Turkey: Elections and Beyond

Turkey completes in June 7 an intensive and decisive electoral cycle that started with the municipal elections in March 2014, went through the Presidential ones in August 2014 and ends with the election of the new Parliament. This period has coincided, firstly, with a deterioration of the regional situation in the Middle East (Syria, Iraq, the rise of the self-appointed Islam State) and, secondly, with a European Union that it is still struggling to overcome its multi-faceted crisis. 

Domestic tensions have absorbed Turkey’s energies and in the coming years the country’s political agenda will be mark by whether political and social polarisation persists, by attempts to transform the political system into a Presidential one and by the results of the on-going peace talks with the PKK. The way in which the new government and the Turkish society will handle all these issues will not only be crucial for Turkey’s social cohesion but also for Turkey’s image abroad and their capacity to project itself globally but, particularly so, in its closest neighbourhood. In this particular context the European Union should review its policies towards Turkey and define ways of constructive engagement with both the Turkish government and the Turkish society. 

CIDOB, CITPAX and the Friends of Turkey in the European Parliament will bring together a small group of experts from Turkey and the EU to analyse the implications of the June elections in three different areas: the “Kurdish question”, the relations with the EU and the foreign policy of Turkey, with particular emphasis on the Middle East.