Refugee Deal Research Articles

The Turkish Government’s Ambivalent Policy Response to the New Influx of Afghan Migrants through the Public Policy Tools

Turkey has been a hub for migrants since the Syrian crisis and has been home to 3.7 million refugees. The literature on migration focusses largely on Turkey’s response to refugees from Syria, host country citizens’ attitudes towards Syrians and their integration challenges, the EU–Turkey refugee deal, and its political implications for the EU and Turkey. Nonetheless, there has been a sharp rise in the number of Afghan migrants to Turkey since the complete withdrawal of US military forces from Afghanistan in 2020. Both scholarly and grey literature highlights that Turkey has recently been an attractive hub for Afghan migrants and other ethnic minorities, following Pakistan and Iran. Nonetheless, this literature has not substantially explored the Turkish government’s attitude towards the new influx of migrants. For this purpose, the article draws upon qualitative research based on secondary and grey literature (including semi-structured interviews with representatives from migration-related NGOs in Turkey). The article underpins its findings from the public policy framework of NATO (nodality, authority, treasure, organisation) by demonstrating how Turkey’s ambivalent response to the refugee inflow is shaped by limited information (nodality), weak legal mechanisms (authority), exploitation of new inflow as cheap labour (treasure), and migration system restructuring (organisation, treasure) after the withdrawal of external actors like the EU and UNHCR.

Pros and Cons of the EU–Turkey Refugee Deal and Why the Cons Prevail

The ‘EU–Turkey deal’ is a catchy nickname of the official document the ‘EU–Turkey Statement’; a result of meetings between EU and Turkey leaders. Although the EU–Turkey deal served as a basis for actions taken in relation to migration both on the side of the EU with its member states and on the side of Turkey, its legal nature remains questionable. Accusations emerged that the EU–Turkey deal resulted in the EU states’ failure to comply with the obligations in the field of human rights, particularly the rights of refugees. Yet, according to the judicial review, the individual member states are the ones responsible for implementing the EU–Turkey deal. The purpose of this article is to examine migration-related issues of the EU–Turkey deal. As the EU–Turkey Statement deals mainly with the status of Syrian refugees, legal implications of their status after the deal are one of the main subjects of this research. This article focuses primarily on the deal’s legal effects and its predominantly negative effects.

Architectures of Similarity: Fragments, Islands and other Escapes from the Turkey and Europe Framework

State-centric explanations of life in Europe and (or, including) Turkey often do much more than account for differences between the two – they reify them. This paper notices similarities instead. Such an analytical exercise does not simply turn the older narrative upside down. It starts with accepting the pluriverse of relations unfolding within Turkey-EU spaces and chooses to experiment with the idea that what seems marginal can in fact be formative. My argument is situated in discussions about mobility – the latter being a chief destabilizer of the conventional idea of space as a perennial entity. Building on observations of diplomatic process, ethnographic moments and conversations with refugee rights workers and volunteers in the period around adoption of the 2016 Turkey-EU refugee deal, I show the analytical possibilities of studying spatiality through the eyes of islands dissenting from the current border regime. Their very existence, on both sides of Turkey/EU border is an invitation to pay closer attention to splits and similarities that run across inter-national borders, rather than along them.

Bordering through othering: On strategic ambiguity in the making of the EU-Turkey refugee deal

This article scrutinises the identity-constitutive role of bordering practices by taking EU-Turkey cooperation on border control and refugee governance as a case. Using Foucault's notion of dispositif, this empirically oriented contribution critically reflects on the link between bordering, othering, and the reification of identities. More specifically, it undertakes a Critical Discourse Analysis of the EU border dispositif to elucidate how material structures and socio-spatial practices and discourses are mobilised in the processes of bordering. Throughout this article, special attention is paid to the strategic uses of ambiguity in refugee governance. Examining strategic ambiguity operative at the level of discourse, in institutional and legal structures, and routine daily practices, the multifaceted approach adopted in this study extends the analysis beyond the impact of strategic ambiguity on refugee's living experiences. The analysis demonstrates that strategic ambiguity relates to multiple domains of refugee governance and becomes a practical ideological tool, a normalising procedure for norm-breaking practices. Providing multiple layers of distinct but mutually reinforcing critical exploration, this study demonstrates how accumulated layers of knowledge, imageries, and historical narratives support institutional, legal and administrative practices in the ambiguous time/space of the EU-Turkey refugee deal. The analysis also exposes how the EU border dispositif translates difference into otherness, and contributes to the construction of European identity through the othering of refugees.

