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1. Representation of Women in the Judiciary in Turkey

Author:
Bertil Emrah Oder
Publication Date:
09-2019
Content Type:
Policy Brief
Institution:
Turkish Economic and Social Studies Foundation (TESEV)
Abstract:
The recently announced Judicial Reform Strategy was subject to public debate with a series of promises ranging from issuing green passports to lawyers as a privileged of visa exemptions to the introduction of an appeal process in criminal cases concerning the freedom of expression.1 The fundamental shortcoming of this new strategy and other reform efforts is the lack of a specific agenda on the representation of women professionals in the judiciary, especially in the leading positions including the apex courts. Policies on women’s representation in the judiciary remained “invisible” in recent reform efforts on judicial policies.
Topic:
Gender Issues, Law, Women, Inequality, Courts, Criminal Justice, and Representation
Political Geography:
Turkey and Middle East

2. Women in Academia and Gender Equality

Author:
Zeynep Gülru Göker
Publication Date:
07-2019
Content Type:
Special Report
Institution:
Turkish Economic and Social Studies Foundation (TESEV)
Abstract:
A recent study published by TESEV shows that science and research is one of the areas with the lowest female participation in high level decision making.1 Among all 201 universities in Turkey, only 9% of the rectors, 10% of the vice rectors and 21% of the deans are women; and again, in Turkey, countrywide, 31% of the professors are women and 69% are men.2 This numerical inequality, as well as being a sign for a lot of other problems, is just the visible or easier-to-see tip of the iceberg. To talk about the obstacles women face in academia and the gender inequality in a wider sense, one must examine all written and non-written rules, practices and norms in every area of academic life, and establishing equality requires transformation in structural, institutional and individual levels. In this report, I will be talking about some of the obstacles women face climbing the career steps in academia and participating in high level decision making and the steps that have been taken and can be taken to ensure gender equality in academic life.
Topic:
Education, Gender Issues, Women, and Inequality
Political Geography:
Turkey and Middle East

3. Women’s Participation in High-Level Decision Making

Author:
Itır Akdoğan
Publication Date:
04-2019
Content Type:
Special Report
Institution:
Turkish Economic and Social Studies Foundation (TESEV)
Abstract:
In this report, we enquire into the issue of gender equality by investigating different sectors at once to offer recommendations for improvement. In this project, which is supported by the Swedish Consulate General in İstanbul, we first examine, in light of data gathered and disseminated by European Institute for Gender Equality (EIGE), the percentage of women high-level decision makers in Turkey’s politics, public administration, local government, civil society organizations, social partners, business, media, judiciary and education/science/research. We compare these rates in their historical transformation and with the rates of European Union countries, thus inspecting them in their wider quantitative context. Next, we conduct in-depth interviews with women (if not present, men) high-level decision makers in these areas to carry out a qualitative assessment of women’s participation in Turkey.
Topic:
Civil Society, Gender Issues, Politics, Women, and Inequality
Political Geography:
Turkey, Middle East, and European Union

4. An International Look at the Women’s Movement: The Gender Agenda of the Global South

Author:
Berfu Şeker
Publication Date:
12-2018
Content Type:
Policy Brief
Institution:
Turkish Economic and Social Studies Foundation (TESEV)
Abstract:
We are at a time when the global politics of women’s rights, gender and feminism are intersecting at the regional and national level, forming around similar dynamics and practices. Against the gains made by women and LGBTI+ groups towards changing gender politics until the 2000s, we are seeing that new populist trends have been gaining power since 2000s.
Topic:
Gender Issues, Women, Inequality, Populism, Feminism, and LGBT+
Political Geography:
Turkey and Middle East

5. Purple Economy: A Strategy for Women’s Equal Economic Participation towards Sustainable Cities

Author:
İpek İlkkaracan
Publication Date:
02-2018
Content Type:
Policy Brief
Institution:
Turkish Economic and Social Studies Foundation (TESEV)
Abstract:
This policy brief is published in the framework of “Women’s Participation for Sustainable City” project under the umbrella project “Supporting Sustainable Cities” of TESEV funded by the Friedrich Naumann Foundation for Liberty. If one were asked to associate a color with the concept of “sustainable cities,” the first to come to mind would be probably green. Not surprising, given that the issue of sustainability originated out of concerns for the environmental crisis and the green economy was proposed as a vision of an environmentally sustainable economy. Today it is widely acknowledged that an additional challenge to sustainability has to do with inequalities in the economic and social sphere. Gender is an important crosscutting dimension of multi-layered inequalities. Hence I would like to propose another color to associate with the concept of sustainable cities and sustainable economies, complementing the green: Purple, the symbolic color of the women’s movement in Turkey and in many countries around the world. The purple economy entails the vision of a gender egalitarian and hence a socially sustainable economy. It starts from the premise that the root cause of obstacles to women’s equal economic participation lies within the gender imbalances in the distribution of caring labor. Caring labor entails provisioning of goods and services to caredependent groups such as children, elderly, ill and people with disabilities as well as healthy adults necessary for their physical, social, mental and emotional wellbeing.
Topic:
Gender Issues, Labor Issues, Women, Economy, and Urban
Political Geography:
Turkey and Middle East

