Cultural Challenges Facing Turkey’s Membership in the European Union

Turkey is one of the first countries asking for membership in the European Union but has not been able to achieve this goal. Even today the prospect of its membership is vague. Turkey hopes to join the EU in its 100 anniversary of independence in 2023 and has set its strategies and policies in line with this goal. It is an Islamic country which might challenge the relatively homogeneous culture of the EU. Some European countries consider the EU a community with a homogeneous cultural, social and political principles and values and regard the orientalist policy of Turkey as an evidence for its heterogeneity with the values existing in the European societies. The present article attempts to investigate the cultural and social barriers as the main obstacle to Turkey’s membership in the EU. Erdogan also believes that cultural problems are the most important obstacle to his country’s presence in the EU. Turkey has only three alternatives if it cannot become an EU member: active involvement, becoming a bridge between East and West, and being an ordinary neighbor to Europe. If Turkey becomes a member of the EU, it can play an important and influential role in the union as the only Islamic member. The present article uses constructivism as its theoretical background and takes it for granted that Turkey faces serious challenges in its path to membership in the EU due to cultural and identity problems.


Introduction
Turkey's membership in the EU has faced problems and obstacles due to the differences and conflicts between the two sides.Different analysts in Turkey and Europe have pointed out the various barriers to Turkey's accession to the EU.The large population of Turkey, the high possibility of wide work force immigration into Europe, cultural and identity issues and Islam, bad economic conditions, the human rights conditions, the status of minority groups and the recognition of Cyprus by Turkey are among the problems mentioned in this regard.
The authors, however, believe that the main obstacle to Turkey's path to membership in the EU is the cultural and the Islamic identity of Turkey.Other problems are, in fact, excuses made by the European side on fear of the membership of this country with a population of 80 million Muslims which might destroy homogeneity of the European culture.In this article, we attempt to examine this issue in a constructivist framework.
The main question addressed in the present article is 'to what extent the cultural and social structure of Turkey led to failure in its long attempt to join the EU?Why Turkey has not been accepted as a part of the Western community despite its wealth of experience in democratic government and membership in security and regional treaties in Europe?The other question is 'what challenges and opportunities could membership or non-membership of Turkey for this country?' The hypothesis considered for these questions is that the major reason for Turkey's lack of success in joining the EU and the main problem behind the Turkey's negotiations with EU is the cultural challenges and Islamic identity of Turkey.Besides, in the case of membership or non-membership of this country in the EU, both these countries can turn the existing challenges into novel and even strategic opportunities.

Theoretical Framework: Constructivism
Constructivism is a reaction against the materialistic aspects of neo-realism and constructivists separate themselves from the neo-realists who emphasize the material aspects of this area by focusing on the social aspects of international relations.In this way, instead of focusing on the "quality of government behaviors", they focus on the "causes" and the foundations and the formation process of the government behaviors and try to find an answer to the question of "why governments behave the way they do in the international system?"According to the constructivists, if only the material factors are paid attention to, no correct answer can be found to this question (Soltaninejad & Shapouri, 2013, pp. 109-110).
Using the constructed and changeable nature of identity, this approach has provided the opportunity and possibility for a change and development in the international system (Mansbach, 2002, pp. 1-5) and presents a new perspective based on new principles and assumptions different from the mainstream by challenging the ontological assumptions of rationalism.And through the "Identity Politics", it attempts to depict how different factors such as culture, religion, ethnicity, gender, race and nationalism play an influential role in the area of foreign and international policies.Therefore, an understanding of how identities and interests are formed and the norms and procedures that come along with their reconstruction and their mutual consolidation are the most important theoretical goals of constructivism (Firouzabadi, 2010, p. 43).
In an article titled "foreign policy and cultural identity: connections and goals", Eftekhari (2010) stated that at the end of the Cold War, virtual foreign policy has acquired a cultural identity in a way that the nationalist orientations in the new millennium can be considered as cultural.In other words, according to Eftekhari, today foreign policy has acquired a totally cultural identity and this has been reflected in defining goals and interests of the players, defining and approving the principles governing the behaviors, and developing the decision-making systems in the area of foreign policy.
On the other hand, some consider culture as an important and influential factor in confrontations and conflicts or cooperation and interaction in the international relations.In "Clash of Civilizations", Samuel Huntington (1996) considers the highest level of cultural identity as a civilization that human beings have and according to this definition, he believes the global affairs are formed as the result of the actions and reactions between the Western (including Europe and Northern America), Confucian, Japanese civilization, Islamic, Indian, Slavic-Orthodox, Latin American and African civilizations.He further believes that the most important conflicts and clashes in the future will occur in the fault lines between the civilizations.
In another article titled "Cultural differences in the international conflicts", Enayat (1994) also divided the world into five cultural centers including Islamic culture in Western Asia and the Middle East, Buddha and Confucius in the Far East, and finally Indian, Islamic, Chinese and local South Eastern Asian cultures.According to Enayat, the factors leading to conflicts between the cultures include the pivotal role of national sovereignty, which makes the people of a nation surrender to ethnocentric slogans, and increased cultural relationships and interactions, which lead different groups insist on preserving their cultural identity.
Under such conditions, an investigation into the cultural challenges between EU countries and Turkey, which has an eastern and Islamic culture, using constructivist approach seems to be quite helpful.

