@article{Kurban, author = {Kurban, Dilek}, title = {Unravelling a Trade-Off: Reconciling Minority Rights and Full Citizenship in Turkey}, series = {European Yearbook of Minority Issues}, volume = {4}, journal = {European Yearbook of Minority Issues}, number = {1}, publisher = {Brill}, address = {Leiden/Boston}, issn = {2211-6117}, doi = {10.1163/22116117-90000016}, pages = {341 -- 371}, abstract = {With Turkey's recognition as an official candidate for accession to the EU, the rhetoric of minority rights has become a part of the national discourse. Various ethnic and religious groups started to raise their voice in demanding not only individual rights, but also the constitutional recognition of their distinct identities through the effective granting of minority rights. At the same time, they vehemently opposed being 'branded' as minorities. What may seem to be a counter-intuitive reaction at first glance is explicable and indeed expected in light of the unique historical context of Turkey, where official minority status has been exclusively granted to non-Muslim citizens who are by and large perceived by both state and society as lesser citizens whose loyalty to the nation is untrustworthy. Aware of this social reality, and not having been immune to the widespread social prejudices against non-Muslim minorities, the unrecognized minorities rejected minority status arguing instead that they were among the 'founding peoples.The paradoxical situation in which various minorities demand cultural recognition and what are essentially minority rights while at the same time vehemently rejecting the 'minority tag' begs for the question: how should Turkey's minority question be resolved without consolidating the existing social pillarizations within society? To address that question, this article advocates the development of a new constitutional citizenship model universally encompassing all minorities rather than the creation of new minority regimes granting special protection to specific groups.}, language = {en} } @article{Kurban, author = {Kurban, Dilek}, title = {Shattered Hopes: When the European Court of Human Rights Shuts its Doors to the Kurdish Displaced}, series = {Perspectives on Europe}, volume = {44}, journal = {Perspectives on Europe}, number = {1}, editor = {Klumbyte, Neringa}, publisher = {Council for European Studies}, address = {Barcelona/New York}, issn = {0046-2802}, pages = {24 -- 30}, abstract = {Perhaps no other ruling by the European Court of Human Rights (ECtHR) has so deeply disappointed the Kurdish human rights victims and rejoiced the Turkish government at the same time, as did an inadmissibility decision issued in January 2006. In İ{\c{c}}yer v. Turkey, the Court rejected as "manifestly ill-founded" the complaint by a Kurdish peasant who in 1994 had forcibly been evicted by security forces from his village. What made this decision particularly devastating for the displaced and joyous for the government was the fact that the ECtHR rejected the application of not only Mr. İ{\c{c}}yer, but also of 1,500 others whose petitions had been pending before the Court.This article traces the evolution of the ECtHR's jurisprudence on Kurdish displacement cases and argues that the Council of Europe's enlargement as well as Turkey's EU accession process has had an adverse effect on the victims' quest for justice in Strasbourg.}, language = {en} } @incollection{Kurban, author = {Kurban, Dilek}, title = {The Kurdish question: Law, politics and the limits of recognition}, series = {Turkey's Democratization Process}, booktitle = {Turkey's Democratization Process}, publisher = {Routledge}, address = {London [u.a.]}, isbn = {978-0-415-83696-8}, publisher = {Hertie School}, pages = {345 -- 360}, abstract = {It is commonly assumed that the exceptional treatment of the Kurds under the law is a provisional phenomenon that occurs during interim regimes and ends with the return to normalcy. In reality, the Kurdish region has always been governed by some form of state of exception. What has changed at times when a special legal regime was de jure in force was the intensity and scale of human rights violations against civilians committed through emergency regimes, forced displacement and cultural assimilation, processes which were often in place simultaneously.When the EU membership process started, many assumed that Turkey would have to undertake a radical overhaul of its constitutional and legislative order and to ensure the equal treatment of all its citizens, in law and in fact. This chapter argues that despite some progress, Turkey's policies on the Kurdish question have remained by and large intact. It concludes, however, that while the legal framework is still 'ethnic-blind' vis-{\`a}-vis the Kurds, politics no longer is, as evident not only in the AKP Government's recognition of the Kurdish identity but also in the Kurdish movement's increasingly bolder claims for a political solution to the conflict.