Different theories  from different disciplines produce different explanations to the questions on EU actorness leading  to large debates in the literature. As for the collective identity formation at EU level, the constructivists argue through a process of intense foreign policy cooperation and institutionalisation shared standards of behaviour, a common identity are developed which brings about the collective action at the end, while liberal institutionalists puts more emphasis on the extent of international interdependence as the catalisator for the collective action. [2] The intergovernmentalists focus on the shared and overlapping interests of the member states as against the realists who argue that external threats and powers lead to collective action and alliance formation.[3] Not only the motivations for the collective action at the EU level but also the limitations to it have constituted divergence in the academic literature. The fist and the famous ‘capabilities-expectations gap’ theory of Christopher Hill reveals the gap between the expectations of collective EU action and the EU’s capacity to deliver it, while Stanley Hoffman with ‘logic of diversity’ argument focuses on the diverging interests of the member states which are difficult to reconcile. The bureaucratic politics between the institutions in Brussels or the pillar structure has been proposed as hurdles for the collective action while David Allen links the foreign policy to the idea of state with a set of interests identified by a government .[4] Realists see EU as incapable of using coercive military force due the the inability of the member states to act collectively on hard core policy issues where national interests can not coverge which as in Kagan’s words is the result of a Hobbesian international system as against to the Kantian one.[5]

As the questions on the existance of European Foreign Policy are invalidated with the behavioural evidences on the influence of the EU in world politics, more attention needs to be directed towards the  issue of what exactly EU foreign policy is,  what it stands for, what it does, or in other words taking the existance of EU foreign policy as given then what is its raison d’etre.[6] In order to find the right answer to the question at hand, it is necessary to understand the evolution of the EU foreign policy system including the institutions, the formal rules, norms; the policy making process and the impact of common policies on the system itself, on EU member states, on the world, as well as the its justifications.

European European has develeoped as civilian power from the very beginning especially institutionalised Europe has been successful in excluding force as an element in interstate relations and been called as zone of peace since the demolition of Berlin Wall which continued until the post-cold war era where European governments and leaders faced with the challenge of justifying their public expenditures on military forces. The conecpt of ‘civilian power Europe’ developed in 1970s by Duchene focused on mainly the division of labor between US focusing on force and Europe spreading prosperity and democracy. European Union’s self image was constructed around the seperation of soft-civilian power reinforced by trade incentives and financial assistance from hard military power. Institutionalised Europe has been associated with the force for good, spreading civilized values across the globe, promoting human rights.[7] Altough most of the literature on the EU’s foreign policy is explained on the definite results it produces to the collective or individiual interests of the EU member states, the notions of ‘eurocentric power or normative power’ EU are necessary to be employed for justifying EU’s foreign policy with a referrence first to common values, second to universal principles. While Manners puts the argument that EU can be conceptualized as a normative power which is normatively different  and promotes universal norms and principles in its relations with non-members[8], another argument has been raised by Bretherton and Volgler on the tendency of the EU to reproduce itself in its relations with non-members referring to patterns of interdependence ‘through the external projection  of internal solutions’.[9]

Paralell to normative or civilizing connotations of the EU foreign policy, the logics  underpinning the EU foreign policy were a matter of discussion. As Sjursen and Smith says EU foreign policy can be explained as an effort to find efficient solutions to concrete problems; or as a reference to what is considered as appropriate given a particular group’s conception of itself and what it represents ; as well as set of  principles mutaually recognized as morally acceptable and just by all parties.[10] In fact the detailed analysis of different waves of the enlargement and different conditionality terms put forward through both enlargement and neighbourhood policies will reveal the fact that EU is not en entity to be limited within the boundaries of a specific approach and logics. All three elements are present in the logics underpinning the EU foreign policy and EU carries elements of both civilizing power projecting its understanding of norms to the rest of the world and normative power promoting universal norms.

The most effective instrument of the EU’s foreign policy over the past 30 years has been the promise of enlargement conditional on the acceptance of some political and economic criteria by the candidate states.  During the cold war EU membership was not a matter of concern since the membership of the states other than the west European countries was not on the agenda while the other west European countries were not so interested in EU membership. When we come to 1970s first enlargement wave to Britain, Ireland and Denmark were realized without the membership criteria.  Infact till 1978 the conditionalty did not become a matter of concern when the European Council declared that ‘respect for and maintenance of representative democracy and human rights’ in each memberstate are essential elements of membership as a clear signal to Greece, Spain and Portugal to proceed with democratisation. In fact the clarification of democracy as a membership criteria was crucial in terms of showing that the European integration is not only an economic project but linked to deeper values with the first signals of its normative connotation.[11]

Bichi while classifying theoretical approaches and arguments about the EU, talks about mainly two broad criteria of inclusiveness nad reflexivity and labels the cases where EFP is neither inclusive nor reflexive as civilizing power. He also makes a referrence to the tendency of institutions to export institutional isomorphism and defines EU unreflexively eurocentric. [12]

According to Manners and Sjursen, normative value of EU rests on the universal character of the principles it promotes; i.e. EU acts normatively when it promotes values that empower actors affected by EFP. Shortly, normative power of EU shall be capable of giving voice to people outside Europe. The issue of reflexivity is not free of division which sharply divides between rationalist and sociological institutionalism. While rationalist and sociological institutionalist portray EU as eurocentric with no room for outsiders, constructivists draws a more inclusive picture for EU. Rationalists argue that EU intentionally exports norms from which it benefits with only enough attention to the receiving end for the beneficial effect to occur which rests on the logic of consequentionalism and expected outcome of the rational choices. This argument that EU promotes its norms because it expects to benefit from their adoptation as a reflexive and eurocentric entity, is being supported by Youngs and Hyde-Price. Young says that promotion of human rights is a part of EU’s general strategy of consolidating regimes and taking third party support fot the EU. Also Haddadi puts forward a similar argument saying that EU promotes the human rights in Maghreb countries to provide security and stability in the area. Moreover, Hyde and Price define EU as a regional hegemon trying to shape the external area by using both soft and hard power.[13]

More radical argument belongs to sociological institutionalists who mainly focus on the institutional isomorphism as a rule for the EFP where norms are exported unreflexively with a single model promoted to all its partners regardless of their context. EU’s projecting its own identity of democratic polity into its relations with third countries is explained by Bözel and Risse’s words as ‘one single cultural script’ or ‘one size fits all’ attidue.[14]

Contrary to the eurocentrism put emphasized by the rationalists, for constructivists EU promotes norms of universal value as an inclusive entity. As the time passes, the line between reflexivity and unreflexivity blurs and an intentional behaviour at the beginning will be a routine which is quite close to the famous ‘path dependency’ argument of historical institutionalism according to which the repetition of communications and practices lead to a standardisation of practices and an eventual change in actor’s reciprocal disposition. In this sense, constructivists focus more on the inclusive character of EU’s foreign policy with the norms and values having universal character.

