Maybe they shouldn’t. Just don’t complain when Americans don’t care what European opinion is on what we do.
Marc
Actually, no, I wasn’t thinking of religious freedoms. Apart from rather silly disputes like that over a girl’s right to wear a headscarf to school (silly on both sides, if you ask me), I have never heard of Islamic religious practices being suppressed anywhere in modern Europe. I was thinking, rather, of the situation of Turkish “guest-workers” in Germany who cannot apply for citizenship even if they were born in Germany and their parents were born in Germany, because German citizenship is determined by jus sanguinis, right of blood, meaning you have to have ethnically German ancestors to qualify. (If I recall correctly, that is a law the German Empire adopted in the late 19th Century, so it would not have to extend citizenship to Jewish and Slavic inhabitants of eastern territories it had recently acquired through war – and it’s still on the books of the Federal Republic.) Unless that problem has been solved since last I heard about it? If not, then the German Turks can’t vote, and in theory could be deported any time the state decides to do so. Also, there’s the problem of Turks in Germany and elsewhere in Europe occasionally being victims of unofficial forms of discrimination, and hate-crime attacks.
Maybe you see it as an insult because you assume that the current waves of anti-islam sentiments in Denmark is bad thing. It may be, but I was just stating a fact in our discussion whether religion plays a part in Turkey’s struggle to become an EU member, it wasn’t an insult. Denmark is a democracy with free speech and the population has every right to express whatever they like.
I don’t reject that many in Denmark believes that Turkey is on the outside because of religion, but I maintain that this has never been a primary reason in Brussel, and that’s why I asked for a cite.
Thanks for the other info btw.
What is the EEA?
And what are the ECSC, ECM, and EC?
And the above discussions leave me unclear: Do people of the EU nations view Turks as “alien” primarily because of their religion or their race?
And yet, I did not make the claim that Turkey isn’t a EU member because of religion. I said it was A big sticking point. As in one of many. And it is. Do you really think Kohl’s and VGE’s comments aren’t indicative of a fairly widespread feeling?
I didn’t say that and I don’t think it. And it has nothing to do with the topic at hand. I didn’t say Europe was unfamiliar with Turkey, I said that they are going to have a harder time than a lot of other countries because they are a Muslim nation, rather than a Christian one.
What the hell does this have to do with anything?
Answer me this, if Turkey was a state with a Christian heritage, do you think their road into the EU would be easier than it is now, everything else being equal?
I think it’s undeniable that it would be.
Brutus:
You misspelled “Bush”.
Actually I agree with Bush (be nice to see Turkey in the EU, IMHO), I also agree with Chirac (it isn’t any business of the US), and I think Bush is more out of touch with reality than we realized if he thinks much of the EU is going to take his opinion about anything into account other than inspiring a few politicians to distance themselves from it as a way of garnering some more votes.
European Economic Area. Allows some countries to “participate” in the single market w/o being full EU members.
The statement wasn’t actually advice for the EU, it was just a way of stroking Turkey to keep them closer to the fold.
No one expects the EU to actually listen.
The EEA is the European Economic Area, an EU light membership status created in the late 80ies/early 90ies to make it easier for non-member states to become members by first becoming EEA members, then go for full EU memebership. Currently made up by Norway, Iceland and Liechtenstein.
The other ones are former abbreviations for EU:
ECSC = European Coal and Steel Community (the beginning of the EU, in 1951)
EC (European Community) & EEC (European Economic Community) & ECM (European Common Market) = former ones for EU (changed to EU in 1994)
It’s been a long ride since the 1950ies.
European here.
Europe should care about what the president of the most powerful country in the world says. They can consider his opinion, then choose to ignore it. The nose of the president of the most powerful country in the world belongs wherever he chooses to stick it. It’s a tough world.
Turkey in the EU is a good idea for a several reasons, which we can discuss in another thread. Those who do not want Turkey in the EU hide their racism behind the human rights issue.
Turkey is pleased, as they’ve been asking to enter the EU for over a decade and they need all the help they can get. The current members of the EU, expecially the French and the Germans think: can someone please rid us of this idiot asap.
All of the above strictly IMHO.
If Turkey was to be a member of the EU, wouldn’t it have to clean up its act considerably? Wouldn’t that serve the interests of the US in several ways?
I’m sorry. You made the claim that religion is “a big sticking point” why Turkey isn’t an EU member. I asked for a cite, not personal opinions. You still haven’t provided a cite, a cite that this is official or unofficial EU policy. In my book, what a party member of a christian party in a specific country says is not relevant to the discussion (that is, unless they can veto a Turkish membership).