}, language = {en} } @incollection{KurbanGulalp, author = {Kurban, Dilek and Gulalp, Haldun}, title = {A complicated affair: Turkey's Kurds and the European Court of Human Rights}, series = {The European Court of Human Rights: Implementing Strasbourg's Judgments on Domestic Policy}, booktitle = {The European Court of Human Rights: Implementing Strasbourg's Judgments on Domestic Policy}, publisher = {Edinburgh Univ. Press}, address = {Edinburgh}, isbn = {978 0 7486 7057 4}, publisher = {Hertie School}, pages = {166 -- 187}, abstract = {Obsessed with the preservation of national unity and homogeneity, the Turkish state has since its inception had little tolerance for Kurdish demands for greater legal recognition and a measure of autonomy. However, its 1987 decision to give its citizens the right to petition the European Court of Human Rights (ECtHR) to enhance its chances for membership to the European Union (EU) obliged the state to confront, at the transnational level, the Kurdish demands for human rights protection and equal treatment. The cases taken to the ECtHR by Kurdish civilians revealed that cloaked in the language of 'war on terrorism', the Turkish military had committed egregious violations including the forced displacement of civilians , the destruction of property, the burning of forests, as well as extra-judicial killings, disappearances and torture. Turkey's EU candidacy increased the existing international pressure on the government to revise its mode of dealing with the insurgency and with Kurdish political and cultural demands more generally. The EU demanded that Turkey first and foremost execute the ECtHR's judgments on Kurdish issues, but also grant the Kurds limited linguistic rights in order to fulfil minority rights protection as part of the membership accession criteria. Yet, as argued in this chapter, although there has been some improvement, the problem has not been eradicated nor has there been any substantive change in government policy on the Kurdish question.}, language = {en} } @incollection{KurbanElmas, author = {Kurban, Dilek and Elmas, Esra}, title = {Turkish Media Policy in National Context}, series = {Understanding Media Policies: A European Perspective}, booktitle = {Understanding Media Policies: A European Perspective}, publisher = {Palgrave Macmillan}, address = {London}, isbn = {978-0-230-34812-7}, pages = {214 -- 229}, abstract = {Since the foundation of the press, the media in Turkey has had a symbiotic relationship with the state. The state's heavy involvement rendered the development of a "media policy" impossible, since the media did not exist as an independent realm to shape and be shaped by society and politics. Instead, it existed as a tool for both civilian and military governments to control and manipulate society. In the past two decades, the changes induced by the economic liberalisation of the early 1990s, the banking crisis of 2000-2001 and the European Union accession process produced a complex regulatory framework governing the media content and structure in Turkey. This chapter argues that, despite some progress, there are still significant legal infringements on media freedom in Turkey, where the media's economic and political dependence on the state continues.}, language = {en} } @techreport{Kurban, type = {Working Paper}, author = {Kurban, Dilek}, title = {Europe as an Agent of Change: The Role of the European Court of Human Rights and the EU in Turkey's Kurdish Policies}, edition = {SWP Research Paper (No. 9)}, publisher = {Stiftung Wissenschaft und Politik}, address = {Berlin}, pages = {30}, abstract = {The commencement of talks between the Turkish government and Abdullah {\"O}calan in late 2012, and the PKK's subsequent announcement of an indefinite ceasefire, has raised hopes for a peaceful solution to the conflict. Recent regional developments - with the emergence of a de facto Kurdish self-rule in Syria and the increasing likelihood of a Kurdish state in Iraq - have made Turkey's permanent settlement of its own conflict all the more pertinent.Important as these developments are, the exclusive framing of the issue within the discourse of "conflict resolution" bears the risk of reaching faulty policy analyses that attribute too much significance to the cessation of fighting. The crux of the Kurdish issue remains the structural inequalities against the Kurds, which predate the conflict between the PKK and the Turkish military. Current debates on the Kurdish demands in the framework of the peace