ABSTRACT
Chapter 5 analyses the drivers of Turkey’s refugee governance as well as the respective changes over time by drawing from the explanation typology developed in Chapter 3. This chapter demonstrates how foreign policy priorities and internal political concerns weigh heavily on Turkey’s policy responses to Syrian mass migration, while economic concerns also have a role to play. The chapter focuses on refugee politics and drivers of governance simultaneously and highlights their interconnectedness. The chapter puts an emphasis on Turkey’s foreign policy acts during the Syrian civil war and international negotiations on migration affairs between Turkey and the EU. In relation with these discussions, the chapter also focuses on the discursive governance of the Syrian refugee issue, in other words, how it is presented in the public sphere by political leaders. This presentation, in turn, shapes how refugee policies are designed and how they are implemented on the ground.