Methodology
This article was done using analytical-descriptive research method.Scientific and academic books and articles have helped a lot during the course of study.Turkish experts in the field were also consulted to obtain a more objective and correct conclusion.However, the sources that have a journalistic nature and lack academic and scientific analysis and have not an objective approach to political and international changes were not used in this study.
This article examines the relationship between some variables including population, culture, democracy, human rights and economy with the desired outcome of Turkey's joining the European Union to check and discover a scientific association.The researchers used this type of study to test of the preset hypothesis; the hypothesis and results showed there are difficult obstacles against Turkey's membership in the European Union.The researchers have no role in the position, status and the role of variables and they did not control or manipulate them; they merely studied what exists and describe and dissect it.

Turkey and Membership in the EU
For about half a century, Turkey has attempted to bring its attempts into alignment with the West and Europe and has been trying to join western organizations.The problem of Turkey's membership in the EU has also been always the major concern of politicians in this country.Ankara officially asked for membership in the EU in 1987.
The Council of Europe started a new chapter in its relations with Turkey in Helsinki in December, 1999.In the Helsinki Meeting, Turkey was recognized as a candidate with the same equal and unconditional right to join as other countries.Therefore, like other European countries which asked for membership, Turkey benefited from a pre-accession strategy to support its reforms (Salamati, 2010, p. 275).
In 1980s and 1990s, the military coup in Turkey and the many instances of human rights violation in this country and the inconsistencies of the provisions of the constitution and its criminal laws with Copenhagen Declaration led to cold relations between Turkey and EU.In the resolution made in Copenhagen by the EU, it has been stated that Canada should have the following conditions before becoming a permanent member of the EU: stability and democracy, legal government, human rights and respect for the rights of the minority groups, an efficient economy, the capacity for withstanding competitive pressures and the ability to cope with the membership duties including pursuit of political, economic and financial policies created by the EU.From 2001, Turkey took effective measures in line with the Copenhagen criteria.Measures such as the abolition of the blood money when in peace, the law for broadcasting radio and television programs in Kurdish, the law of teaching the Kurdish language and other local languages in specific courses, increasing police regulations, giving more rights and privileges to non-Muslim religious communities were the important demands by the EU that were satisfied by Turkey (Athari, 2005).
In 2003 and 2004, there were many positive points about the relations between Turkey and EU and there was a ray of hope for the Turks to be able to become a full member in the future.However, in 2005 and 2006 their hope for joining the EU faded for different reasons such as the following: 1) Internationalizing the Cyprus issue by the EU and accession of Cyprus to the EU in 20042) General perception of the Turks that their membership in the EU is impossible before 2011 and is quite likely to be postponed to after 2014 made their society and government disappointed about joining the EU.
3) The end of the rule of some of the key European leaders such as Berlusconi in Italy and Gerhard Schröder in Germany, who supported Turkey's membership while the new generation of the European leaders showed no willingness to accept Turkey's accession to the EU (Naghdinejad, 2008).
The issue of Turkey's membership in the EU is one of the most complicated cases of membership of a country in the EU and despite the great reforms made by Turkey in the framework of the EU and in line with their policies, still its membership outlook is vague and up to now this country has not managed to achieve its goal (Khalouzadeh, 2013).
Considering the negotiations and the measures that had been taken since 2003, it was predicted that Turkey's full membership will be achieved by 2014 or maximum in 2023.But against the expectations, this process slowed down and even stopped and the improving relations between Turkey and the EU broke off and the improved relationships that peaked since 2005 were worsening for different reasons including the emergence of new leaders such as Merkel and Sarkozy in Germany and France and their change of attitude about Turkey and their disagreement with its membership in the EU.The Islamophobic movements created in Europe and also the issue of Cyprus and the cases raised against Turkey by the human rights court about hijab led to negative attitudes towards Turkey and the belief that they will not accept Turkey due to its Islamic identity.
Another event that had a negative effect on Turkey-EU relations after Justice and Development Party came to power in Turkey was this party's support for the Palestinian government and its criticisms against the Israeli regime (Khalouzadeh, 2013).The new role of Turkey in the Middle East and its position against the Arabian Spring evolutions has made the European governments even more sensitive.
It should be mentioned that membership in the EU has been the most important foreign policy followed by Turkey because it will lead to economic growth, improved democracy and development in this country making it an influential country in the region and the world.The relations between Turkey and EU, however, are not normal despite the two sides' attempts and the main cause of this is the excuses made by the European side and its strictness about Turkey which has led to ignorance of the attempts and reforms made by Turkey for membership in this union.In fact, it can be stated that European countries do not have the previous willingness about Turkey's membership as they were not so strict about other European countries asking for membership in the EU.