talks often overlook the history in which these demands were shaped, communicated and pursued, not only by the Kurdish national movement but also, and first and foremost, by the human rights activists in the Kurdish region. The legal and political mobilisation of Kurdish civil society vis-{\`a}-vis European institutions raised awareness about the human rights abuses committed by the Turkish government and framed concrete rights claims for equality, justice and the rule of law. The ECtHR and the EU, for their part, have played a critical - though not necessarily always coherent and consistent - role in the relatively significant, albeit substantively limited, reforms adopted by Turkish governments since the late 1990s. At the same time, this European engagement has not always pushed Turkey in the direction of enhancing the democratic participation and human rights of its Kurdish citizens, particularly in the post-9/11 context.This paper looks into the evolution of the trilateral relationship between Turkey, Europe and the Kurds over the course of the past three decades. Based on the current political situation in Turkey and its region, it argues that there is an imminent need for European re-engagement in the Kurdish issue in a coherent, continuous and critical manner based on a systematic political dialogue with diversified domestic actors.}, language = {en} } @incollection{KurbanSozeri, author = {Kurban, Dilek and Sozeri, Ceren}, title = {The state of the journalistic profession in Turkey}, series = {Media Policies Revisited: The Challenge of Media Freedom and Independence}, booktitle = {Media Policies Revisited: The Challenge of Media Freedom and Independence}, publisher = {Palgrave Macmillan}, address = {London}, isbn = {9781137337832}, pages = {191 -- 205}, abstract = {From the outset, the media in Turkey have developed as a political institution rather than a market and media owners perceived themselves primarily as political actors. This has caused the media to be divided between proponents and opponents of the political establishment. Initially, media polarisation was characterised by ideological divisions. With the changes brought in the ownership structure after the 1980s, however, where news outlets were transferred from family firms to large corporations, the proximity (or distance) of media owners to government became no longer indicative of political (dis)agreement; rather it was primarily driven by economic interests. Accordingly, the journalistic profession was transformed from a self-driven political class to an instrument of power for the state and the private capital.This chapter aims to provide an analysis of the multi-faceted and inter-connected sources of pressure - the military, the government, courts, media owners and journalists themselves - on the journalistic profession in Turkey. These sources reinforce each other in sustaining various types of pressures on the media of a political, legal and financial nature. The constraints produced by these power mechanisms gain particular weight and become all the more effective in view of the absence of a collective professional identity and the lack of solidarity among journalists. The deeply entrenched socio-economic inequalities that characterise the journalistic profession, professional hierarchies and ideological polarisation deepen journalists' vulnerability vis-{\`a}-vis political and economic power, as represented by the state and media ownership.}, language = {en} } @incollection{Kurban, author = {Kurban, Dilek}, title = {Protecting Marginalised Individuals and Minorities in ECtHR: Litigation and Jurisprudence in Turkey}, series = {The European Court of Human Rights and the Rights of Marginalised Individuals and Minorities in National Context}, booktitle = {The European Court of Human Rights and the Rights of Marginalised Individuals and Minorities in National Context}, publisher = {Brill/Martinus Nijhoff}, address = {Leiden}, isbn = {9789047426738}, publisher = {Hertie School}, pages = {119 -- 136}, abstract = {The ECtHR case law played an indispensable role in bringing to light the egregious human rights situation in Turkey in the late 1980s and early 1990s, shedding light to an administrative policy of systematic violations against Kurdish civilians. If awareness of the poor human rights record of Turkey was largely triggered by the ECtHR's jurisprudence, reforms to improve it were made possible with the emergence of the EU as an actor in Turkish politics. This chapter argues that after decades of litigation history with the Strasbourg court, law and politics in Turkey fall far short of meeting the European human rights standards. While significant progress has been made in recent years in harmonizing the Turkish legal framework with the principles laid out in the Human Rights Convention and the jurisprudence of the ECtHR, the constitutional and legal structure continue to rest on an authoritarian understanding which seeks to protect the interests of the state against individuals at the cost of violating fundamental rights and liberties.