Turkey-EU relations: The return of ‘high politics’
by
ALİ RESUL USUL*

This project assumed much greater importance for the EU after a series of profound energy crises between Russia, Ukraine and the EU. Had the energy chapter in the negotiations between the EU and Turkey, which had been blocked without clear reasons, not been opened, this could have had severe repercussions for energy provision and consumption in western EU states.

Although this could at first glance be considered part of a normal bargaining process between international actors, as I intend to demonstrate in this article, it should also be considered another concrete example of a more significant shift within the overall process of accession negotiations between Turkey and EU.

This article will argue that while the accession negotiations between Turkey and the EU have been hijacked by various “high” political issues such as the Cyprus problem, the Turkish governing elite, disappointed by the EU’s non-meritocratic attitudes toward Turkish candidacy to the EU, has started to play the game by resorting to some of the tactics that the EU has employed, that is, exerting other high political issues, most notably the matter of the energy security of the EU and those states that border the EU geopolitically in the Middle East, Africa, the Balkans and the Caucasus to gain greater leverage in negotiations. Thus, I will argue that we have reached another significant turning point in EU-Turkey relations, which I term “the return of high politics to the accession negotiations between Turkey and the EU.”

Accession negotiations between

Turkey and EU: from the logic of meritocracy to the logic of high politics

Turkey’s EU candidacy has always been beset by numerous difficulties and problems. At the root of this problem lies a notable reluctance of the EU to commit itself on the issue of Turkey’s EU membership, most probably due to Turkey’s unique cultural and political makeup and the size and volatility of the geographical area it covers and borders. Although Turkey became a candidate for membership in 1999, since the inauguration of its candidacy, relations between the two have not progressed as was initially expected.

Turkey’s quality of democracy and its human rights record did not constitute the central issue in relations between it and the EU during the Cold War period. There were two basic reasons for this reality: Turkey was not a candidate for EU membership. Therefore, the EU was less interested in the nature or practices of Turkey’s political regime. Secondly, world politics were dominated by security priorities and as a result “soft” issues such as democracy and human rights were regarded as secondary vis-à-vis “hard” issues, namely the “Soviet threat.” When the Cold War ended and Turkey was accepted as a candidate in 1999, everything started to change. In addition to Turkey’s candidacy, democratic norms and values re-emerged in the wider European political context. Consequently, the nature of the Turkish political regime has been at the center of the framework of relations.

These historic transformations in relations between the EU and Turkey gave rise to a genuine reform movement encompassing various groups within Turkey. The movement endeavors to consolidate existing democratic institutions and rights, eliminate serious human rights violations in the country and opens a new chapter with regard to the Kurdish issue. Turkish governing elites initially believed Turkey would become an EU member on condition that it merely complied with the Copenhagen political criteria, in spite of the fact that certain civil and military bureaucrats still harbored skeptical ideas regarding political changes that the EU required Turkey to implement, particularly with respect to the position of “minorities” in Turkey.

When the Justice and Development Party (AK Party) started to govern the country in 2002, the pace of reforms accelerated significantly and, as a result, Turkey was indeed able to carry out a number of significant constitutional amendments and legal and administrative reforms: the transformation of the military-dominated National Security Council (MGK) into a civilian and advisory body and the elimination of its executive powers; the end of emergency rule in the Southeast; the lifting of a ban on teaching non-Turkish ethnic languages, including Kurdish; and the allowing of TV and radio broadcasting in these languages; the adoption of a new association law, civil code and a new press law; the abolition of the death penalty; the easing of purchasing tangible assets by non-Muslim communities and the lessening of restrictions on the opening of places of worship; substantial improvements concerning the elimination of torture and mistreatment; and the full implementation of the directives of the European Court of Human Rights. All these reforms were extremely important and heralded a new era for Turkey’s democracy.

Until the second half of 2000, meeting the Copenhagen criteria had been the basic concern of institutions monitoring Turkey-EU relations. The EU Commission and other EU leaders had strongly urged Turkey to carry out political reforms. Concerning Turkey’s integration with the EU, the basic discussions between Turkey and the EU had revolved around Turkey’s human rights records, the problem of Turkish democracy and the nature of the Turkish political system between 1999 and 2005-6. It is clear that “international” problems, such as the Cyprus issue or the disagreements between Turkey and Greece with regard to the Aegean Sea (their delimitations of territorial waters, the continental shelf and national airspace in the Aegean Sea), were not at the center of relations. Although a number of these issues, most notably the Cyprus problem, was indirectly included in the 1999 Helsinki Summit decision, none of these matters constituted a stumbling block on the road to Turkey’s EU membership until 2004, when the EU decided to grant full membership to the Republic of Cyprus (represented by Greek Cypriots alone) even though the problem of the status of the whole of the island had not yet been resolved. In other words, the need to satisfy the EU’s terms of democratic conditionality had been at the core of relations between Turkey and the union until the second half of the 2000s.

Therefore, the EU had efficiently developed a good understanding of political conditionality which highly depended on its meritocratic nature. This meant that the speed of membership negotiations between the EU and candidates had to a great extent been dependent on the extent of democratization first and then that the nature of accession negotiations should proceed according to technical stipulations rather than pursuing the “logic” of high politics. According to this logic of meritocracy, candidates should be subjected to the same requirements and be evaluated by the same criteria based on merit, and a candidate is to become an EU member if it can manage to open and close the stipulated “chapters of negations.” In this understanding of negations and candidacy, the impact of “international” or “high political” issues on relations between member states and candidates should be minimal, if not non-existent.