Whether the diversity of approaches and debates on European Foreign Policy is a signal for the health in the literature or rather a ‘cacophony of dissonant voices’ is a matter of discussion as Walter Carlsnaes argues. He focuses on the need for an emprical research on the EU international actorness instead of giving effort to find a dominant approach explaining the evolution and working of the system.[15] EU as a sui generis entity different from the socalled international actors as states, state-like actors, without any government but with a form of governance, can not be easily explained within the boundries of the ‘foreign policy actorness’ legal definition.  On the other hand as the behavioural observations indicate EU compared to many states or state-like actors exerts more influence on the international arena even affecting in a direct or indirect way the policy decisions executed within the third countries as well as the reforms taken through the famous notion of ‘conditionality’ as it was the case in Turkey. As the constructivist argument says, there occurs an emotional environment between the EU and third countries within which both sides form expectations from eachother through some policy tools, hence EU at the end appears as en entity unique to be investigated over which foreign policy actorness should be redefined as against the traditional terms.

Rather than limiting the analysis to the justification of EU’s actorness on one of these aproaches, or giving effort to explain EU’s foreign policy within the boundaries of the selective approaches, it is better to base the analysis on the emprical and historical research of the evolution of EU foreign policy system  (the institutions, the formal rules, the informal norms), the policy-making process and impact of common policies or the failure to agree common policies on the system itself, on EU member states as well as on the world.[16] This emprical research will lead us to approach from a broader perspective to the question ‘Is the EU a normative power, promoting universal values or is it a eourocentric civilizing power projecting its own understanding of norms onto the rest of the world or both?  While capturing the answer the policy tools employed by the EU and its impacts vis a vis member states, candidate countries and the rest of the world should be the subjects of emprical analysis, namely enlargement and neighbourhood policies of the EU.  The emprical analysis of EU foreign policy around those policy tools will bring us to the logics underpinning the EU enlargement and neighbourhood policy.

Diğdem Tümtürk

[2] Alexender Wendt, ‘Collective Identity Formation and the International State”, American Political Science Review, 88, 2, 1994, pp. 389-390.

[3] Roy Ginsberg, The Foreign Policy Actions of the European Community (Boulder: Lynne Rienner, 1989).

[4] David Allen, “The European Rescue of National Foreign Policy?”, in Hill, ed., The Actors in Europe’s Foreign Policy, p. 303.

[5] Robert Kagan, “Paradise and Power: America and Europe in New World Order”, (London: Atlantic Books, 2003)

[6] Ibid.

[7] William Wallace, “Is There a European Approach to War?”, European Foreign Policy Unit Working Paper, 2005, 2, p. 2.

[8] I. Manners, “Normative Power Europe: A Contradiction in Terms?”, Journal of Common Market Studies, 2002, 40, p. 241.

[9] Bretherton, C. and Volgler, J., “The European Union as a Global Actor”,(London: Routledge, 1999), p.249.

[10] Sjursen and Smith, op.cit., p.3

[11] Federica Bicci, “Our Size Fits All”, European Foreign Policy Unit Working Paper, 2005/3, p.7.

[12] Ibid., p. 201.

[13] Ibid., p. 207.

[14] T.Börzel and T. Risse, “One Size Fits All! EU Policies for the Promotion of Human Rights, Democracy and the Rule of Law”, Workshop on Democracy Promotion and the Rule of Law, 4-5 October, Stanford University.

[15] Walter Carlsnaes, “Where the Analysis of European Foreign Policy Going”, European Union Politics,5, 4, 2004, p.495.

[16] Karen E. Smith, “The EU in the World: Future Research Agendas”, European Foreign Policy Unit Working Paper, 2008/1, p. 3.

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The table shows the possible advantage of cooperation, as a supportive example to liberalist view and the reasons of non-cooperation, explaining realist concerns over cooperation, among states. Although cooperation rewards both parties, they end up with lose-lose outcome out of the fear of being on a disadvantaged side, in case of one-sided choice to cooperate, that is, to remain silent, because there is no guarantee that the other side will cooperate too. This lack of trust leads to the anarchy and chaos among states, undermining cooperation to a great degree [6]. One other perspective that deserves to be mentioned is sociological institutional approach, derived by Barnett and Finnemore based on Weberian arguments, which criticizes other theories for their ignoring the important question of whether IOs serve the intended aim. While realists and liberals see the IOs as instruments of states as they derive power from them, Barnett and Finnemore argue that “… the rational legal authority that IOs embody gives them power independent of states that created them and channels that power in particular directions”. It is claimed that bureaucracies make rules, define “shared international tasks, create and define new categories of actors” and “create new interests for actors”. This autonomous tendency leads to IOs‟ inefficiency and self-defeat as this bureaucratic model “…make[s] them unresponsive to their environment, obsessed with their own rules at the expense of primary missions”. [1] As the general understanding of IOs has been discussed so far, it is time to start focusing on UN analysis.

As a legal representative of international law, both the concept of international law and thus the relevance of the UN have been of a big debate over the last years. International law was seen by the realists as means of implementing power politics and legitimizing authorities of the Great Powers. While Great Powers seem reluctant to abide by the rules and regulations seeing them overly constraining, international law is left “helpless in this situation – unable to constrain a powerful state on its own, it is assumed to depend for its effectiveness on a balance of power” [7]. Deriving from these arguments realists have arrived at some conclusions about the functioning of the UN. First, they claim that the UN is largely irrelevant because the Great Powers “determine world political outcomes”, including international laws and rules and not the UN. Second, realists “tend to see the UN as a tool of the strong that serves their interests” and legitimize their authorities in the world politics. [8] This leaves the UN very inefficient in the case when its goals diverge from the priorities of the strong states constituting it.