}, language = {en} } @techreport{Kurban, type = {Working Paper}, author = {Kurban, Dilek}, title = {Reparations and Displacement in Turkey: Lessons Learned from the Compensation Law}, series = {Case Studies on Transitional Justice and Displacement}, volume = {July 2012}, journal = {Case Studies on Transitional Justice and Displacement}, publisher = {ICTJ / Brookings}, address = {Washington, D.C. [u.a.]}, pages = {22}, abstract = {In countries that have experienced large-scale displacement, compensating the losses of victims raises unique challenges for governments. The difficulty of designing and implementing a reparations program is further elevated in a context where displacement was both on a massive scale and forced, where the displaced have been subject to serious human rights abuses by security forces and where these incidents occurred is an armed conflict. The economic, administrative, and legal challenges affiliated with the design and implementation of a mass-scale compensation program for hundreds of thousands, if not millions, of victims are exacerbated by the complexity of political and legal issues associated with prosecuting state agents. The forced displacement of more than one million individuals in Turkey in the context of the armed conflict between the Turkish armed forces and the Kurdistan Workers' Party (PKK) is a prime example of this situation. After years of denial of state responsibility, in an effort to enhance its chances for EU accession, the Turkish government adopted a compensation law for the displaced in 2004. Being one of the few countries actually compensating the displaced for their economic losses, Turkey has often been pointed to by the international community as an exemplary case. Yet, a close study of the government's policies on displacement in general and the compensation law in particular shows that the international community has prematurely hailed Turkey for its compensation scheme for the displaced. Furthermore, the limited reparative efforts of the Turkish government took place in the absence of a political solution to the Kurdish question or a "transition" to peace. Drawing on the lessons drawn to be learned from the Turkish case, this paper aims to reflect on the challenges of designing and implementing an effective reparations program for the displaced in situations where the root causes of displacement are still valid.}, language = {en} } @book{KurbanYegen, author = {Kurban, Dilek and Yegen, Mesut}, title = {Adaletin K{\i}y{\i}s{\i}nda: 'Zorunlu' G{\"o}{\c{c}} Sonras{\i}nda Devlet ve K{\"u}rtler- 5233 Say{\i}l{\i} Tazminat Yasas{\i}'n{\i}n bir Değerlendirmesi- Van {\"o}rneği}, publisher = {TESEV Publications}, address = {Istanbul}, isbn = {978-605-5832-95-7}, publisher = {Hertie School}, pages = {166}, abstract = {In 2004, the Turkish government adopted a compensation law for the Kurdish victims of forced displacement during the armed conflict between the PKK and the Turkish military in the late 1980s and the 1990s. Acclaimed by the UN and the EU as a successful example of a domestic reparations program, the law enhanced Turkey's chances for the opening of the accession talks with the EU and led the European Court of Human Rights to reject, on the basis of the availability of a new mechanism, around 1,500 applications filed by the Kurdish displaced. The law was also welcomed as a justice mechanism. Based on an extensive fieldwork in the province of Van in Turkey's Kurdish region, this book analyzes the substance and the implementation of this law from the lens of the displaced, their lawyers, the civil society in Van and the public officials charged with implementing the law. It questions the assumption that the law provides an efficient transitional justice mechanism capable of repairing the relations between the Turkish state and its Kurdish citizens.}, language = {mul} } @incollection{Kurban, author = {Kurban, Dilek}, title = {Substantive Challenges to the Protection of Religious Freedom under the Framework Convention}, series = {The Framework Convention for the Protection of National Minorities: A Useful Pan-European Instrument?}, booktitle = {The Framework Convention for the Protection of National Minorities: A Useful Pan-European Instrument?