ABSTRACT
Chapter 3 discusses some of the main issues and current challenges dominating Turkey’s relations with the EU in the recent years. Accordingly, this chapter on the one hand examines the cooperation and integration on economy, trade and energy issues. On the other hand, it addresses the migration crisis, the reduction of the EU’s pre-accession assistance to Turkey, and the various recent crises that the EU has faced and discusses them in regard to EU–Turkey relations. This chapter is important for two reasons. First, the issues and challenges discussed in the chapter show how relations have moved beyond the scope of accession negotiations and have increasingly assumed a transactional nature. In return, this may have repercussions on the role civil society can play in these relations. Second, some of the challenges have direct or indirect affect over the Turkish civil society, and a careful study of these challenges may inform us about the future course of Turkish civil society.