THE DISCURSIVE LEGITIMATION OF THE EU-TURKEY REFUGEE DEAL IN EUROPEAN POLITICAL DISCOURSE

This study explores the legitimation strategies employed in European political discourse on EU’s migration
 cooperation with Turkey. More specifically, this paper elucidates factors that shape argumentation in
 European parliamentary debates on 18 March 2016 EU-Turkey Statement, also known as the EU-Turkey
 Refugee Deal. Adopting an interdisciplinary research methodology rooted in Critical Discourse Analysis
 and using analytical tools of Cognitive Linguistics, this study aims to provide empirical insights into the
 legitimation of migration and asylum policies. This study connects to the growing body of literature on
 discursive legitimation in an attempt to extend the existing set of categories of legitimation proposed in
 earlier studies.

RWANDA – UK: Refugee Deal

Africa Research Bulletin: Political, Social and Cultural SeriesVolume 59, Issue 4 p. 23575A-23575C Overseas Relations RWANDA – UK: Refugee Deal First published: 14 May 2022 https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1467-825X.2022.10516.xRead the full textAboutPDF ToolsRequest permissionExport citationAdd to favoritesTrack citation ShareShare Give accessShare full text accessShare full-text accessPlease review our Terms and Conditions of Use and check box below to share full-text version of article.I have read and accept the Wiley Online Library Terms and Conditions of UseShareable LinkUse the link below to share a full-text version of this article with your friends and colleagues. Learn more.Copy URL Share a linkShare onFacebookTwitterLinked InRedditWechat No abstract is available for this article. Volume59, Issue4May 2022Pages 23575A-23575C RelatedInformation

“You sleep with the devil; you wake up in hell!”: On the new EU-Turkey Deal

Right from the start in 2016, the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) and Amnesty International challenged the legitimacy of the so-called refugee deal between Turkey and the EU. Toward the end of 2020, the EU concluded another agreement with Turkey as part of the €6 billion in funding covered by the refugee deal, in spite of Turkey’s deteriorating human rights record. Against a backdrop of Turkey’s weaponizing of refugees against Europe and Europe’s treatment of the refugee issue as a local problem, the European border and coast guard organization Frontex has been practicing illegal pushbacks. It is clear that once you toy with the devil, you cannot escape hell.

The EU–Turkey deal in the 2015 ‘refugee crisis’: when intergovernmentalism cast a shadow on the EU’s normative power

The aim of this article is to understand why the EU opted to conclude the ‘EU–Turkey refugee deal’ in March 2016 in the context of the Syrian refugee crisis, despite the fact that the agreement deeply contradicts fundamental EU values and norms. The article seeks to explain the outcome—the conclusion of the EU–Turkey refugee deal—by analysing not only the ability of EU institutions to shape decisions, but also their motivations, ideas and preferences in justifying the EU’s actions in responding to the refugee challenge. It is argued that the deal results from ideational and power struggles between supranational (the European Parliament and the European Commission) and intergovernmental institutions (the European Council and the Council of the European Union). It is demonstrated that while the former put forward normative arguments, the latter invoked security as a main concern to avoid internal divisions between Member States. This article also reveals that such ideational and power struggles have consequences for the EU’s identity. Theoretically, the article builds on the new intergovernmentalist claims and on the normative/civilian power literature. Empirically, it explores the usage of normative justifications by EU institutions and points to inter-institutional tensions in framing the EU’s response to the refugee challenge.

The EU’s response to the Syrian refugee crisis: a battleground among many Europes

ABSTRACT This article examines the European Union (EU)’s response to the 2015–2016 refugee crisis. Departing from the understanding that Europe is a contested phenomenon, it investigates how different – Thick, Thin, Parochial and Global – Europes influenced the EU’s management of the crisis culminating in the March 2016 EU-Turkey ‘refugee deal’. Two findings are advanced. First, European actors reacted differently to the EU’s initially attempted Thick Europe approach to the crisis, following their respective Europe conceptions. Second, faced with growing divisions, they ultimately united around a lowest common denominator solution represented by the refugee deal which illustrated Thin Europe at the expense of a more norm-based policy associated with Thick and Global Europes. The findings demonstrate the significance of embedding the various European reactions to the crisis within different Europe categories while showing that consensus was still possible to tackle an external problem.

EU-Turkey Refugee Deal: Buck-Passing and Bargaining on Human Lives at Risk?

Since the early stages, the EU-Turkey Refugee Deal has generated several controversies concerning its legal and moral standing. In the first section of this paper, for important informative purposes, I will briefly discuss several points related to how the legality of the deal could be contested. In the second section, I will turn my attention to a more detailed examination of whether the deal could be considered immoral with regard to two morally condemned practices, namely: buck-passing, or evasion of responsibility, and bargaining on human lives at risk. In the final section, I will attempt to outline guiding principles for a hypothetical deal that would be more responsive to the principles underpinning the Refugee Convention than the morally condemnable principles in the actual deal based on those two grounds discussed here.

