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The article discusses the politics and history of Cyprus, focusing on its division between Turkish Cypriots in the North and Greek Cypriots in the South. It comments on the attempted coup d’état in 1974 that aimed to overthrow the government and annex Cyprus to Greece, and the subsequent invasion by Turkish forces. The author reflects on Cyprus' European Union (EU) membership and Turkey's prospects for EU membership. Other topics include international mediation, the prospect of reunification, and the influence of nationalism.

In this article, I build a theory of European Union (EU) expansion using Social Identity Theory. The theory proposes that the development of a national identity in relation to Europe is the most significant contributing factor to a policy to support/oppose expanding the EU to include applicant countries. According to the theory, strength of identity—whether more national or European—is the key variable in explaining the policy toward applicant countries. As a preliminary exploration of the theory, I look at why some decision-makers within EU countries support Turkey’s accession while others do not. The identities among top decision-makers within Britain, Germany, and France are used to examine the policy preferences regarding Turkey’s bid for membership into the EU during these three recent progressions: the recognition of Turkey as a candidate country in 1999, the development of a timeline for full membership in 2002, and the beginning of accession negotiations in 2005. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper examines Turkish national identity as the critical element in Turkey's exclusion from the European Union (EU). My central contention is that the main obstacle to Turkey's membership in the EU may not be the reason that European officials formally cite, that is to say, problems related to democracy, economics, and human rights, but rather, perceptions of Turkey and Turkish national identity as 'alien' and 'others.' As Europe reinvents itself along ethnic and to a certain extent, racial lines with the emergence of the EU, a powerful regional block pursuing a different kind of superpower whose main domain is the soft power, European perceptions of the Turk constitute serious obstacles to Turkey's integration into Europe. Therefore, Turkey's hopes for full membership in the EU are far from being materialized at this point due to questions regarding Turkey's national identity. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

At the present time, there are no clear outcomes in Turkey's European Union (EU) accession process. By the end of the two years following the rise of the pro-Islamist Justice and Development Party (AKP) to the government in 2002, Turkey's accession process entered into a stalemate. Potent political opposition to the Turkish candidacy in Europe has escalated, despite a staunch Turkish political commitment since 1999 to meet the Copenhagen Criteria for admission. In this article, we argue that Turkey's EU accession process has contributed to opening political spaces for Islamism and ethno-nationalism in the country, ironically producing societal and political forces undermining Turkish membership. We inquire first into the practical reasons obstructing Turkey's membership to the Union and second into the societal and political implications of the continuation of the bleak possibility of EU membership for Turkey. As far as the latter is considered, our focus is limited to an analysis of the politicization and institutionalization of the ethnic and Islamist conservative politics in Turkey within the process of "liberal democracy." [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In the context of the negotiation process for Turkey's accession to the EU, the author delves into the country's current situation and its condition as a bridge. She focuses on the question of Islam and modernity, taking as her point of departure the example of Kayseri, a city and region in Central Anatolia, which is dynamic and productive without having lost its cultural and religious values for this reason. Among these values, she highlights an obstacle which distances the country from an economic rapprochement with the EU, namely the role of women in the economy, although she underscores the idea that everything indicates that this necessary change could occur soon. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Might Turkey be thought of as a model of democratic Government for the rest of the Islamic world? Can Turkey be a lighthouse of democracy in the Islamic world? The objective of this work is to try, to answer these questions, and for this it focuses on two interrelated factors, which the author believes to be fundamental, in order to try to understand Turkey's domestic policy: "nationalism" and "religion", two elements that have been the object of strong debate in Turkey at the turn of the century, in the framework of the two last elections, held in April 1999 and November 2002. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]