Obstacles Facing Turkey for Membership in the EU
In this section, we will refer to some of the reasons pointed out by Turkish and European experts about the obstacles to Turkey's membership in the EU.If Turkey removes these challenges, it can be hopeful about its accession to the EU though approaching the European standards will not be possible with bogus and artificial efforts.
Turkey is a country in which many of the civilizational appearances and infra-structures such as its religious and cultural structures and also a large portion of its land are Asian.There are many important unresolved issues to be solved according to the EU before Turkey can join it (Basiri & Mousavi, 2010, pp. 45-84).

Democracy, Human Rights, Army and Policy
After the military coup in Turkey in 1980, the military government's crackdown on individual freedom and formation of parties and democracy led to concerns in Europe.The establishment of National Security Council and membership of the militaries in this council and their supervision over domestic and foreign affairs in Turkey and the issue of the Kurds added to these concerns.On the other hand, with regard to human rights and democracy violation by the Turkish government, we can refer to the long list of the claims made by the Turkish citizens about illegal seizure of their personal properties by Turkish officials and the war tax imposed on them (Naghdinejad, 2009, p. 328).
Continued human rights violation and torturing were also among the reasons for disagreement about Turkey's accession to the EU.The opponents believed that Turkey's membership disturbs the peace and security in the EU.It should be noted that since the time when the Justice and Development Party came to power, human rights indices have been promoted to a considerable extent in Turkey and civil control has imperceptibly taken over the previous military system (Moradian, 2006, p. 691).

The Kurds Crisis
The suppression of the Kurds by the Turkish army is one of the issues the EU has been concerned about.The Kurds have been always in conflict with Turkey for creating a self-governed and independent region.After Abdullah Ocalan, the head of PKK, was arrested, the intensity of the conflict was reduced and the pressure imposed by Europe made Turkey take a more lenient approach towards the Kurds.The issue of the Kurds is considered as a sensitive and important issue for Turkey, but the EU does not also support the Kurds' complete independence.
Turkish officials know quite well that any negotiations for membership in the EU will have no result without solving the problem of this segregationist ethnicity and respecting their civil rights.During the recent years, the issue of the Kurds has been the most important challenge facing the Turkish officials in finding a way into the EU and at the same time the most important national security issue in Turkey.The minority Kurds who reside in European countries have always created problems for the relations between Turkey and European countries.Turkey has tried to have a veto power in any issue that is related to the Kurds.The Kurds have been dangerous both in Turkey's Middle East policies and its European policies (Moradian, 2010, p. 676).