The European Union’s refugee crisis and rising functionalism in EU-Turkey relations

ABSTRACTThis article investigates the evolving relationship between the European Union (EU) and Turkey following the 2015 refugee crisis. It argues that post-crisis relations have become predominantly functional, measured by strategic EU-Turkey partnership based on interdependence as well as the EU’s relative retreat from political membership conditionality. This is particularly demonstrated by the March 2016 EU-Turkey ‘refugee deal’ whereby functional cooperation deepened amidst material and normative concessions that the EU granted Ankara. The article concludes that although functionalism is set to guide the relations beyond the question of Turkey’s EU accession, a future EU-Turkey external differentiated integration arrangement remains uncertain due to pending challenges.

The Global Evolution of Travel Visa Regimes.

The Global Evolution of Travel Visa Regimes.

THE COVERAGE OF EU-TURKEY REFUGEE DEAL IN THE TURKISH ONLINE PRESS

Turkey has played a significant role as a shelter for Syrian refugees whose number in the country has reached almost 3 million, the largest Syrian refugee population in the world. As a result of Turkey’s geographical and political position in Syrian migration issue and along with the in the face of the overwhelming flow of smuggled migrants and asylum seekers from Turkey to Greece, in 2016 Turkey and the EU signed the Refugee Deal which aims to stop irregular arrivals from Turkey to Greek islands by allowing Greece to return to Turkey those migrants. However, the deal has raised many concerns and questions from especially some Turkish and international institutions and rights groups. Among those questions are its fairness for migrants and asylum seekers, its legality, its ethics and its feasibility. In this context, taken into consideration that the news media has an impact on forming of public opinion so that on policy outcomes and implementation, this study aims to examine the coverage of the EU-Turkey Refugee Deal in the Turkish online press. More particularly, the study is concerned with the actors and the frames which are dominantly present in the news, in order to trace how the deal has taken on meaning in public debate. In order to achieve this purpose, this study examine the news about the deal that was posted on the websites of Hurriyet, Milliyet and Cumhuriyet between 20 March and 20 July 2016 by using both content analysis and frame analysis.

Quo vadis Europe: The EU – Turkey Refugee Deal – visionary blueprint or humanitarian disaster?

Commentary

The Syrian Refugees Crisis in Increasingly Fragmented International Law: Is the EU - Turkey Readmission Agreement in Accordance with International Law?

One of the world’s most chaotic and devastating civil war has been sustained since March 2011 in Syria. This Syrian Crisis has transformed much more complex, unpredictable and atrocity in this region than the guess of the states. Different conflicting actors, intervening states (and also their different interest/motivations) and also unprepared international society led to dead end or cul-de-sac for this sudden crisis. At the same time, Syrian refugee crisis appeared for neighbor and European states on the agenda. None of these states had prepared for this kind of migration and number of community. 1951 Geneva Refugee Convention is the main legal document that is relating to define refugee, their rights and obligations of states. Nonetheless, some of exceptional clauses (geographical exception clause of the Turkey), some of European states domestic policies and their domestic policy pressures and Civil War which became more desperate view in the time; these conditions force to the international society and the states to create new process and legal structure for this crisis. EU – Turkey refugee deal and agreement can be eventual consequence in this process. In fact, it is continuing process. As well as, is this process legalized enough yet? In other words, how much is it legalized or which is stage in this process? All of these questions are still waiting to be answered. Some summits, official and unofficial meetings and works for drafting have already been made since the beginning period of the crisis but these attempts and initiatives are seem to be questionable for the effectiveness. Could these developments be creating fragmentation in international law?

The EU-Turkey Refugee Agreement of Autumn 2015 as a Two-Level Game

The Syrian refugee crisis has put EU-Turkey relations under pressure for action, as in 2015 hundreds of thousands used the Turkey-Balkan route to entre central Europe. However, with some countries as Germany, Austria, and Sweden ‘suffering’ more than others under the influx, pressure for action including Turkey was especially high in these countries. Against this background, the article aims to analyse the EU-Turkey negotiations of autumn 2015 as a ‘two-level game’, with special interest on domestic factors possibly to impact on Turkish or German bargaining power. In both countries, the need for an agreement in the refugee issue at international level was accompanied by specific domestic conditions such as the contested ‘open-doors policy’ introduced ad hoc by chancellor Merkel on September 4, 2015, as well as the hung parliament after the June elections on the Turkish side. Against this obvious entanglement of domestic and international issues, the article applies the basic logic of ‘two level games’ as introduced by Robert Putnam on the EU/German-Turkish negotiations leading up to the ‘refugee deal’ (EU action plan) of November 2015. Among others, it turned out that significant veto powers in both countries were not in sight and that a non-agreement would have raised the political costs for Germany more than for Turkey, thus enlarging the German ‘win-set’ size of acceptable solutions.