Oppositional usages of Europeanization in Turkish constitution-making: discussions on religious freedom

Abstract

The European Union has traditionally played an anchoring role in Turkey, pushing the Republic towards the enhancement of fundamental rights and freedoms. However, the decreasing credibility of the project for EU membership after 2005 has gradually led to selective reforms being introduced, and most recently to de-Europeanization. Against this quickly changing background, this paper seeks to investigate the usages of Europeanization by domestic political actors during the discussions on the recently failed constitution-making process (2011–2013). It specifically focuses on deliberations over religious freedom, and argues that Europeanization has continued to serve as the normative context in constitution-writing.