Economic Instability
Another issue focused on by the EU as an obstacle to Turkey's membership in the EU is economic instability in this country.The economic structure in Turkey has many weaknesses compared with other European countries.Based on the estimations made by the Economic Commission for Europe, Turkey's membership in the EU is going to cost 28 Milliard Dollars for the EU (Soltani, 2005).
In 1963, in Ankara Agreement it was basically agreed that Turkey joins the EU on the condition that it develops economically and attains the required living standards.Therefore, it seems that this recognized Turkey's claim about being European, but the low level of economic development in Turkey led both sides particularly Turkey to accept the presumption that implementing this agreement will entail an economic miracle for this country.Therefore, the economic issues and problems facing the Turkish government are among the obstacles that the EU puts emphasis on and wants them resolved (Salamati, 2010, p. 282).

Recognition of Cyprus
Turkey ruled over Cyprus island since 1571 and from 1878 the British found their way into Cyprus and occupied it.In 1954, after the British left and after the violent behavior of the Greek, it was announced as an independent country in the treaties of Zurich and London.After the measures taken by Greek for taking over the whole island, the Turkish Republic started military actions in 20 th of August in 1974 to establish security and peace and to ensure that the treaties of Zurich and London are executed.After the negotiations for peace failed, in 1983 Turkish Republic of Northern Cyprus declared independence and a peace initiative was proposed by Kofi Annan, the Former UN Secretary-General (Ahmadi Lafouraki, 2008: 121).The issue of Cyprus became even more complicated after the Greek Cypriot Republic joined the EU.Since then, Turkey is not willing to give up Turkish Northern Cyprus and this has become the subject of dispute between Turkey and the EU (Fallahzadeh, 2005).

Demography
Those against Turkey's accession to the EU believe that if Turkey joins the EU, Muslims will outnumber the Christians and considering the growing rate of population in Turkey the population of Turkey will become larger than Germany's, the most populated EU country and considering the voting system used by the EU which is based on the population of the countries, this means a higher position for Turkey in the EU which is concerning, according to the EU members (No'parast, 2007, p. 87).
In fact, the main reason for their disagreement about Turkey's membership is its 77 million population and its 98% Muslim population because if it happens, the culturally homogenous and uniform composition of the EU will change in favor of the Muslims, which is against the policies followed by the EU otherwise no such strictness can be seen in the case of other countries as Croatia whose request for membership was easily accepted on their simple request for membership.Therefore, the attempts and plans made by Turkey and its investments for membership seem to be useless because the EU will never accede to its membership under the existing conditions and will continue to make excuses (Khalouzadeh, 2013).
The opponents of Turkey's membership believe that by Turkey's entrance into the EU, a population of one million will be added to the current Turkish population, which will worsen the unemployment problem that is currently a big issue in Europe.They also put forward their concern about the increase of Muslim population in the EU countries.For most of the biased people of Europe the initial influence of Turkey's membership is a flood of immigrating Muslims who are inconsistent with the Western culture and putting aside the reforms made by the Turkish government, they are generally against its membership (No'parast, 2007, p. 87).

