Türkiye Ortadoğu Çalışmaları Dergisi, cilt.3, sa.1, ss.137-164, 2016 (Hakemli Dergi)
International and regional organizations can act as persuasive actors with regard to minority rights in a given country by raising awareness, putting the
issue on agenda, and endorsing a new platform in a country which may lead to
a policy change. Despite the general observation that Turkey’s Europeanization process has had limited impact on the minority issues in Turkey, there are
numerous examples that the European Union (EU) has played a constructive
role in improving of rights and fundamental freedoms for the Kurdish populace
living in Turkey. The Law on Compensation for Damage Arising from Terror
passed in 2004 is a case worth addressing in order to ascertain both the symbolic and discursive policy change. The aim of this article is to explain how the
EU used democratic tools to promote change in Turkey’s political structure for
the displaced Kurds. The Europeanization of Turkey, based on specific conditionality, is taken as primarily responsible for granted for the shift and the
policy change. In this policy-oriented case study, hypotheses from Rationalist
and Constructivist Approaches in Europeanization literature are investigated to
explain the causes and constitutive relations of the policy shift from repudiate
to compensation.