De-Europeanisation as Counter-conduct: The Case of non-Muslim Religious Minorities in Turkey

• Published in: Romanian journal of European affairs Vol. 22; no. 2; pp. 5 - 29
• Main Author: Güneş, Serap
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: Bucuresti Institutul European din România 01-12-2022; European Institute of Romania
• Subjects: Accession; Arab Spring; Autocracy; Behavior; Candidates; Christians; Civil Society; counter-conduct; de-europeanisation; Democracy; Democratization; Digital archives; europeanisation; Europeanization; Foreign policy; Governance; Governmentality; Intergovernmental relations; Minority groups; minority rights; Political Sciences; Political Theory; Politics; Politics / Political Sciences; Politics and society; Religious minorities; Sovereignty; turkey; minority rights; Turkey; governmentality; Europeanisation; deEuropeanisation; counterconduct
• ISSN: 1582-8271; 1841-4273

Democratic conditionality has been one of the main drivers of accession Europeanisation and a foreign policy instrument of the European Union’s democracy promotion in third countries through its enlargement policy. In an era of rising autocratisation, however, the normative influence of the EU is increasingly questioned as to whether it continues to be a driver of democratisation. Focusing on one of Turkey’s Christian communities, Armenians, this paper aims at analysing the impact of EU candidacy period between 1999-2022 on the minority policies of Turkey. It employs the concepts of counter-conduct and governmentality to analyse the dynamics through which the Turkish government seeks to uproot and reverse the Europeanisation in minority rights, and how this counter-conduct works in the case of Armenian community.