![Sample our Area Studies journals, sign in here to start your access, latest two full volumes FREE to you for 14 days]({"type":"image" , "src" : "/sda/5922/TOC-Subject-Sample-2021-Area-Studies.jpg"})
ABSTRACT
Judicial reform has been part and parcel of democratization process among countries preparing for European Union accession. The literature on EU enlargement, political conditionality conceptualizes the EU’s role in promoting rule of law and judicial reforms in its external neighbourhood, especially in the candidate states as largely positive. However, in the Turkish case, the EU’s political conditionality in judicial reform presents a mixed picture. This paper provides a qualitative case study with the aim to assess the conditions under which backsliding occurs. The paper’s main proposition is that this backsliding in judicial reforms and rule of law is due to the interplay of the relative weakness of the EU’s political anchor and the relative strength of the domestic struggles facing political elites. Judicial reforms emerge as a visible aspect of backsliding as it has become a key priority area for the EU. This paper assesses to what extent the changing pace and direction of judicial reforms have been driven by a mix of factors; the EU’s political conditionality as well as the domestic costs of adaptation.
Acknowledgments
I would like to thank Aylin Ece Cicek and Adea Gafuri, both graduate students at Sabanci University for their data collection.
Disclosure statement
No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author.
Notes
2. See European Commission (Citation2011) and European Commission (Citation2014).
3. Interview with the Political Counselor official, the EU Delegation to Turkey, Ankara, March 30, 2015.
4. Interview with the EU Desk officer in the Ministry of Justice, Turkey, 30 March 2015.
5. This point is stressed in the interviews by the officials from the Political Counselor Section in the EU Delegation in Ankara, 30 March 2015.
6. The monitoring was re-launched in 2017 following the Turkish backsliding in its reforms and the adoption of the State of Emergency.
7. Interview on judicial reforms with a Professor of Constitutional Law from Yakin Dogu University, 20 March 2015.
8. The European Commission’s Progress Report for Turkey, 1999, p.9. http://ec.europa.eu/enlargement/archives/pdf/key_documents/1999/turkey_en.pdf.
9. Ministry of Justice Judiciary Reform Strategy, September 2009, http://www.sgb.adalet.gov.tr/Judicial-Reform-Strategy.pdf. This judicial strategy was revised twice in 2012 and 2014.
10. Interview with a former official in the DG for Justice, the EU Delegation to Turkey, Ankara, March 30, 2015.
11. The highest organ that checks the constitutionality and the legality of all laws and bills adopted in Parliament as well as the Supreme Court for prosecuting elected governmental officials.
12. Detailed information on the judicial reform packages from the Ministry of Justice, http://www.abgm.adalet.gov.tr/absurecindeturkyargisi/yargireformpaketleri.html.
13. In both cases, secularist elite in the highest echelons of the military and bureaucracy were jailed for planning political unrest and overthrowing the elected civilian government, however, in 2014, it was finally revealed that these charges were trumped on fabricated evidence and those in jail were finally released. Both of these cases were prosecuted and tried in courts where the judicial members were now from the Gulenist movement- the religious organization which became the AKP’s nemesis after 2013.
14. Erdal Safak, ‘Gucler ayriligi-Separation of Powers’, Turkish Daily newspaper Sabah, https://www.sabah.com.tr/yazarlar/safak/2008/06/11/gucler_ayriligi2, 11 June 2008.
15. Reuters, 25 July 2016. http://www.reuters/com/article/us-turkey-security-eu-juncker-idUSKCN10501.9.
16. http://www.europarl.europa.eu/news/en/press-room/20170629IPR78637/turkey-meps-raise-the-alarm-on-eu-accession-talks, 6 July 2017.
17. Florian Eder, “Austria to the EU: We need to talk about Turkey,” Politico, https://www.politico.eu/article/austria-to-the-eu-we-need-to-talk-about-turkey-eu-membership-sebastian-kurz-austrias-foreign-minister/, 12 December 2016.
18. Ayakkabi kutusu Meclis gundeminde, Hurriyet Turkish Daily, 18 December 2013. http://www.hurriyet.com.tr/gundem/25395637.asp.
19. This is a religiously based social organization, which was in alliance with the AKP government until 2013, and the corruption scandal led to a serious fault line between them.
20. Erdoğan’dan HSYK aciklamasi, Turkish Daily newspaper Zaman, 24 January 2014. http://www.zaman.com.tr/politika_basbakan-erdogandan-hsyk-aciklamasi_2195374.html.
21. Turkish Daily newspaper Hurriyet, 29 December 2013. http://www.hurriyet.com.tr/gundem/erdogan-orada-bir-yanlis-yaptik-25465765.
22. Author’s interview with a member of the European Parliament in Brussels, 19 January 2015.
23. The reversal of reforms in this fashion was also emphasized in the Interview with the Political counsellor section in the EU Delegation in Ankara, 30 March 2015, as a key factor in backsliding witnessed in Turkey.
24. Serkan Demirtaş, “Turkish parliamentary speakers deplored end of court independence,” Turkish Hurriyet Daily News, 3 January 2014. http://www.hurriyetdailynews.com/turkish-parliamentary-speaker-cicek-deplores-end-of-court-independence.aspx?pageID=238&nID=60549&NewsCatID=338.
25. Turkish Daily newspaper, Cumhuriyet, 24 October 2018. http://www.cumhuriyet.com.tr/haber/siyaset/1120302/_Yargidan_musaade_alacaksak_ben_bu_makamda_durmayayim_.html.
26. The ruling AKP perceived an existential threat with the attempted military take over by the followers of the Gulen movement, and a struggle for power ensured among these two groups, supporters of the AKP and Gulenists.