6. We Are Here We Are Half The City We Live In

Author:
Esra Kaya Erdoğan
Publication Date:
12-2017
Content Type:
Policy Brief
Institution:
Turkish Economic and Social Studies Foundation (TESEV)
Abstract:
This policy brief is published in the framework of “Women’s Participation for Sustainable City” project under the umbrella project “Supporting Sustainable Cities” of TESEV funded by the Friedrich Naumann Foundation for Liberty. No matter which measure of residential settlement one takes, women constitute around half the population everywhere in Turkey. Especially with regards urban areas with a smaller spatial scale, there is almost unanimous agreement that space-oriented policies concern women directly. It is important to keep these circumstances in mind in order to strengthen the political presence of women at the local level, and to pursue local policies with a woman-centered approach.
Topic:
Gender Issues, Governance, Women, Inequality, and Urban
Political Geography:
Turkey and Middle East

7. Equality Units As A Tool For Women’s Participation At The Local Level

Author:
Zelal Yalçın
Publication Date:
12-2017
Content Type:
Policy Brief
Institution:
Turkish Economic and Social Studies Foundation (TESEV)
Abstract:
This policy brief is published in the framework of “Women’s Participation for Sustainable City” project under the umbrella project “Supporting Sustainable Cities” of TESEV funded by the Friedrich Naumann Foundation for Liberty.
Topic:
Gender Issues, Governance, Women, Inequality, and Urban
Political Geography:
Turkey and Middle East

8. Reflections on Turkey: Islamic Middle Classes at a Glance

Author:
Etyen Mahçupyan
Publication Date:
12-2014
Content Type:
Special Report
Institution:
Turkish Economic and Social Studies Foundation (TESEV)
Abstract:
This report focuses on the rising prosperity of the Islamic middle class since 2002 and the diversification of the religiosity concept within a pluralist structure in Turkey. Written by TESEV consultant Etyen Mahcupyan in February 2014, this report explains the importance of the rising middle class and the new generation of Anatolian entrepreneurs for the political and sociological transformation of Turkey. The findings of the surveys and focus groups are evaluated under four categories: 1) Political Institutions and Rights, 2) Family, Women, Sexuality, 3) Group Affiliations, Individualism, Tolerance, 4) Openions about Market Economy, Class Differences and Western World.
Topic:
Islam, Religion, Women, Economy, Political structure, Class, Family, and Sexuality
Political Geography:
Turkey and Middle East

9. Headscarf Ban and Discrimination

Author:
Dilek Cindoğlu
Publication Date:
11-2010
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
Turkish Economic and Social Studies Foundation (TESEV)
Abstract:
The headscarf ban applied in institutions of higher education, in the public sector, and as this research has shown, in the private sector, reveals the perspectives of the state and its institutions and as well of the society on human, women’s and citizens’ rights. The restrictions and barriers to entry of women to study and work in institutions of higher education and public sector institutions, in place since the 1960s, rest on a mentality that views women’s choices to wear headscarves as an attack on the secular regime, instead of treating their choices as a manifestation of their freedom of religion and belief. Consequently, the practices that were initially violating freedom of belief gradually deteriorated to cause further violations of rights to education, to employment, to equal access to public life and of basic rights and liberties such as the right to equality. The headscarf ban in institutions of higher education has for many years been and remains to be a widely debated and contested issue. Though there is a wealth of analysis, dialogue, debate and research on the subject, it is largely restricted to whether the headscarf ban in universities is justified or not. The impact that the ban has had on headscarved women’s lives have, on the other hand, been absent in the debates and analyses on the headscarf ban. A question that has not been featured in research and public debates so far is despite the public sector ban on the headscarf what are the experiences of those headscarved women at work who were able to graduate from university, but did not abandon their choice to wear headscarf to practice their faith and without? In other words, what is the impact of the headscarf ban in the public sector on the professional lives of higher educated headscarved women? Does this ban, which applies to public sector institutions, also hinder or restrict professional headscarved women as they apply for or work in private sector jobs? What obstacles are there for professional headscarved women to entering job markets in Turkey and to advancing their careers? This report is a product of TESEV Democratization Program’s quest to answer these questions. It examines one of the greatest roadblocks on Turkey’s path to democratization, the headscarf ban, and the implications of the ban on public and private sector employment to document the myriad forms of discrimination and rights violations that headscarved women face immediately after they decide to become working professionals. Though some forms of workplace discrimination 6 that headscarved women face also affect non-headscarved professional women with similar socio-economic backgrounds, the headscarf is the primary source of the majority of discrimination faced by professional headscarved women. Again, this report shows that the ban on the public sector spilled over to the private sector. Cases of discrimination and rights violations that are believed to have diminished and to even have been reversed in favor of headscarved women during the two terms of the AK Party administration continue to be recorded, especially and more vehemently in the private sector.
Topic:
Democratization, Gender Issues, Religion, Women, Inequality, and Discrimination
Political Geography:
Turkey and Middle East