Securitization of migration in official discourse in Turkey in post-Cold War Era

Abstract

Since the end of the Cold War, Turkey has become a destination country for the human mobility of people who are not of 'Turkish descent and culture’. For the first time in the history of the Republic, Turkey has become a destination and not only a transit country. The thesis is interested in the changing official responses of the Republic to this transition. The question asked is whether and/or in what ways major human mobility cases to Turkey in the post-Cold War Era were securitized in the official discourse of the Republic. The cases that are focused on are the mobility of the 1989 Ethnic Turks of Bulgaria, and the Northern Iraqis in 1991, mobility from the post-Soviet countries and from the Central African countries since the early 1990s, and post-2011 Syrian human mobility. While examining this question, the thesis adopts the perspective of securitization theory and looks to see whether these human mobilities were portrayed as a threat to Turkey’s national security or not.