Bringing the Puzzle together: Democratic Reform Process of Turkey after Helsinki from Theories on Democratization and Europeanisation Perspectives

It can be claimed that democratization theories and Europeanization literature have two different perspectives on democratic transformation processes of states. On the one hand, theories on democratisation provide elite completion and modernisation as the two main competing approaches. Although these approaches have different perspectives, they share the same focus on the domestic factors as causes of transformation. On the other hand, it can be suggested that Europeanization literature, either it be Constructivist, Institutionalist or Rationalist, has a tendency to focus on the role of the EU as an external force driving democratic transformation of its member and candidate countries. Although they employ either a logic of appropriateness or a logic of consequences, they share the same outside-in perspective focusing on external factors as causes of democratic transformations. In this paper, it will be claimed that although these different focuses on the subject can create a dilemma; they can also create an opportunity. It can be proposed that these two arguably opposing views can be complimentary as they shed light onto different parts of the puzzle. For this aim, the recent reform process of Turkey will be taken as a case study and evaluated from both perspectives with a focus on selected reform topics: abolition of capital punishment, changing nature of civil-military relations and ceding rights to ethnic and religious minorities. It will be claimed that these cases represent a combination of internal and external factors as causal factors for change. In the light of these cases, it will be concluded that these reforms cannot be explained by looking at only one set of factors; therefore, combining the two different strands of literature can improve our understanding of democratisation processes in European context.