https://orcid.org/0000-0002-7814-3146
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ABSTRACT
Introduced in the 2000s as a component of social welfare reforms, the means test determines the eligibility of aid applicants based on previously set income categories. Replacing local committees that decided eligibility, this centralized and digitalized screening process rests on information infrastructures that are mostly invisible. This paper argues that the ways in which applicants contest the outcome of the means test, subvert the eligibility requirements, and go around the screening processes, make visible these otherwise-mostly invisible information infrastructures. Through a discussion of the contestations, subversions, and go-arounds applicants use (not always successfully) to receive emergency food relief from municipal food banks in Istanbul, the paper shows that these information infrastructures not only appear as if they are value-neutral and apolitical, but in so doing, they also serve as useful tools for obscuring who the actual decision makers are.
Disclosure statement
No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).
Notes
1 Introduced in 1992, the Green Card program aimed ‘to provide health services to poor people not covered by any social assistance programme either as direct contributors or dependents’ (Buğra and Keyder Citation2006, 223).
2 See the literature review for more information on the other two types.
3 ‘In cases where applicants had neither, household income was calculated by adding reported income from employment and hypothetical income from agricultural land owned, if any’ (Erus, et al. Citation2015, 101).
4 There are however legitimate privacy concerns regarding such ready availability and accessibility of personal information (Kılıç and Şimşek Citation2013).
5 Muhtars are elected village or neighborhood leaders. They have legally specified administrative duties, including but not limited to, recording births and deaths, aiding security forces, informing authorities in cases of contagious illnesses.
6 There is also quite a bit of discussion on whether it is food destined for waste or surplus food that cannot be retailed, that the food banks distribute. See, for example, (Booth and Whelan Citation2014; Alexander and Smaje Citation2008; Lohnes and Wilson Citation2018; Turkkan Citation2020; Lindberg, et al. Citation2014; Lindenbaum Citation2016; Warshawshy Citation2016).
7 These, however, do not deal with the applicants and the recipients in any capacity. As such, they are excluded from this study.
8 For a more extended discussion on the pervasiveness of the discourse of deserving poor in Turkey, see, Turkkan Citation2021; Üstündağ and Yoltar Citation2017; Eder Citation2010, 173–177.
9 Whether the means test has actually been successful in preventing the distribution of aid along electoral lines is an important, interesting and a politically loaded question. Indeed, throughout the 2000s and 2010s, as cuts to public spending were fueling the emergence of food banks, religious charities with organic ties to the governing Justice and Development Party (JDP) stepped in to deliver various social services that the state was no longer providing – usually in return for support for the party (Atalay Citation2017; Göçmen Citation2014). These services included, among others, various types of (regular, intermittent, short term) food aid to the urban and rural poor. In other words, the government was cutting social services (Kılıç Citation2008; Şener Citation2016), while encouraging the provisioning of those services through religious non-profits it was affiliated with and/or was supportive of (Göçmen Citation2014; Buğra and Keyder Citation2006, 224). Moreover, at the town and city level, JDP-run municipalities worked with JDP-affiliated and/or supported religious non-profits to provide the services slashed by the central state. Opposition-run municipalities also attempted similar collaborations, usually with non-religious charities and/or non-profits (Eder Citation2010, 177–179).
Some of these political tensions rose again during the pandemic when the governing party, controlling the institutions of the central state (in this case, the district governorate (kaymakamlık) and the office of the governor (valilik)) seized the donations collected by the opposition-held municipalities. These municipalities were intending to and had used funds previously to run the municipal soup kitchens, municipal food banks and other services of the municipal foundations. See, for example: (Birgün Citation2020).
10 According to one of my informants, this legal lenience, coupled with 100% tax exemption given to the donors – apparently – makes food banks preferable for laundering money. For obvious security reasons, I do not go into this aspect here.
11 I do not have signed consent forms from each individual I had ‘fleeting conversations’ with at the food bank. There were some, like the staff, who knew I was doing fieldwork, and there are some, mostly the recipients, who did not – or may not have. I acknowledge that this leaves an ethical grey zone.
12 See Regulation no.5837 (Bakanlar Kurulu Citation2011).
13 It can alternatively be called ‘yoksulluk belgesi’, ‘muhtaçlık belgesi’ (proof of need) or ‘fakirlik ihtiyaç ilmühaberi’
14 Integrated Social Assistance System.
15 Social Assistance Information System.
16 See the Decree no.633 for the Law no. 6233, with which the databases were legally established (T.C. Başbakanlık Citation2011) and the Regulation on the data registration and sharing from the databases (T.C. Aile, Çalışma ve Sosyal Hizmetler Bakanlığı Citation2014).
17 Thus, without an ID number, there is no way to legally access public assistance as the applicants cannot be screened. Undocumented immigrants, for example, are automatically disqualified from applying for and/or accessing aid.
18 Selen (public official at a district governorate in Istanbul).
19 Selen.
20 In most cases, the allowance corresponds to the size of the household – though of course there is both a floor and a ceiling which depends on the size of the food bank and the type of donations it receives (On this, see (Turkkan Citation2021)). Moreover, what a recipient can get from the food bank as aid, how much and how often are also determined according to their registered household composition in the food bank’s database. If there are no babies registered to the household, for example, the recipient cannot get formula or diapers. The intention here is to prevent re-sale of the aid received from the food banks.
21 If, for example, there is no toddler recorded in a recipient’s household, yet they are trying to get diapers from the food bank.
22 (TBMM Citation1944) (TBMM Citation1977).
23 See for example, Istanbul Metropolitan Municipality Social Services and Assistance Bylaws (IBB Citation2017). Also see, Court of Audit’s (Sayıştay) Decision no.174 on the issue (Sayıştay Citation2016).
24 For a discussion of the role of the muhtars in identifying those who need assistance at the neighborhood level before the databases as well as the problems that mechanism of identification has generated, see (Buğra and Keyder Citation2003, 38–48).
25 For an extended discussion of how these resistances unfold vis-à-vis healthcare and health insurance before and after the social policy reforms, see (Üstündağ and Yoltar Citation2017).
26 For a more extensive discussion on how identification and categorization of the screening processes generate subjects, particularly the ‘appropriate’ type of urban poor, see Turkkan Citation2021.
27 Selen.
28 Nesrin (public official at a district governorate in Istanbul).
29 Ibid.
30 Ibid.
31 Mehtap (municipal food bank staff).
32 Gizem (municipal food bank staff).
33 Selen.
34 Ibid.
35 Gizem.
36 Nuran (public official at a district governorate in Istanbul).