Returning Home: The Ambivalent Assyrian Experience in Turkey

Discrimination and precarious living conditions in Tur Abdin, in southeastern Turkey, prompted Assyrians, indigenous Christian ethnic people to the country, to leave their homeland for Europe in the early 1960s. The process of migration continued for several decades and intensified with the militarization of the eastern provinces during the fight against the Kurdish PKK. Many Assyrian villages had to be abandoned. With an appeal formulated in a circular letter by Turkey’s then Prime Minister Bülent Ecevit in 2001, the Turkish government encouraged Assyrians abroad to return to their former homeland, assuring them that their security and rights as citizens would be guaranteed by the state. At the beginning of the new millennium, the situation in Tur Abdin seemed noticeably improved. The end of the state of emergency in the eastern provinces and the application of rule of law in the wake of the reforms in the context of EU accession process contributed to this. Many of the Assyrians who emigrated re-visited their former villages, but also tried to rebuild churches and their mostly dilapidated houses. Clarification of ownership of land and properties after occupation and changes of legal basis became a key issue.

Turkish Exports Before and After the 2001 Financial Crisis: A Panel Gravity Model

Turkey was subjected to a number of financial shocks after the liberalisation movements in the 1980s. The most devastating of them was the consecutive political and financial crises in late 2000 and early 2001. The absence of political stability and depreciated Turkish Lira devastated the markets. The Turkish government immediately acted against the collapsed economic system and introduced a radical Economic Stability Programme under the supervision of Kemal Dervis¸. The programme has restructured the banking and financial system and improved economic discipline. In this study, we aim to investigate the impacts of the 2001 crisis and the structural changes on Turkish exports. To this end, we estimate a one-way gravity model, using panel data belonging to Turkish exports to 135 World Trade Organization (WTO) member countries, over the period between 1981 and 2015. The augmented model controls for the inter/intra-industry exports, competitiveness, trade agreements, trade unions and additional demographics. We utilised Poisson pseudo-maximum-likelihood (PPML) estimator to account for unobservable time-invariant effects, zero trade, possible heteroscedasticity, and cross-correlation. The results reveals that Turkey has become a free market economy after the liberalisation movements in the early 1980s, and its exports are determined by the same indicators that affect other similar economies; on the other hand, the 2001 crisis has an immediate positive effect on exports through weak Turkish Lira, but this effect turns to negative in the following year. In addition, we find that structural changes in the economic system has a significant effect on exports and help to mitigate the trade-distorting effects of the global financial crisis in 2008. JEL Codes: C33, F13, F14

On the Collateral Impact of Turkey’s Authoritarian Turn: Re-securitization of the Kurdish Issue and the Kurds’ Struggle for Minority Recognition and Self-Determination

Since the collapse of the peace process in 2015, the Turkish Government has sought to turn every move towards Kurdish rights into an existential threat – a process led to the re-securitization of the Kurdish question. Ever since the descent of Turkey into an authoritarian polity has begun in the aftermath of the June 2015 elections, the Kurdish minority has suffered a brutal crackdown marked by high of political imprisonment and greater restrictions on freedom of assembly and association and on electoral aspects of self-determination. This commentary will take a closer look at the dire consequences of the collateral impact of Turkey’s authoritarian turn on the Kurdish political movement from the perspectives of minority rights and self-determination.

Playing politics with the plight of refugees. How the EU went into Erdogan’s political receivership

At the peak of the ‘refugee crisis’ in late 2015-early 2016, the EU reached an agreement with the Turkish government, known as the EU Facility for Refugees in Turkey. It has served as a bone of contention between the EU and Turkey ever since its implementation. As anticipated by many experts, critical voices and NGOs in Turkey and Europe, the Facility has provided the Erdogan regime with a strategic tool to blackmail the EU without caring for the humanitarian needs.

Top-Down Naturalization: Turkish Government Propensity and Syrian Refugee Attitudes

Naturalization takes place at the intersection between a host government's propensity to give citizenship and refugees' attitudes towards it. However, the naturalization of Syrian refugees, with its top-down approach, shows the possibility of a divergence between a government’s propensity and refugees’ attitudes, and that divergence may spoil the expected benefits. This study questions the factors that determine government propensity and refugees' attitude, besides the convergence and divergence between them. The regressions have been estimated using data collected from a sample of 296 Syrian students at Mardin University, Turkey. The findings of this study revealed a contradiction between attitude and propensity, although they share factors of education and the hosting context. While the indications of social and cultural integration have a positive effect on attitudes, they do not affect propensity. Besides the contextual factors of hosting province shape attitude and propensity. Moreover, the most important factor in deciding attitude is the perception of the costs and benefits of naturalization.