The best example is the 2003 Iraqi invasion case as one of the biggest failures in UN history. The Iraqi case showed explicitly how UN was unable to constrain the actions of US – the strong state, which entered Iraqi territory without the UN authorization and no sanctions were imposed.

The Afghanistan war case further showed that the US does not need the UN authorization when its interests are at a stake. Legitimizing its intervention by Article 51 of UN Charter, a right of self-defense, the US has led violent campaigns again Afghanistan and the Taliban government that was seen as the supporter of the terrorism, however, there are explicitly lacking grounds for such a justifications of US actions in the Charter [9].

Despite all the examples for malfunctioning of the UN, it has proved itself to be the international lawmaker, going through several transformations throughout the centuries. The redefinition of the powers of the UN‟s political organs has given it more weigh in international law making. The General Assembly‟s power of convening “treaty negotiations capable of producing some of the most ambitious multilateral treaties multilateral treaties the world has ever seen”. Moreover, its power to create administrative tribunal for settling the disputes, the reputation of its „recommendations‟ which are taking into account by state judiciaries and are bases for international treaties and agreements [8]. The most powerful body in this sense is the Security Council which has a right of imposing sanctions in cases of violations, can take actions not out of the scope of Chapters VI and VII, can create subsidiary bodies “capable of taking legally binding action on states or individuals”. Being an “enforcer of UN privileges and immunities” the Secretary-General generates new law playing a role of mediator or arbitrator. Moreover, the UN has been a signatory to the new sets of rules governing warfare, or human rights conventions. The ever growing importance of the UN in generating binding legal norms does create international law, a fact in opposition to the realist claims that it‟s the consent of states that create international obligations [8].

Created in 1945, the UN basically aimed at achieving international peace and security by providing platform for dialogues and stopping wars between countries [10]. It has developed various institutions, provisions and regulations to achieve that aim. One of them is outlined in the Art.2/3 stating that “all the members shall settle their international disputes by peaceful means in such a manner that international peace and security, and justice, are not endangered” [8]. Art. 33 of the UN Charter underlines certain methods to be employed while settling disputes; “the parties to any dispute, the continuance of which is likely to endanger the maintenance of peace and security, shall, first of all seek a solution by negotiation, enquiry, mediation, conciliation, arbitration, judicial settlement, resort or regional agencies or arrangements, or other peaceful means of their own choice” [8]. The peaceful settlement of border war between Ethiopia and Eritrea, which lasted over years, is a proud example of the principle and the efficiency of UN and its policies [15]. However, the long-lasting efforts of the UN in settling the dispute between Israel and Palestine have not given any progressive results, not being able to bring the Israeli government into compliance with advised solutions [16].

However, the provisions aimed at securing international peace have led to growing debate over their practicability over the recent years. The principle of nonintervention, as a mean of arriving at peaceful relations among states, is outlined in Art.2/4: “all members shall refrain in their international relations from the threat or use of force against the territorial integrity or political independence of any state, or in any other manner inconsistent with the Purposes of the United Nations” [12]. The only exception to the prohibition of the use of force is the right of self-defense written in Art.51. The problematic issue here is that the principle of self-defense has become an issue of debate after the US invasion of Iraq on the basis of „anticipatory self-defense‟. The “Bush Doctrine” justified an attack on Iraq basing the claims on the assumption that Iraq posed a threat to the security of US and seek for authorization of pre-emptive attacks, meaning that the use of force is justified even if there has not been an actual attack but the evidence of future threats [11]. The Art. 51 states; “Nothing in the present Charter shall impair the inherent right of individual or collective self-defense if an armed attack occurs against a Member of the United Nations, until the Security Council has taken measures necessary to maintain international peace and security” [12]. The important point to be mentioned lays in the phrase “…if an armed attack occurs…” questioning the legitimacy of US intervention in Iraq on the grounds of preventing future aggressions.

Recently, the internal crises, such as civil wars, humanitarian crises, have been seen as threats to international security, undermining stability and peace. As a result, the importances of promotion of democracies, and respect for human rights have come to the agenda and humanitarian intervention have faced growing acceptance in international arena. Nevertheless, the emerging importance of humanitarian intervention has brought growing debates of its legitimacy due to two main reasons. First of all, humanitarian intervention falls contrary to the principle of nonintervention, undermining state sovereignty. Before 1990s the principle of nonintervention was seen superior to the preservation of human rights because of highly instable international affairs, where the war was the next door should the sovereignty of one state be undermined by the other. However, after the end of the Cold War, an increase in humanitarian emergencies, having direct effect on international peace, creating clashes between different nations, together with the diminished fears over undermining international peace by increasing defense of human rights brought the issue to the UN agenda. The dilemma was solved by Brahimi report that stated “…that political neutrality has often degenerated into military timidity and the duty to protect civilians” [8].

Second, there is growing criticism over efficiency and legitimacy of humanitarian interventions. The Srebrenica and Rwanda tragedies show the inefficiency of humanitarian intervention resulting in more harm than good. The hesitation of UN peace keeping forces to intervene in these cases resulted in huge casualties and the reluctance of the states to commit all the resources needed for settling the disputes led to the UN inefficiency in the regions of crises [13]. Operation Restore Hope in Somalia brought into daylight the ugly truth about actual aims of “humanitarian” intervention. While the first phase of the intervention was for humanitarian reasons, the development of the conflict proved different. “The moment the UN and the United States went to war against General Aidid, the international forces ceased to have any humanitarian role. And from the beginning, the soldiers did not behave like humanitarian workers. There were innumerable cases of misconduct, including torture, rape, and summary killing. Violations by Canadian Special Forces were but the tip of the iceberg” [14].

At this point it is necessary to examine the role of the UN in contemporary international relations.

