31 May 2023

Despite Erdogan’s win, the EU should not give up on a reset with Turkey

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Recep Tayyip Erdoğan’s victory in last weekend’s presidential runoff is a huge disappointment for Turkey’s opposition. After their success in the 2019 local elections and their coalition-building efforts, the opposition appeared poised to unseat Erdoğan despite an unlevel playing field. The president appeared particularly vulnerable due to a sagging economy and the aftermath of a devastating earthquake which revealed the extent of Turkey’s institutional corruption and decay.

Despite the outcome, EU leaders should avoid the temptation to throw the baby out with the bathwater. Three moves, if carefully undertaken, can help to slow – and perhaps even reverse – the decline of EU-Turkey relations, while also advancing EU strategic interests more broadly.

Short-term goals: Avoid self-inflicted wounds, explore diplomatic possibilities

Erdoğan’s win inevitably reduces the degree of closeness that the EU can hope to have with Turkey for the time being. But less closeness need not mean less policy ambition.

First, the EU can start by not scoring an own goal by providing Erdoğan with any ammunition that he could use to delay Sweden’s NATO accession even further.

While the erosion of military non-alignment (Sweden and Finland) and situational neutrality (Belarus) in Europe is not a welcome development, it nonetheless represents today’s reality. After Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, the EU’s immediate path towards becoming a more serious security and defence actor lies in ‘Europeanising’ NATO. Forthcoming European Council conclusions and statements made by EU leaders should therefore exhibit restraint in any values-based criticism between now and this summer’s NATO summit in Vilnius.

Second, as the outcome of Ukraine’s counteroffensive becomes clearer by the autumn, the focus in many Western capitals may shift towards how to end hostilities. While Turkey’s efforts have thus far only proven useful in achieving more limited goals (such as last year’s Black Sea Grain Initiative), they may once again be required should interest in a ceasefire gather momentum.

Even in the face of growing pressures and incentives, consensus on a ceasefire among the 27 Member States may prove elusive. Some will likely welcome the prospect, whereas others who view Russia’s assault on Ukraine as a direct threat to their own security may remain uncompromising. Nonetheless, this does not prevent select Member States from hailing any Turkish effort to convene the warring parties as a sign of good faith and recognition of Ankara’s status and interests, so long as this does not detract from the collectively agreed components of the EU’s approach towards the war.

Recent research argues that European integration in external action can occur through ‘processes initiated by member states outside of the Union’s traditional framework, but still closely linked to it, as well as areas which are traditionally or formally not part of [EU foreign and security policy]’. Contrary to the notion that unity is a prerequisite for strengthening the EU’s impact on the world stage, unity when rooted in the lowest common denominator can come at the expense of strategic action.

This endeavour offers an opportunity to exhibit ‘geopolitical’ actorness in a proactive fashion, employing a crisis in one theatre (Russia/Ukraine) to thaw relations with another actor (Turkey). This would contrast with the EU’s initial response to the war, which was largely reactive, even if it eventually led to transformative actions (such as offering candidate status to Ukraine).

Erdoğan has already shown his ability to pursue diplomatic resets (e.g. with Egypt and Saudi Arabia) in response to interest-based pressures and incentives. Isolated efforts to improve relations with Turkey could therefore have positive knock-on effects.

Looking beyond the horizon

Erdoğan’s win also raises enormous questions about the future of Turkey’s political system. The continued erosion of democratic institutions and norms over the next five years, combined with unanswered questions over who will eventually succeed Erdoğan, suggests that Turkey’s ruling party may fracture.

This could produce unforeseeable consequences for domestic political stability – even more so given the likelihood of the now-demoralised opposition also splintering after its failure to take the presidency. The EU should hedge against this by throwing its weight behind targeted efforts to strengthen its customs union with Turkey in Erdoğan’s new term.

Such an undertaking would require both sides to make unpalatable compromises, but would also represent a natural ‘win-win’ in the economic realm. It could also lay the ground for any post-Erdoğan uncertainty by providing an additional layer of institutionalisation in the EU-Turkey relationship, even if a more ambitious modernisation of bilateral instruments remains impossible.

Given the EU’s gargantuan task of credibly advancing the accession processes of Ukraine, Moldova and the Western Balkans, an opposition victory was unlikely to breathe new life into Turkey’s candidate status. With Ankara’s accession process effectively moribund, the EU’s relationship with Turkey now has a more geopolitical (and less normative) dynamic – a reality that has only become more unavoidable since the continental security order’s collapse last year.

Building on the June 2021 European Council conclusions, piecemeal attempts to improve the customs union should therefore be conditioned on progress towards a diplomatic reset, acknowledging both sides’ duty to handle the bilateral the relationship with care. This would replace the current approach, in which domestic factors within Turkey hinder deeper economic cooperation.

While this would not entirely eliminate the forces driving anti-Western rhetoric in Erdoğan’s Turkey, it would nonetheless offer a clearer incentive structure for both sides. It would also allow the EU to avoid the accusations of hypocrisy due to its pursuing transactional relations with Turkey when it suits its interests (e.g. on refugees) but citing Ankara’s candidate status when it fails to live up to its standards.

Turkey would have remained committed to pursuing an independent foreign policy (to varying degrees) irrespective of the election’s outcome. Disagreements over Cyprus, the Eastern Mediterranean, Syria, and the response to Russia’s aggression against Ukraine would not have disappeared. As the issues plaguing EU-Turkey relations are (at least partly) structural in nature, they are unlikely to be repaired through regular haranguing, with one side unilaterally adopting the role of rule-maker and expecting the other to be a rule-taker.

With the continental security situation already fragile, the EU should avoid making this worse by inadvertently locking in a dynamic of confrontation and instability in its relationship with Turkey. Now is the time for an interests-based approach that looks beyond the immediate horizon.