five in-depth interviews were conducted with administrators and specialists. The findings revealed that in terms of their strategic attitudes about national security in Turkey there are three groups of think tanks: critical ...

Since the 1990s, there has been a global proliferation of transnational organized crime (TOC). Turkey, as a transit site between the East and the West, has been one of the routes through which organized crime groups transport illicit goods in collaboration with other networks of crime. This paper investigates TOC in Turkey and maps out Turkey's role as a transit country in smuggling and trafficking. The paper also deals with Turkey's contribution to international efforts in combating TOC in light ...

Describe the development of minority rights in Turkey in light of the European Union accession process. They conclude that Turkey initiated several reforms that were necessary for EU membership but failed to alter its established “minority regime,” which recognizes as minorities the non-Muslim Armenian, Jewish and Greek communities and excludes other groups from the minority category.