Cultural and Value Structure
The EU is a vague and confusing phenomenon from which different interpretations are made due to certain contradictions and inconsistencies existing in it.On the one hand, it has a parliament, the executive, the judiciary, diplomacy and a currency.On the other hand, any of its members are independent in terms of regulations, governments, culture, identity, education, history and army (Ghavam & Kiani, 2011, p. 83).
The possibility for a concept called "European identity" has been paid attention to by the experts with the development of the EU.In fact, the collective identity is related to the feeling of the members in terms of belonging to one another in a way that some consider it as a precondition for a group that seek for political cooperation with one another.The first function of this collective identity is to provide the ground for cooperation, which can in itself serve as a fundamental condition for forming a regime (Easton, 1965, p. 15).This European identity is conceivable when Europeans gather together because of a joint culture.EU theorists planned to replace the patriotic feelings in each of the countries with a common feeling of being European.They considered the entrance of countries with a different social and religious identity into the EU as an obstacle to the realization of this collective European identity.Turkey is located between the West and the Islamic world and although it has announced secularism as the basis for government, it is under the influence of the Islamic movements due to its majority Muslim population and its neighboring Islamic countries.
With regard to including Christian values in the treaty establishing a Constitution for Europe, there have always been disagreements.The Islamic Turkey which was always thinking of joining the EU had this concern that the chance for joining the EU will be reduced for Ankara by the inclusion of Christianity as the official religion of Europe (Zanganeh, 2010, p. 205).
Regarding the Christian identity of the union in opposition to the membership of Turkey it should be mentioned that after the French referendum of 2005, the subject of Turkey is one of the reasons for the opposition.In this survey, a significant percentage of respondents (18 to 35 percent) declared that the reason for this opposition towards this treaty is because of the membership of Turkey in the EU.In the Netherlands, such concerns were among one of the reasons for public opposition to constitution treaty of the EU (Richard-Nihoul, 2005, p. 30).
Turkey has a different cultural, religious and identity structure from the EU members and this problem has created a gap in the homogeneous culture of the EU.Huntington puts forward this belief that Poland, Slovenia and Lithuania will become a member but not Turkey because the EU believes that it does not belong to their club and the reason might be cultural.According to Huntington, cultural reasons are the main obstacle to Turkey's membership in the EU.He considered Turkey's entrance into the EU as "mixture of civilizations" and a source of damage to the homogeneity and purity of western values which can alter the balance of power to the detriment of the West (Basiri & Mousavi, 2010, pp. 45-84).
Another dimension of the identity challenges facing Europe following Turkey's accession to the EU is the issue of religion and religious attitudes.This can be demonstrated in the statement made by Helmut Kohl, the former German chancellor: "Europe is a Christian club" (Aydin & Erhan, 2004, p. 951).
In fact, it should be admitted that the union has a constructivist approach to Turkey's membership.One of the preconditions for membership in the EU is to be European and have a joint history, memory and identity.However, Turkey lacks this precondition due to lying in a different territory and its different culture and identity.From the constructivists' perspective, since Turkey lies in the Islamic territory and Islamic movements have developed and influenced other movements in this country, Europeans are concerned that its entrance into the EU will spoil the homogeneous Christian culture.
Constructivism puts emphasis on intersubjective beliefs common to the people of the world.Identity sources in the EU include values, beliefs, norms, feelings and tendencies, etc.They refer to a set of values and norms which distinguish the culture of the Europeans from that of other people in the world.As Islam is an inseparable aspect of the Turkish culture and considering the conflict between Islamic culture and Christianity, Turkey has not been able to make a coordination between its European and Islamic culture.Thus, it can be claimed that the main barrier to Turkey's membership in the EU is cultural and social and other issues mentioned by the European sides in the negotiations with the EU are simply excuses and are raised because of the existing concern about cultural heterogeneity in this union.
France and Germany, as the most important and the most powerful opponents of Turkey's presence in the EU, lead the opponents of this country's accession.In addition, the British Government has also expressed its opposition to Turkey's membership prior to the referendum of the Union (Brexit) using some words that led to anger of the political leaders of Turkey.