The case of Turkish flotilla raid by Israeli government leads to the questioning of the efficiency UN decisions in international relations. Michael Oren, Israel’s ambassador to Washington, said on the U.S. TV program “Fox News Sunday” that “We are rejecting an international commission”, the proposal of UN on international investigation to be carried into the deadly raid on Gaza bound aid-ship, claiming it to be the right of the Israeli government to carry their own investigation. [17] Moreover, despite the fact that the Israeli government violated the international Law of the Sea, attacking the flotilla on international waters, no sanctions were imposed on it, although 15 council members “had called for condemnation of the attack by Israeli forces “in the strongest terms” and “an independent international investigation.” [18] The apparent support from the US towards Israel can be seen as a reason of Israeli government‟s “courageous” stance against the international world and the UN, proving once more the attitudes of the Great Powers to be decisive, undermining the notion of justice and the intended aim for UN creation. However, the recent case with imposing sanctions on Iranian government as a result of Iranian nuclear program, shows that UN still to be a relevant actor controlling an balancing instable cases in international arena.

It seems as some of the past experiences of failure in terms of humanitarian interventions have taught some lessons to the UN on the recent case of Kyrgyzstan humanitarian crises. Whereas the past cases, such as Rwanda, were major failures because of the late response by the UN or unwillingness to provide required resources by the states, this time the reaction of the UN to humanitarian crises in Kyrgyzstan was immediate and it seems the UN is not going to be greedy this time. According to news “the UN called for $71 million to assist hundreds of thousands of people affected by ethnic conflict in Kyrgyzstan, and a similar appeal aimed at helping the refugees in Uzbekistan is expected to be launched later” [19]. Whether this big attention is a reason of Great Powers‟ pursuing their interests in the region or not, the taken action is a positive step for the goodwill of mankind.

As human being is not perfect, nothing created by them can be expected to be perfect. The UN being comprised of the states, which are the creations of humans, is not perfect in any sense. There have been many failures, and without any doubt there will be even more. However, it would be unfair to take into granted all the contributions the UN made to international peace and security by focusing on the mistakes and failures and regard the UN to be merely an arena for power politics. Even if so, it is better to engage in power politics under the UN ceiling than engaging in wars. Thus, no matter what the UN actually represents, it sure has a positive effect on international peace and for improving the UN functioning in international relations the failures should be taken as precedents for reformed actions and more effort should be made on the issue on state basis.

Rashad HASANOV

1. Barnett, Michael N. and Martha Finnemore, „The Politics, Power, and Pathologies of International Organizations‟, International Organization vol.53, no. 4 (Autumn 1999), 699-732.

2. Concert of Europe. In Encyclopedia Encyc online. Retrieved from http://encyc.org/wiki/Concert_of_Europe

3. European Coal and Steel Community. In Encyclopedia Wikipedia online. Retrieved from http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/European_Coal_and_Steel_Community

4. Absolute gain (international relations). In Encyclopedia Wikipedia online. Retrieved from http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Absolute_gain_(international_relations)

5. Relative gain (international relations). In Encyclopedia Wikipedia online. Retrieved from http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Relative_gain_(international_relations)

6. Scott B., Andrew L., Richard D., Jack D., Matthew P., Christian R.S. and Jacqui T.. (3rd Eds.). (2005). Theories of International Relations. New York, NY: PALGRAVE MACMILLAN.

7. Nico Krisch, “International Law in Times of Hegemony: Unequal Power and the Shaping of the International Legal Order”, The European Journal of International Law Vol.16, no.3 (2005), 369-408

8. Weiss, Thomas G., and Sam Daws (eds.), The Oxford Handbook on the United Nations (Oxford: OUP, 2007).

9. War in Afghanistan (2001–present), Legal basis for war. In Encyclopedia Wikipedia online. Retrieved from http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/War_in_Afghanistan_(2001-present)

10. United Nations, Security Council. In Encyclopedia Wikipedia online. Retrieved from http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_Nations

11. Anthony Dworkin (2002, August 20). Crimes of War. Iraq and the “Bush Doctrine” of Pre-Emptive Self-Defence. Retrieved from http://www.crimesofwar.org/expert/bush-intro.html

12. Charter of the United Nations, CHAPTER I: PURPOSES AND PRINCIPLES, Article 2/4 Retrieved from http://www.un.org/en/documents/charter/chapter1.shtml12

13. Thelma Ekiyor and Mary Ellen O’Connell, “The Responsibility to Protect (R2P): A way forward – or rather part of the problem?” Foreign Voices No.1 February 2008.

14. Alex de Waal, Harvard International Review, No Such Thing as Humanitarian Intervention. Retrieved from http://hir.harvard.edu/index.php?page=article&id=1482&p=2

15. Kofi Annan and Amara Essy. UN Eritrea-Ethiopia Boundary Commission, Securing a Lasting Peace Between Ethiopia and Eritrea. Retrieved from http://www.un.org/NewLinks/eebcarbitration/oped.htm

16. Reuters (2007, June 14). Haaretz, Ex-diplomat: UN failed in Middle East, subservient to U.S., Israel. Retrieved from http://www.haaretz.com/news/ex-diplomat-un-failed-in-middle-east-subservient-to-u-s-israel-1.223183

17. Jeffrey Heller (2010, June 6). Reuters, Israel rejects international inquiry into lethal raid. Retrieved from http://www.reuters.com/article/idUSTRE65005R20100606

18. (2010, June 1). CBS News, U.N. Calls for Probe into Israeli Aid Ship Raid. Retrieved from http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2010/06/01/world/main6536693.shtml

19. (2010, June 23). India Blooms News Service, Kyrgyz: Despite security constraints, aid flows in. Retrieved from http://www.indiablooms.com/ForeignDetailsPage/foreignDetails230610a.php

Since the end of the 1980s, a conflict emerged berween Azerbaijan and Armenia over the region of Nagorno-Karabakh. In 1992 the conflict culminated into the war between these countries. Cornell (2001), in his book Small nations and great powers: a study of ethnopolitical conflict in the Caucaus, writes how the conflict over this territory turned to be inter-state issue as well as the casualties of the war:

