Turkey has been pushing for a long time to become a member of the EU. The formal application to join the European Community—the organisation that has since developed into the European Union—was made on April 14, 1987. Turkey was officially recognised as a candidate for membership on December 10, 1999 at the Helsinki summit of the European Council, having been an Associate Member since 1963. The negotiations have started on October 3, 2005, a process that is likely to take at least a decade to complete.
[B]Issues and problems regarding membership[/B]
Their possible future accession is now the central controversy of the ongoing enlargement of the European Union. An overview of the issues at hand:
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Differences in fundamental values and culture between a predominantly Muslim country (99.8% of the population) with current dominantly Christian and non-religious EU members, all of which are historically Christian.
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The Turkish government's refusal to officially recognize the state of Cyprus, a current E.U. member, technically nullifies any negotiations and promises made between Turkey and the E.U., and is the greatest obstacle to Turkey's accession to the E.U., much before other issues.
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Only 3% of Turkey's territory lies in geographical Europe. Furthermore, the Turkish capital is not in Europe, but, like the smaller member state Cyprus, in Asia. Turkey's membership would mean that the European Union's external borders would now reach Middle Eastern nations such as Syria, Iraq and Iran.
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Turkey's large size and poverty. Turkey would upon accession represent an expansion almost equal in population to that of the 2004 Enlargement while the Turkish economy has been known for very unstable growth and sharp recessions despite some recent improvement. Many question whether the EU can support and "absorb" such a large and poor state, and many member states are wary of a potentially huge wave of poor Turkish immigration. (note: when Eastern European countries like Poland joined, some countries worried about immigration waves too. This was even the case in the early days of the united Europe when Portugal and Spain joined)
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Turkey's large political power once in the Union. Its almost 70 million inhabitants will bestow it the second largest number of representatives in the European Parliament, after Germany. With the current rate of population increase some fear it might even surpass Germany by the time of accession; thus drastically altering make up of the European Parliament.
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Many have continuing doubts on the commitment of the Turkish state to democracy and human rights, and its ability to reach European standards in these issues as gender equality, political freedom and minority rights
So much for the reservations and issues. That's not what this thread is about. Imagine that Turkey complies to all of our minimum standards and conditions regarding economy, democracy and human rights, would it then be a good idea to let the country join the Union?
[B]Arguments pro membership[/B]
Turkey as an EU member would be a good buffer against fundamentalist threats coming from the ME. Moreover, it would exclude the possibility of the country ever becoming a fundi islamic nation.
Apart from that, a muslim country in the EU could bring the EU and other muslim countries closer together which could have a positive effect on diplomacy and conflict handling. These are the main reasons why the Bush administration has been lobbying in favor of (swift) accession
[B]Arguments contra membership[/B]
On the other hand you can ask yourself if the above is enough to justify Turkey's accession. We've just had a massive englargement of the Union to the east, confronting us with the fact that the current organisation of decission making isn't adapted to such a large Union. The Constitution could've solved that, but as you know it made a crash landing and is in the fridge for the time being. At this time further expansion would mean the downfall of the Union as a whole. That's why the chairman of the European Commission, Barosso, said that after the accession of Bulgaria and Romania in 2007 a further expansion is not possible before the political structure of the Union is modified.
Moreover, I have a problem with prioritizing Turkey's membership procedure while stopping other country's procedures. Croatia, Macedonia, Bosnia and Montenegro for instance are closer to Brussels and would benefit a lot more from membership as it would be a push in the back to get their political and economical structures organised and to solve ethnic tensions in the region. It has only been somewhat like 10 years since these countries became independant after Yugoslavia collapsed and they're still in the middle of getting everything "on the road." Imo they deserve membership more than Turkey.
Apart from that, you can't deny that Turkey doesn't really have cultural, historical or geographical links with Europe like the other members have. You can ask yourself where the real "borders" of Europe are. At a certain point the EU will have to draw the line and stop expanding. Imo beyond the Caucasus in the North East and the Balkan peninsula in the South East you're not in Europe anymore. If you ask me allowing Turkey to become member is a bit exagerated in that perspective.
Finally there's the public opinion. During the past few years the EU citizens have lost (a part of) their faith in the Union due (in part) to the rapid expansion. The EU was originally created by six founding states in 1958, but has grown to its current size of 25 member states. There were five successive enlargements during this period, with the largest in 2004, when 10 new member states joined. A growing number of people have lost insight into what the EU actually is and who all the members actually are. Furthermore, a large part of the population is against Turkish membership. Forcing that down the citizen's throats would damage the EU a lot internally imo.
In other words: I'm not radically opposed to Turkish membership since it has some benefits, but at this point I'm not at all in favor either. Maybe someone else here has an other opinion on the matter, so let's hear it!
(Btw, sorry for the long ass post, but I wanted to provide some essential info and facts for those who don't live in Europe)