The shift to the logic of high politics

However, the nature of Turkey’s progress in the EU integration process started to change sometime between late 2004 and early 2005. The general attitudes within EU states toward both greater integration and continued enlargement at this point began to undergo a transformation. There had been an increasing sense of “enlargement fatigue” in almost all long-established EU states. The fatigue manifested itself in a clear rejection of a proposed EU constitution in France and the Netherlands in 2005.

Popular support of the enlargement process in general has been declining. In this new environment, the nature of EU political conditionality also started to change. In the post-enlargement period, EU conditionality became much stricter in the rigidity of its application to candidates. Likewise, the prize of EU membership has rendered itself even more elusive. There is no longer a guarantee that the successful fulfillment of candidateship criteria will ensure membership in the EU.

The basic rhetoric at the time was connected to problems concerning the condition of Turkish democracy and Turkey’s human rights record. However, enlargement fatigue in the post-enlargement period, together with the inability to find solutions to the perennial Cyprus problem and the subsequent Europeanization of the issue when the EU accepted Cyprus as member sate without a solution, have contributed only in ushering in a new atmosphere in EU-Turkey relations where “high politics” has started to replace the previously merit-dominated process of accession. To the above problems can be added the more recent anti-Turkish rhetoric voiced at regular intervals by recently elected leaders of leading EU states such as French President Nicolas Sarkozy and German Chancellor Angela Merkel. This rhetoric has served only to make the views of both elites and the general public in both countries less accepting of Turkey’s endeavors to complete the accession process.

‘The Cyprus sabotage’

Since 2004-5, rather than domestically focused issues such as Turkey’s democracy and human rights, other international problems, headed by the status of Cyprus, have dominated Turkey’s aspirations for candidacy. When (Greek) Cyprus joined the EU on May 1, 2004, it became an EU member and a problematic situation with regard to Turkey’s membership aspirations emerged. The EU demanded that Turkey extend the borders of the Customs Union with the EU to include 10 new EU members from Central and Eastern Europe, Malta and the “Republic of Cyprus.” Turkey included these new members into the Customs Union with the exception of (Greek) Cyprus on account of the simple fact that Turkey had not and furthermore did not recognize (Greek) Cypriot leaders as the representatives of all of Cyprus as it had been established in 1960.

The EU punished Turkey by freezing accession negotiations on eight important chapters of negotiations. This punishment was a real blow to Turkish-EU relations and Turkey’s progress in the negotiations process. Since December 2006, when the EU Commission began enforcing this punishment, the Cyprus problem, which clearly constitutes a high political issue that has continued since 1963, hijacked both Turley’s relations with the EU and the wider Turkish accession process.

Another international issue that has been blocking Turkey’s accession process is the problematic attitude that France has displayed toward Turkish candidacy. France is now blocking five chapters of acquis, arguing that these chapters are somehow related to membership criteria.

Moreover, the Cyprus and Sarkozy issues are not the only ones proving difficult for Turkey. We also see that EU-Turkey relations in general are complex, and the likelihood of Turkey’s EU membership is much more nuanced than remaining merely a product of fulfilling political and economic criteria or acquis or failure to do so, but the sum of more real political calculations. Even the most recent document of the EU Commission on enlargement strategy, published in November 2008, underlined the fact that Turkey’s geo-strategic location gives it a vital role with regard to EU energy security policy.

Turkey’s human rights records and the quality of Turkish democracy are obviously still very important for the EU. However, what we see is a shift from norm-based discussions to “high” political issues. A good example of this shift is that EU institutions have not shown themselves to be particularly receptive to significant domestic political changes in Turkey, such as the opening of a state TV channel broadcasting in Kurdish. This move, regarded as revolutionary for some commentators on the Turkish political scene, has not been adequately supported or praised by EU institutions, which had until recently been exerting such pressure on the Turkish state to make concessions on this and similar issues.

Turkey has started to play the game in the same manner

It seems Turkey has also started to play the game in the same way. When Prime Minister Erdoğan visited the EU headquarters on Jan. 19, 2009, he plainly and explicitly stated that Turkey may reconsider its support for the Nabucco pipeline project, if there is no progress on the energy chapter, which had hitherto been blocked by France and Cyprus. After serious problems experienced with the provision and supply of Russian energy and the emergence of Russia’s new energy politics, the EU has tried to diversify the source of its energy resources and the Nabucco project has come to the forefront, not as an alternative to Russia on gas totally but as a supplement to it.

Another noticeable point that supports my argument that EU-Turkey relations have assumed a more real political character is the fact that even Turkish foreign policy executives, including new Foreign Minister Ahmet Davutoğlu, have started to think that recent international incidents in parts of the Middle East and the Caucasus as well as Russian activities of late have rendered Turkey geopolitically more vital for overall European security and provided Turkey with new strategic cards it can play during negotiations. Therefore, the strategic reasoning among Turkish governing elites has started to shift from seeing EU-Turkey relations from a norm-based logic and instead to link it closer to geo-strategic calculations. This shift does not mean that norms, like democratic consolidation and improvement of human rights are not important for the Turkish governing elite, but it does mean real political issues have started to dominate the process.