The conflict has led to over twenty thousands casualties and almost one and a half million refugees, a refugee flow which has resulted in a considerable crisis especially in Azerbaijan, with the number of displaced persons numbering close to one million. Over fourteen percent of the territory of Azerbaijan is occupied, territories which have been ethnically cleansed in the course of warfare of their Azeri population by Armenian Forces. The conflict is regarded as an internal conflict by the major powers and international organizations, and the efforts of the international community to bring an end to the conflict have been half-hearted at best and exiguous at worst. The conflict over Nagorno-Karabakh clearly possesses an intra-state dimension, that of the struggle for independence on the part of the Armenian population of Nagorno-Karabakh. However, since the beginning of 1992 the conflict also possesses an inter-state dimension in the sense that it involved two sovereign states as belligerents: Armenia and Azerbaijan… p. 31. … By early 1992, the power vacuum created by the dissolution of the Soviet Union led to the loss of the last factor containing the conflict. Thus with the imminent withdrawal of the formerly Soviet forces, Karabakh became the scene of what gradually increased to a full-scale war. The Armenian side, having prepared itself to solve the conflict through military means, did not loose any time to act. p. 61[i]

As stated above, the war outbroke just after the dissolution of the Soviet Union. In fact, following the Glasnost and Perestroika policies of Gorbachev, the Soviet Union had already lost almost all its influences on its member republics. Most important fact is that people of this gigantic union themselves believed in the demise of the Soviet Union and its influence. Especially, people of Azerbaijan, after the January Massacre, done by the Red Army of the Soviet Union during the dissolution period, were among the strong believers to this demise. In these circumstances, nationalist movements became dominant in all post soviet republics. On the other hand, according to Abrahamian (1998), there always been nationalism in the Soviet Union in the form of “linguistic nationalism”, caused by the imposition of the Russian language to all Soviet republics instead of the mother tongue of each republic[ii]. Therefore, after dissolution of the Soviet Union, Nagorno-Karabakh conflict became a war between ‘Armenians’ and ‘Azerbaijanis’, or ‘Hays’ and ‘Turks’, according to Armenian nationalists of this period. Khojaly Massacre ‘performed’ by the Armenian army was the breaking point of the war making these two nations to turn to be enemies for several decades, as history approves. On the official website of Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Azerbaijan (mfa.gov.az) the settlement process of the conflict presented by the UN and OSCE is described below:

In general, the legal and political constituent for the settlement of the conflict is based on the norms and principles of international law, laid down in UN Security Council resolutions 822, 853, 874 and 884 as well as in the appropriate documents and decisions of the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE) and other international organizations. As mentioned above, the UN Security Council resolutions were adopted in 1993 in response to the occupation of the territories of Azerbaijan and reaffirmed respect for the sovereignty, territorial integrity and inviolability of the international borders of the Republic of Azerbaijan and all other States in the region. The Council demanded immediate cessation of all hostile acts, immediate, complete and unconditional withdrawal of occupying forces from all occupied regions of the Republic of Azerbaijan, and called for the restoration of economic, transport and energy links in the region, ensuring the return of refugees and displaced persons to their homes. n. pag.[iii]

Until today, the settlement of the conflict is very (if not the most) significant issue in both domestic realm and the foreign policies of both countries. In this article, public opinion in Azerbaijan on Nagorno-Karabakh conflict and its effects on Azerbaijan’s foreign policy will be briefly analyzed.

PUBLIC OPINION IN AZERBAIJAN ON NAGORNO-KARABAKH CONFLICT, IT’S IMPACT ON FOREIGN POLICY, AND OPINION-POLICY CONNECTION ON THE CONFLICT

1. 1. Nagorno-Karabakh Conflict as ‘Bread and Butter’ Issue in Domestic Realm

After the January Massacre, and the following declaration of independence followed by dropping the term ‘Soviet Republic’ from its name, Azerbaijan entered into the most difficult phase of its history, where social, economic and political upheavals waited for it.

Firstly, Karabakh War detoriorated the social life in all aspects and throughout the whole country. In addition to dead bodies of soldiers ‘went’ to all cities and villages, the people(now, refugees) displaced from their motherland, Dağlıq(Nagorny) Karabakh, flowed to all regions, especially to big cities of Azerbaijan. According to the report of Chloe Arnold (2002), Baku-based BBC correspondent, until the ceasefire established in 1994, ”an estimated 17,000 people had been killed, another 50,000 had been wounded, and 1.2 million had been forced from their homes. Today, many of the 100,000 Azeris who fled their villages in Nagorno-Karabakh are still living in abandoned railway cars, mud-brick houses, and tents”. Considering the size of population in Azerbaijan which approximately was 7 million(The State Statistical Committee of the Republic of Azerbaijan), it is obvious that the number of refugees which was over 1 million created deep social concerns in Azerbaijan. The refugees could not adapt to the ‘new life’ in another lands, and local people did not get well along refugees because they had to share already scarce resources with newcomers. For this and many another reasons, people felt such bitter consequences of Nagorno-Karabakh conflict on everywhere in daily life.

Moreover, economic life was as collapsed as demographic situation. Economy had already been collapsed as a result of the Soviet dissolution. According to the World Bank report (2002), “Most of the formerly Soviet states began the transition to a market economy in 1990-1991 and made efforts to rebuild and restructure their economic systems, with varying results. The process triggered a severe transition decline, with Gross Domestic Product (GDP) dropping by more than 40% between 1990 and 1995”[iv]. In addition to this, the unexpected and huge migration caused by Nagorno-Karabakh War paralyzed the already deteriorated economy. Inflation and unemployment were at the top of the problems and the public opinion on this issue was formed in a way that all the guilt for the current situation was seen on the Karabakh War, and its initiator-Armenia.

Furthermore, political situation in Azerbaijan was negatively affected by the Nagorno-Karabakh War. Ayaz Mutallibov, the head of the state since September 8, 1991, resigned from his post on March 6, 1992, under the pressure of Azerbaijan Popular Front (leader of which was Elçibey) due to failure in defending Khojaly and giving an opportunity to Armenian army to realize a genocide in Khojaly. The national presidential elections were held on June 7, 1992, and Elçibey was elected the President of Azerbaijan Republic by gaining over 50% of votes.[v] The same issue of Karabakh War made Elçibey also to resign from presidency, and apart from Karabakh issue, there was a threat of civil war in the country. It was not until 1996 the stability and order was established in Azerbaijan under the presidency of Haydar Aliyev. Political landscape, however, were the same throughout this period. Settlement of Nagorno-Karabakh conflict were the first priority of these three governments although Mutallibov was communist while Elçibey and Aliyev rejected communism.