}, publisher = {Intersentia}, address = {Antwerp-Oxford-Poland}, isbn = {978-9050956437}, pages = {119 -- 126}, abstract = {One of the most significant substantive challenges in the interpretation of the Framework Convention concerns the effective protection of freedom of religion of minorities living in Europe. That the freedom of religion and political rights are among the founding pillars of democratic societies has been emphasized time and again by the European Court of Human Rights (ECtHR). The significance of these rights and freedoms for religious minorities is obvious due to the importance of religion for their identity and existence. However, in an environment where both the definition of minorities and the substantive scope of Articles 7 and 8 of the Framework Convention are subject to debate, the effective protection of minorities' rights to exercise their religion individually and in association with the others is a major challenge to the work of the Advisory Committee. A discussion of the religious rights and the corollary political rights of minorities in Europe raises at least two critical questions: the personal scope of application of the Framework Convention and the substantive scope of freedom of religion protected under Articles 7 and 8 of the Framework Convention. In other words, which groups should be deemed as religious minorities in this context and what kinds of rights should they be granted to be able to meaningfully exercise their freedom of religion? This chapter draws particular attention to the disconcerting implications of the ECtHR's judgment in the case of Leyla Şahin v. Turkey for minority protection in Europe, and urge the Advisory Committee to read Strasbourg's jurisprudence on religious freedom with a grain of salt.}, language = {en} } @article{Kurban, author = {Kurban, Dilek}, title = {Kein schmutziger Deal mit Erdogan}, series = {Die ZEIT}, journal = {Die ZEIT}, publisher = {Die ZEIT}, abstract = {Die T{\"u}rkei bietet syrischen Fl{\"u}chtlingen keinen wirklichen Schutz. Sie kann deshalb auch kein Partner der EU bei der Abriegelung ihrer Grenzen sein.}, language = {de} } @article{Kurban, author = {Kurban, Dilek}, title = {Forsaking Individual Justice: The Implications of the ECtHR's Pilot Judgment Procedure for Victims of Gross and Systematic Violations}, series = {Human Rights Law Review}, volume = {16}, journal = {Human Rights Law Review}, number = {4}, publisher = {Oxford Journals}, issn = {1461-7781}, pages = {731 -- 769}, abstract = {The Council of Europe's enlargement rendered reforming the European Court of Human Rights (ECtHR) inevitable. The post-1998 reforms aimed at transforming the ECtHR into a quasi- constitutional court and enhancing its efficiency. This article is concerned with one such reform, 'the pilot judgment mechanism', and contests the desirability of its application to gross and systematic violations. The article discusses why, contrary to opposing claims, the ECtHR's judgment in Doğan and Others v Turkey concerning the forced eviction of Kurdish civilians by the Turkish military is a pilot judgment. It then shows why this matters, based on the Court's İ{\c{c}}yer decision which found a compensation law the Turkish government adopted in response to Doğan and Others to be an effective domestic remedy and rejected 800-1,500 pending cases. Based on empirical research on the implementation of this law, the article argues that in applying the pilot judgment to the Kurdish cases, the ECtHR reduced the notion of 'effective remedy' to compensation, overlooking the victims' demands for truth and justice, and enabled Turkey to continue to commit gross violations with impunity. It concludes that while pilot-judgments might be effective in handling repetitive cases arising from systemic legal problems in post-communist contexts, they should not be applied to conflict or post-conflict cases where the underlying problems are deeply-rooted ethno-political disputes.}, language = {en} } @article{Kurban, author = {Kurban, Dilek}, title = {Merkel's Deal with Turkey}, series = {Dahrendorf Blog}, journal = {Dahrendorf Blog}, abstract = {The Syrian refugees deal between the EU and Turkey, brokered by Chancellor Angela Merkel during her October 2015 visit to Turkey, was politically and morally contentious from the start. It has become all the more critical after the Paris attacks.}, language = {en} } @article{Kurban, author = {Kurban, Dilek}, title = {Europa verr{\"a}t im Umgang mit Erdoğan seine Werte}, series = {Die Zeit}, journal = {Die Zeit}, language = {de} } @article{Kurban, author = {Kurban, Dilek}, title = {The EU has a choice - suspend Turkey's accession process}, series = {Hertie School Research Blog}, journal = {Hertie School Research Blog}, abstract = {As post-coup purges erode democracy, the EU must take a stand, Dilek Kurban says in an interview.}, language = {en} }