Inrättar Turkiet sig i EU:s led? - En studie av Turkiets EU-diskurs -

Abstract

“How does the Turkish debate appear concerning the EU-discourse in relation to political conditionality? Is Turkey accepting the demands that are being made?” These questions are answered in this thesis through a qualitative document analysis of the debate concerning EU as it is in Turkish newspapers and statements made by Turkish political representatives. The debate is used to describe the association’s process in a candidate country through investigating how the process and the relationship between EU and Turkey are discussed within the country. The national debate is then used to compare with the accession process for the Central and Eastern European countries based on conditionality to discover if Turkey is different from other candidate countries and if so explain why. It was found that Turkey is in many respects a unique candidate country which is challenging the very foundation of the EU enlargement. By not accepting the founding aspect and admitting to being inferior to EU but emphasizing what Turkey has to offer EU more then what EU has to offer Turkey the result of this thesis is that Turkey is not accepting the demands that are made. The Turkish debate concerning the EU-discourse is dominated by a will to be a member in the European Union but not at the cost of the country’s sovereignty and culture.