Examines the current wave of migration from Turkey through the experiences of 21 public figures in exile
Features interviews with 21 Turkish public figures: Barbaros Sansal; Bulent Somay; Can Dundar; Deniz (nickname); Engin Sustam; Eser Karakas; Fatih Vural; Faysal Sariyildiz; Gokhan Bacik; Guliz Vural; Hasip Kaplan; Hayko Bagdat; Jinda Zekioglu; Meltem Arikan; Mine Gencel Bek; Murat Ozbank; Nazan Ustundag; Nil Mutluer; Ragip Durhan; Sehbal Senyurt Arinli; Yavuz Baydar
Explores the political reality on the ground in Turkey; the political, social and economic impacts of authoritarianism; the meaning of exile; transnational repression mechanisms put in play by Turkey; and potential scenarios for reconciliation and normalisation in Turkey
The book not only focuses on the experiences of exile but also reflects on current debates in politics and international relations regarding integration, asylum seeking experiences, statelessness, transnational repression, and mobilisation
Includes a foreword by Professor Samim Akgonul at the University of Strasbourg
Turkey's authoritarian turn under the reign of Erdo?an, and the crackdown on freedom of speech and assembly, has caused many Turks either voluntarily or involuntarily to flee the country. Featuring interviews with former politicians, artists, journalists, academics and activists, this book gives a voice to those in exile. By presenting their own stories in their own words, we learn how individuals cope with the realities of separation from their homeland, how they have managed to build new lives abroad and the prospect of return to Turkey. Both heart-breaking and informative, this book provides a snapshot of a new layer of intellectual diaspora in the making.
Author Biography:
Dr Ahmet Erdi zt rk is Senior Lecturer (Associate Professor) in International Relations and Politics at London Metropolitan University and a Marie Sklodowska-Curie fellow at Coventry University in the UK and GIGA in Germany. He is also an associate researcher (Chercheur Associ ) at Institut Fran ais d' tudes Anatoliennes and editor of International Journal of Religion. He was a Swedish Institute Pre and Post-Doctoral Fellow at Institute for Research on Migration, Ethnicity and Society (REMESO), at Link ping University, Scholar in Residence at the University of Notre Dame's Kroc Institute for International Peace Studies. He is the author of more than 20 articles, numerous policy reports, opinion pieces and co-editor of four special issues and two books on religion and politics and Turkish politics. He is a regular contributor to media outlets such as Open Democracy, The Conversation, Huffington Post and France 24.Bahar Baser is Associate Professor of Middle Eastern Politics at Durham University. Previously, she was an associate professor and research group leader at the Centre for Trust, Peace and Social Relations of Coventry University. She is also an associate research fellow at the Security Institute for Governance and Leadership in Africa (SIGLA), Stellenbosch University, South Africa. She completed a PhD in Social and Political Science at the European University Institute in Florence, Italy. During her PhD, she had the opportunity to work as a Visiting Research Fellow at Humboldt University in Germany, at Institute for Research on Migration, Ethnicity and Society (REMESO) at Link ping University in Sweden, and the Instituto de Ciencias Sociais (ICS) in Lisbon, Portugal. Dr. Baser's research interests include ethno-national conflicts and political violence, conflict resolution, third party mediation, migration and diaspora studies. Bahar has various publications in peer-reviewed academic journals and she has published a book in Turkey entitled: The Turkish-Kurdish Question in the Diaspora: Second-generation in Sweden and Germany. Her book Diasporas and Homeland Conflicts: A Comparative Perspective was published by Routledge in 2015. She has published four co-edited volumes by different publishers and she has penned more than 30 articles that are published in prestigious journals such as Ethnicities, Ethnic and Racial Studies, Third World Quarterly, Civil Wars and Ethnopolitics among others. Her research has been funded by the British Academy, CBRL, the Swedish Institute, the Italian Foreign Ministry, Coventry University and the Newton Fund-National Research Foundation (South Africa). She has written policy reports for Berghof Peace Foundation, TUSIAD Foreign Policy Forum and the Heinrich Boll Foundation.