1. 2. Weight of Nagorno-Karabakh Conflict in Azerbaijan’s Foreign Policy

Generally, since the independence of Azerbaijan, Nagorno-Karabakh issue and its settlement have always been among the top priorities of Azerbaijan’s foreign policy. In their speeches, Azerbaijani officials, including president and foreign minister, always claimed about the opportunities that both Armenia and Azerbaijan could benefit if the conflict resolved within the frames of the integrity of Azerbaijani territories, that is, after Armenia’s withdrawal of its army from the occupied territories of Azerbaijan. Elmar Mammadyarov, Foreign Minister of Azerbaijan, in his article published on Wall Street Journal (2008), once again emphasized the importance of the settlement of Nagorno-Karabakh conflict not only for the parties of conflict but also for the region:

The current market price for oil and gas is high and we should be able to maximize the economic potential of our strategic resources. The unresolved Nagorno-Karabakh conflict, however, threatens the security of the existing pipeline infrastructure, preventing us from optimizing the region’s energy trade with Europe. For us in Azerbaijan this will impede economic growth, which has been averaging around 30% in the past few years. n. pag.[vi]

Above, in the excerpt, again it can be seen that official Azerbaijan wants to return its territorries at any cost and without any compromise. This is the real proof of the huge impact of public opinion on the foreign policy.

The question emerges: How it is possible for public opinion to have such huge links with  foreign policy on this issue?

1. 3. A Multiaxial Evaluation of the link between Foreign Policy and Public Opinion on Nagorno-Karabakh Conflict

Nagorno-Karabakh issue, in general, is one of the issues which are difficult to be categorized as an issue solely belonging to domestic or foreign policies. It is for this reason that opinion-policy linkage on Karabakh issue is so huge and ‘fresh’. Therefore, it would be mistake to comment this issue without considering the socio-economic and political factors affecting this links. Based on ‘a Multiaxial Assessment of Policy Climate in Mediating Opinion-Policy Connections’ proposed by Shiraev and Sobel (2003), the link between opinion and policy can be analyzed by several dimensions and axes. There are two dimensions affecting the opinion-policy linkage. First one is ‘basic socio-economic and political factors’ which include two axes, namely, ‘political institutions and communications’ and ‘political landscape’. Second dimension is ‘basic cultural and psychological factors’, again which includes two axes, namely, ‘general socio-cultural variables’ and ’contextual and situational factors’[vii]. In order to clarify the affect of these dimensions and axes on opinion-policy linkage in Nagorno-Karabakh issue, on the Graph 1 the case is shown graphically.

Graph 1 – Analysis of impact of  several factors on foreign policy-public opinion connection on the issue of Nagorno Karabakh conflict

CONCLUSION

Considering the historical, political, social and economic factors on Nagorno-Karabakh issue and the policy-opinion connection on this issue, the following conclusions can be drawn.

First, the history made this conflict escalate into the war in which hundred thousands were killed and over a million people were internally displaced. Second, political life during the early independence period was full of upheavals and instability; however, the political atmosphere on the Karabakh issue has always remained unchanged. This is mainly because of the fact the public opinion has remained unchanged on the issue. Third, socio-economic factors were very effective in the process of opinion forming. The war was considered to be the father of all social and economic upheavals in the country. Fourth, the attention was drawn to the fact that on issues like Nagorno-Karabakh conflict, where it is not possible to categorize the issue solely as domestic or foreign, opinion-policy linkage is very huge because public opinion has great impact on foreign policy.

Jamil Islamov

[ii] Abrahamian, L. (1998, 08 01). Mother Tongue: Linguistic Nationalism and the Cult of Translation in Postcommunist Armenia. Berkeley, USA. Retrieved from http://www.escholarship.org/uc/item/9cm4d9vn

[iii] Ministry of Foreign Affairs. (tarih yok). Republic of Azerbaijan Ministry of Foreign Affairs. Retrieved on June 12, 2010, from http://www.mfa.gov.az/eng/khojaly_en/index.php

[iv] The World Bank. (2002). Transition: The First Ten Years – Analysis and Lessons For Eastern Europe and the Former Soviet Union. Washington. DC.

[v] Academic dictionaries and encyclopedias.http://en.academic.ru/dic.nsf/enwiki/42307

[vi] Mammadyarov, E. (2008). The Caspian Moment. Wall Street Journal , 4.

[vii] Sobel, R., & Shiraev, E. (2003). International Public Opinion and the Bosnia Crisis. Lanham: Lexington  Books.

One of the most important policy fields in the EU is regional policy whose effective implementation depends on the compatibility of local and regional governance systems of member states with EU practice and regulatory norms. In line with the European Regional Policy, the potential member states pass through a transformation process where EU accession enacts as catalyst to the policy enhancement in terms of European Regional Policy standards. However, this period of policy transformation in candidate countries are not free of challenges. In that respect, Turkey constitutes a special case study in terms of its still ongoing adaptation process with EU regional policy regulations and norms. Turkey is a country with huge interregional disparities which has passed through a fast structural and policy changes in an unstable macroeconomic environment over a long period of time. Throughout this transformation period Turkey made remarkable attempts to develop a regional policy. Firstly, the transformation from a plan-driven import-substitution to an open export-based economy was realized in 1980 and further steps were taken to develop a fully market economy. The eventual admission of Turkey’s candidate status in the Helsinki European Council (1999) accelerated Turkey’s efforts in the way of harmonizing its policies with the acquis. From that time onwards, the policy transformation period posed some challenges to Turkey as other candidate countries.

In order to make a detailed examination of those challenges and Turkey’s actions as against to those challenges, it would be useful to make a comparative analysis of this transformation between a recently acceded country to the EU namely, ‘Poland’ and Turkey who had experienced similar challenges while adopting their regional policies to EU standards. Similarity in territorial length, average population and share of rural population in the total, sharp east-west division in terms of socio-economic development, levels of unemployment rates may be given as reasons laying behind our choice to study on Poland.