Pan-Islamism in the Malay States and British Reaction (1912-1918)

This article analyses the growing of Pan-Islamism in the Malay States during the First World War. Before the First World War broke out, the British government in the Malay States adopt diplomatic relations with various countries. This policy allows other countries to have economic and social relations with the Malay States. Turkey is one of the countries that have good relations with the British and hence are allowed to have diplomatic relations with the Malay States. Pan-Islamism began to become a problem when a group of young intellectuals in Turkey sparked the idea and movement of a universal Islamic union. As a result, Pan-Islamism has begun to spread across the Malay States. This movement influenced the Muslim community to support the Turkish government on the principle of universal unity of Muslims. Although the British realized that the growing support of Pan-Islamism are able to affect the loyalty of the people in the Malay States against the British but the British can not restrict the entry of Turkish missionaries or traders to come to the Malay States. This is because the British still have good relations with Turkey. As a result, Pan-Islamism continues to grow in the Malay States until the First World War broke out in 1914. As such, this article assesses the extent of the Pan-Islamism impact on the growing of Pan-Islamism in the Malay States during the First World War. This study uses qualitative research methods by examining primary sources such as the Straits Settlements Annual Report documents and the files of the British High Commissioner’s Office. The results prove that Pan-Islamism has been accepted by the people of the Malay States, but the support was brought under control by the British throughout the First World War.

Evaluation of Air Quality Index by Spatial Analysis Depending on Vehicle Traffic during the COVID-19 Outbreak in Turkey

As in other countries of the world, the Turkish government is implementing many preventive partial and total lockdown practices against the virus’s infectious effect. When the first virus case has been detected, the public authorities have taken some restriction to reduce people and traffic mobility, which has also turned into some positive affect in air quality. To this end, the paper aims to examine how this pandemic affects traffic mobility and air quality in Istanbul. The pandemic does not only have a human health impact. This study also investigates the social and environmental effects. In our analysis, we observe, visualize, compare and discuss the impact of the post- and pre-lockdown on Istanbul’s traffic mobility and air quality. To do so, a geographic information system (GIS)-based approach is proposed. Various spatial analyses are performed in GIS with the statistical data used; thus, the environmental effects of the pandemic can be better observed. We test the hypothesis that this has reduced traffic mobility and improved air quality using traffic density cluster set and air monitoring stations (five air pollutant parameters) data for five months. The results shows that there are positive changes in terms of both traffic mobility and air quality, especially in April–May. PM10, SO2, CO, NO2 and NOx parameter values improved by 21.21%, 16.55%, 18.82%, 28.62% and 39.99%, respectively. In addition, there was a 7% increase in the average traffic speed. In order for the changes to be permanent, it is recommended to integrate e-mobility and sharing systems into the current transportation network.

Contemporary Turkish-French Rivalry in Libya

The research represents a real attempt to show the contemporary competition and conflict that erupted between countries to control the countries that affected by The Arab Spring. Especially the oil-rich, including Libya, which has a distinguished geographical location, so this is what made France and Turkey engage in a political adventure, an economic competition, and an attempt to establish influence in Libya. The State of Libya was completely destroyed in order to control its oil, which is targeted by Western countries and their oil companies. The Turkish government tried to exploit its Islamic identity to influence the emotions of the Libyan parties and provided support for them. Then, it made an agreement with the Libyan government headed by Fayez al-Sarraj to demarcate the maritime borders, which gave it space to pressure against its opponents in the Mediterranean, after its negotiations to join the European Union failed due to France's refusal to join. The research was divided into five parts, the first dealt with contemporary Turkish-French relations, while the second one dealt with Turkey's position on the French intervention in Libya in 2011. The third one showed France's position on Turkey's accession to the European Union. The fourth one clarified the Turkish-French relations after the 2011 Libyan crisis. The fifth one included the contemporary French strategy in Libya, and finally the sixth one revolved around the impact of the Turkish-French competition on Libya. Keywords: crisis, oil, Libya, Turkey, competition, France.

The Dry Man of Europe—Ottoman Prohibition against British Domination

Chapter 8 examines temperance and prohibition history within the Ottoman Empire and secular Turkey. Drinking and viticulture were widespread throughout the empire, though the trade was often in the hands of non-Muslims. The Ottoman liquor traffic even became integral to the European-run Ottoman Public Debt Administration. Mustafa Kemal Atatürk was among the drunkest leaders in world history, yet Atatürk and the secular Turkish government in Ankara embraced prohibitionism as a means of denying badly needed alcohol revenues to the Christians occupying their lands—most notably the British controlling Istanbul and the Greeks around Smyrna. Turkish prohibition expanded across Anatolia, as Atatürk liberated Turkey’s occupied territories. Only in 1924, with the end of foreign occupation, was the Kemalist prohibition rescinded, and replaced with a national alcohol monopoly, in which the financial benefits of the liquor trade would accrue to the Turkish state, not to foreigners.

Turkish government may continue neglecting environment

Significance Long droughts and longer summers due to climate change are lengthening the wildfire season. Yet wildfires are just one in a series of environmental crises that highlight the growing damage to the country’s environment not just from climate change but also from factors related to government policies. Impacts Prolonged droughts, frequent heatwaves and flash floods are causing severe damage to sensitive ecosystems, agriculture and fishing. Turkey is also exposed to the indirect effects of climate change, which contributes to regional conflicts and creates refugees. Criminalisation of environmental activism and repression of protests are raising social tensions and contributing to political polarisation.