Turkey's compliance with the European Union's development policy: a pattern of external differentiated integration?

Abstract

Turkey's relations with the European Union are at a stalemate, with accession negotiations effectively frozen. Yet, Turkey opts into the EU acquis in multiple policy areas, where its voluntary compliance-prior to or an alternative to accession, could be conceptualized as external differentiated integration. We analyse Turkish compliance into the EU acquis in one policy area: Development policy. We assess Turkey's opting into the EU rules on development policy from the perspective of three key factors, institutional structure, volume of aid and geographical focus. We argue that Turkey's alignment with the EU development acquis is most visible in the institutional structure of Turkish foreign aid, and its increasing volume. Yet, there is also a highly visible divergence between Turkey and the EU in terms of geographical focus, acting as an element of competition in development policy. The transformation of Turkey's development policy enhances Turkey's opting into the EU acquis.