Moreover Polish experience of post-communist transition in early 1990s and Turkey’s transformation from a centrally planned economy to a more liberal in 1980s; the fact that both countries are characterized with huge disparities between West-East and Rural-Urban regions; centralization being an important hurdle in the way of implementing its regional policy in the pre-accession policy in both countries; and the dominant position of sectoral policies over regional policies for long years again both in Turkey and Poland, constitutes another dimension which makes Poland and Turkey as suitable units for a comparative analysis.

PROBLEMS IN THE POLICY TRANSFORMATION IN TURKEY& POLAND: A COMPARATIVE ANALYSIS

1. Regional Unevenness

It is usually argued that Turkey is characterized with huge internal disparities which means that Turkey’s accession to the EU would increase the already existing regional disparities within the EU. The western/eastern divide of Turkey in economical terms constitutes a significant hurdle on the way of Turkey’s policy transformation in line with EU conditionality. Despite Turkish economy’s long-term growth, the even development across the country could not be observed. Besides regional disparities, provincial disparities in the country are also unbearable. The disparities between the East and the West of Turkey can be related to the characteristics of the local politics executed in those regions besides the economic and social factors. The local politicians  in the West are approaching local problems and demands from a national-level perspective in that sense they put a great importance to their relations with Ankara in the way of achieving local political objectives. On the other hand, in the eastern part of the country due to the low-income and agriculture-based economy, the voters are highly involved in local politics and reflect their regional identity by this way.[i]

For Polish case, we can say that Poland faces serious problems of uneven regional development which constituted a hurdle in its progress to EU as well. Due to its historical heritage, Poland is still suffering from a division between the better developed western part and the lower developed eastern part division.[ii] Similar to Turkey, the eastern part of the country was portrayed as peripheral region by the regional planners in Poland and the post-communist systemic transformation of the national economy pointed out the weakness of the regional structure in the country which was shaped under central planning.[iii] The changes in industrial and agricultural production, the process of privatization and the spatial adaptation have not been uniformly intensive throughout the country on the basis of which lies the regional diversity, levels of wealth, dependence on production conditions and the level of social development.[iv] As a result, this transformation led to a polarized regional development with two groups of winner and looser regions between 1990-94 period.[v] The 1999 reform of country’s territorial organization has not greatly affected this spatial polarization of the country and this polarization continued to be a hurdle on the way of Poland’s regional policy harmonization with EU as it was the case in Turkey. The urban-rural tension continues to have an impact on the regional policy development of Poland. This division affected the direction of investments as well. Since the rural regions were in trouble surrounded with a weak infrastructure, poor privatization and fragmented agriculture were not attractive for the investors; they were directed towards the urban areas associated with well-developed infrastructure, strong privatization prospects and cheap labor.[vi] This regional unevenness in Polish case is quite similar to Turkish case in the sense that in both countries rural areas are highly differentiated in terms of their preparedness for EU accession, with the regions in the western part of the country in a much better position to overcome the EU membership than those in the East.

The regional disparities in both countries together with the general shift in the EU regional policy away from “equalization and solidarity” to “efficiency and competitiveness” led to concerns on the ability of the eastern regions  to meet the challenges in formulating and implementing the regional policy especially their scarce resources are taken into account which will deepen the regional disparities.

2. From Centralization to Decentralization: A Difficult Progress

In order to understand the complexity and uniqueness of the regionalization process in Turkey, it’s necessary to examine the regional structure in Turkey.  The unitary state in Turkey does not have a legal definition of “region”.[vii] Within the framework of the provincial system the main relations are centered on two actors, namely center and province. This is a quite centralized system in the sense that the center determines the performance of the provisions through financial and political measures.  What’ more the reforms realized in the way of accessing to EU did not change the top-to-bottom approach in regional policy implementation. The regionalization attempts by State Planning Organization and State Institute of Statistics were realized without collaborating with the regions and without giving them sufficient decision-making power and economic resources. This centralized nature of the governance led to a belief that “the centre knows the best”[viii] and this kind of an approach prevails the political culture of Ministries and SPO as well. This understanding in Turkey can be related to the absence of both capitalistic class and industrial heritage from the very beginning of the Republic which led to a state-led economy even after 1980s when the shift to economic liberalization was the case and this state-dependency diminished the importance of regional and local politics has to a great extent in Turkey.[ix]

As mentioned before this centralization is an Ottoman legacy consolidated by the nationalist government of the new Republic of Turkey. Recent years witnessed a transformation of this method of governance due to some external and internal pressures like the motivation to harmonize with EU for accession. In line with this transformation the constitution was amended several times with the aim of reexamining the administrative structures in the country. However, at the end of the day the public administration remained still highly-centralized since the laws don’t emphasize on local democracy and decentralization of power. What’ more the bureaucrats did not perceive the regional planning as a necessary function and since 1960, sectoral logic dominated the regional one and the national plannings were prepared in line. Although some proposals were made by the SPO to establish regional representations, the desire to implement those proposals was quite limited. One of the factors at the basis of the regionalization failures is problematic nature of the institutional structure at the central level. The horizontal coordination between the sectoral Ministries and SPO in regional planning could not be realized due to status questions of SPO vis-à-vis the Ministries.

Turkey’s centralized governance system constitutes a big challenge in Turkey’s harmonization of its regional policy with EU norms and regulations since it’s nor compatible with the multi-level governance at EU level. The absence of an intermediary institutional structure between the center and local made it difficult for Turkey to bring its regional policy to EU standards in the pre-accession periods.[x]

For Poland the centralization has been an important hurdle in the way of implementing its regional policy in the pre-accession policy although not as severe as in Turkey. As already mentioned before, the biggest weakness of Polish regional policy stemmed from centralization which was a legacy of Communist era. Within this system regions run from Warsaw and had no institutional capacity for self-managed development.[xi] After long years of a centralized system the 1999 reform delivered a decentralizing promise of equipping the country with administrative structure that would facilitate the EU entry. However, even after this transformation the Poland’s EU pre-accession programmes were largely managed within one central organizational framework which resulted in a big coordination problem. During the pre-accession period the funds were not coordinated as support instruments for regional development, meaning that they operated separately without any multiplier effect.[xii]