In this regard, the British Prime Minister, David Cameron, 15 days prior to the referendum of the European Union, said that Turkey does not have chances to joining the European Union in the coming decades.No expert can be found to have an idea opposite of this.Because it is not practical.(Reuters, 11.6.2016).He, a month before these statements, believed the comments of the activists, demanding the withdrawal of England from the European Union, who said Turkey will soon join this Union, to be ridiculous and rejected them and told that the current progress of Turkey in the direction of Ankara to join the European Union shows that this country will not be able to join the EU until the year 3000.(BBC News, 22.5.2016)George Osborne, the British Treasury Minister also stated that as long as I am alive, there is no possibility of Turkey joining the European Union.Turkey has not taken a step forward.Concerns exist in the field of democracy and human rights in this country.The British Government's policy is that this country could not join the European Union.The activists demanding British withdrawal from the EU always said that joining Turkey to the EU will add to the massive flood of immigrants who are entering into this country while the number of immigrants in Britain are out of control.One of the most crucial issues of these obstacles is the natural opposition of some EU Member States with Turkey joining to the EU.Based on what can be predicted, negotiations of Turkey and the European Union will last to the future years.In the year 2017, national elections will be held in France in which the probability of victory of Hollande's rival, i.e.Nicolas Sarkozy or someone else in the middle of the right wing.Sarkozy is the main opponents of Turkey's membership in the EU.Even the current President of France, Francois Hollande, does not have a positive approach in this regard.
In addition to France, the other European countries as well have created some obstacles in their policies and actions against Turkey's membership in the EU.The two countries, Greece and Cyprus should also be added to the list of opponents of Turkey to join the European Union.Now Turkey faces another opposition to its direction of membership in the European Union.This great opposition is taken place the Czech Republic.Czech president expressly opposed Turkey's membership in the European Union.Miloš Zeman, criticizing Turkey's policies in the region, has announced that Turkey, instead of being NATO's ally, acts like one of ISIS allies.He also disagreed with Turkey's membership with the European Union in Exchange for Turkey's help to the refugee crisis in Europe.
As one can see, some of the members of the European Union express their keen disagreement with Turkey's membership in the EU, and some of these disagreements are fundamental.Even though the concerns and arguments of the opposed block of Turkey's membership in the European Union differ to some extent, in spite of differences of opinions and disagreements with this issue, all of these countries believe that joining Turkey to the European Union will cause dangerous consequences to this regional organization which can even, in the long term, cause deviation from the original objectives, and ultimately lead to its disintegration.The same issue has caused these countries to seek for obstacles to stop Turkey's full membership in the European Union.But, in spite of the existence of different and even conflicting attitudes between the members of the European Union about Turkey's membership, there is a general consensus among all the Member States of the Union that only when can Turkey be a member of the European Union to be able to adapt itself with the criteria raised in the Copenhagen Conference and the framework of negotiations in 2004 data.
According to the Copenhagen criteria, Turkey must reform its political and economic conditions and create some changes in the structure of the administrative and judicial reforms and gain the ability to carry out its political and economic commitments; Turkey's efforts in these areas are not completely successful.Because, according to the Copenhagen criteria, the applicant countries must create stable institutions that guarantee democracy, the rule of law and human rights, and respect the rights of minorities.On the other hand, in the economic aspect, providing terms of economic competition and the formation of a dynamic and efficient and coordinate market economy with the European Union and having the necessary ability to compete with the forces of the market in the EU are imperative.

Conclusion
The present article first presented a history of the efforts made by Turkey for membership in the EU.Then by analyzing the obstacles to its membership, it discussed different views in this regard.And by concentrating on the cultural and social obstacles, it tried to show that the main barriers to its membership in the EU are, in fact, cultural and identity issues.
The different religious and identity structures in Turkey and the large population of Muslims in this country bring Europe the concern that Europe's homogeneous and consistent culture will be challenged by Turkey's accession to the EU.Due to being located outside Europe, Turkey has a different history from the EU members.In fact, the cooperation of European countries with this union has been developed based on the common culture, religion and history; Turkey lack this determining commonality.Therefore, by making excuses and trying to hide the main obstacle and focusing on other issues, EU has tried to prevent its membership in this union which, as pointed out by the members themselves, is a Christian club.
Furthermore, if Turkey fails to become a member in the EU, it will have only three options: active involvement under the restricted conditions and qualifications, becoming the bridge between East and West and becoming an ordinary neighbor to Europe similar to other neighboring non-member countries.If the this Islamic country manages to join the EU, it can play an influential and effective role in the new developments in the Islamic world as the only Muslim EU member.If Turkey does not become a member, it can try to catch up and make up for the lost and ignored opportunities in the Middle East region.