3. Priority of Sectoral Policy over Regional Policy

Despite the steps taken to establish new structures at regional level, the absence of a real agency or ministry for regional policy at national level led to SPO assuming the full competence on this area in Turkey and for nearly 40 years or more the SPO has been preparing five-year development plans on sectoral basis So in addition to the centrality we must add the sectoral understanding to define traditional planning method in Turkey. Within this approach, the plans were made to promote the development of certain sectors without considering the regional dimensions. Thus the incentives were directed to the businesses that will enable sectoral growth rather than development of needy regions. As an example to this understanding we can give the national development plans focusing largely economic measures and city plans at the local level without tackling the regional disparities.[xiii]

The same problem reveals itself while examining the Polish case. The National Development Programmes in Poland were composed of a complex set of priorities and initiatives. The so-called coordination problem in the implementation of those programmes led to implementation of regional initiatives and this predominance of the sectoral policy over regional policy led to the imbalanced regional development. This problem is related with one of the important principle governing the EU regional policy, the so-called ‘concentration’ principle. In line with this principle the candidate countries should concentrate the funds on most needy regions instead of directing it to sectors with a growth potential. However, in Turkey the resources most of the time were oriented to national industrialization rather than to the reduction of regional disparities. Even giving 35 provinces the status of Priority Development Areas in 1993 did not the direction of resources from industrialized provinces to underdeveloped ones. While these provinces received 15.7 percent of public investment in 1991, 12.4 percent in 1992 and 17.8 percent in 1993, provinces in Marmara and Aegean regions attracted more than 50 percent of the public investment.[xiv] The same concentration problem is relevant for Poland in its pre-accession period during which the workforce and finance were concentrated mainly in the largest Polish cities as it was the case in Turkey.

CONCLUSION

The comparative analysis above addresses the problematic dimensions of regional policy implementation in Turkey and led us to make concrete conclusions on the way recording a successful score for Turkey’s harmonization with acquis. First of all, in the pre-planning stage, regional analysis shall be realized from a broader perspective including the sharing of responsibilities among relevant ministries, regional agents and civil society organizations, meaning a shift from a centralized approach to a decentralized one. Moreover, the problems within the bureaucracy have to be solved for efficient regional governance as well. Although the EU conditionality has been a strong driving force for Turkey’s alteration of its regional governance, there are still counter forces within the bureaucracy acting against change.[xv]

Turkey has to take lessons from the experiences of existing EU countries to revise its regional policies and in order to increase the pace of its adaptation process with the acquis. In line with this revision the first step shall be to share and reorganize this responsibility. Also the regions shall firstly rely on their internal power instead of state dependency. The establishment of regional self-governments to implement regional policy is another lesson to be taken for Turkey in this pre-accession period. These regional self-governments are crucial in the sense that they will be able to make independent investment decisions to support economic activity and to establish cooperation between different institutions.[xvi] Most importantly, an accelerated and healthy period of policy transformation needs a qualitative change instead of quantitative financial transfers which means a radical change in the values, institutional structures and communication.

Diğdem Tümtürk

[ii]Poznan (Wielkopolskie), Wroclaw (Dolnoslaskie), Gdansk (Pomorskie) and Krakow (Malopolskie) and Warszawa (Mazowickie)[ii] are those limited number of prosperous regions which are located in the western and southern parts and backed by strong economic, cultural, scientific and academic centres and attracting high levels of investment hence creating lots of job opportunities, and boosting their economies. Please see Annex for detail information.

[iii] Miroslawa Czerny, Andrzej Czerny, “The Challenge of Spatial Reorganization in A Peripheral Polish Region”, European Urban and Regional Studies, Vol. 9, No. 1, (2002) p.60.

[iv] Justyna Weltrowska, “Economic Change and Social Polarization in Poland”, European Urban and Regional Studies, Vol. 9, No. 1, (2002) p. 49.

[v] The winning regions with a developed services and technical infrastructure, skilled kabor forces, a scientific and technological base before 1999 consists of Warsaw, Poznan, Cracow, Wroclaw, Gdansk, Szczecin, Bydgoszcz and Bielsko- Biala. The loosers are the old industrial regions (Lodz, Katowice, Walbrzych, Jelenia Gora, Legnica, Konin and Tarnobrzeg); recession regions (Koszalin, Slupsk, Olsztyn, Suwalki, Tırun, Wloclawek, Plock and Ciechanow); poorly developed regions ( Ostroleka, Lomza, Bialystok, Biala Podlaska, Siedlce, Chelm, and Zamosc)

[vi] Blazyca, Heffner and  Huhes, op.cit., p.265.

[vii] There are different examples for different conceptualizations of the term ‘region’ in Turkey. First of all, the country is divided into seven regions considering the climatic and topography conditions. Moreover the regional development projects initiated by the SPO like  Eastern Black Sea Regional Development Plan (DOKAP), Zonguldak-Bartin-Karabuk Regional Development Project used the term ‘region’ on a project basis.The South-eastern Anatolia Project (GAP) has a distinctive regional development administration regulated by a specific legislation. Another conceptualization of ‘region’  is about the Emergency State Region (OHAL) which was established in the South-eastern Anatolia to fight against terrorism.

[viii] Ebru Loewendahl-Ertugal, “Europeanization of Regional Policy and Regional Governance: The Case of Turkey”, European Political Economy Review, Vol. 3, No. 1, (Spring 2005) p.34.

[ix] Dulupçu, op.cit., pp. 105,106.

[x] Only exception to this is the South-eastern Anatolian Development Project (GAP) administration.

[xi] Miroslawa Czerny, “Uneven Urban and Regional Development in Poland”, European Urban and Regional Studies Vol.9, No. 1, (2002) p. 37.

[xii] Tomasz Grzegorz Grosse, “An Evaluation of the Regional Policy System in Poland: Challenges and Threats Emerging From Participation in the EU’s Cohesion Policy, European Urban and Regional Studies, Vol. 13, No. 2, (2006) p. 153.

[xiii] Loewendahl-Ertugal, op.cit., p.29.

[xiv] Ibid., pp.27,28.

[xv] Loewendahl-Ertugal, op.cit., p. 45.

[xvi] Grosse, op.cit., p.152.