You make three big mistakes in your assumption:
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You confuse the past with the present. 20 years ago religion and culture would maybe have been an issue, ref. an earlier post of mine. It’s not an issue today. The EU is expanding rapidly and may even include countries to the east of Turkey in a couple of decades.
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You see Europe as Christian. But even though Europe is a continent with a Christian heritage, very few people see themselves as Christians. In a recent survey in my home country only 4% said they were Christians, down from 15% ten years ago (in a similar survey in the US about 60% regarded themselves as Christians). This is also the reason why the traditionally strong center-right Christian parties in Europe today has much less support than they used to have.
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The EU was up until 1992 first and foremost a trade agreement, not a union or a federation. It’s only recently that the EU has involved itself in social issues.
To answer your question, if Turkey was a state with a Christian heritage and everything else were equal, then no, I don’t think it would be any easier for Turkey to become an EU member, simply because EU membership is about trade, not culture, see below. However, it would have silenced some of the opponents of Turkish membership in the Christian community, so in that regard you might say it would be easier.
I have already listed the reasons for why Turkey haven’t become an EU member in a previous post, mainly that the Turkish economy doesn’t even come close to fullfilling the requirements for EU membership (inflation, debt & deficits) and Turkey’s shady human rights record; notably the death penalty, prison torture, and outlawing Kurdish culture. I also said that a lot has changed in Turkey the last two years. Currently one of the major remaining issues is the continued imprisonment of a few lawfully elected representatives to the Turkish parliament. They were jailed because they were Kurds and embraced Kurdish culture.
This is a bit peripheral to this thread but as it is a frequent misconception I’d like to give some information. Disregard as appropriate for purposes of this thread.
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the ius sanguinis rule was (and is) that you inherit German citizenship from your parents on the basis of their citizenship not ethnicity. That means the descendants of naturalized parents inherit their citizenship as a matter of course. The “ethnic German ancestors” option was/is an additional way to acquire citizenship, that’s used by members of ethnic German populations to immigrate. (AFAIK it’s only open for ethnic Germans from Eastern Europe/the former Soviet Union as other populations are not deemed to have been ethnically persecuted).
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considerations on recent territorial accquisitions will hardly have figured in the legislation of the 1871-1918 empire as the last of these acquisitions were in the 18th century.
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Nowadays children born in Germany whose parents have eight years legal residence get German citizenship (but have to decide between age 18 and 23 between renouncing their other citizenship or the German one). Parents of already born children up to age ten could apply to have their children also profit from that; relatively few did apply.
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the term of legal residency that confers a right to get naturalized without administrative discretion used to be 15 years, and is now 8 years. (you can get naturalized before but at the government’s discretion, meaning it does help if you are a sports celebrity or similar). That means that fully two thirds of resident aliens (the human sort) could get naturalized at any time if they so chose. Judging by the numbers most of them are reluctant to do so, which seems to indicate that e.g. the disadvantages of not being a citizen in Turkey outweigh the disadvantages of not being a citizen in Germany to them. One factor may be that in most countries of origin aliens may not own real estate, which is a consideration if you stand to inherit the family home/farm.
I don’t doubt that there are those whose objections to Turkey are racist in nature, but I strongly object to your statement that all of ours are.
fair enough 
So the fact that a large number of people fought to get a reference to Christian heritage specifically in the EU constitution is not an indication that a large segment of people with power feel that Christianity and culture are a defining element of the European Union is not an indication of what’s going on?
Followed up by two extremely influential European politicians from two different countries who specifically laid out that the reason they object to Turkish membership is because they are Muslim.
But I’m sure those are just isolated incidents and reflect in no way, shape or form a larger attitude of a number of EU legislators. Taken together, these aren’t indicators that religion and culture aren’t going to be a large obstacle that the Turks are going to have to overcome? OK then. :rolleyes:
I do nothing of the kind.
In a couple decades, I might have monkeys come crawling out of my ass. We might as well just say, in a couple of decades, there won’t be a European Union so this whole Turkey thing is moot.
What happens in a couple of decades has no bearing on the obstacles that face Turkey right now. And one obstacle is that Turkey is often seen as a non-European country and one of the reasons for that is their religion.
Now, as I said before, Turkey can overcome their religion by quickly complying with all EU requirements so fully that the EU has no choice but to allow them in, without admitting that the only reason is xenophobia.
But so long as Turkey is viewed as an outsider, they aren’t going to be cut any breaks by the EU.
I don’t see Europe as Christian. I’m well-aware that most Europeans these days describe themselves as non-religious.
That’s unimportant though. Christianity is still present in the culture and its an aspect of shared history in the EU that Turkey does not have.
I’m aware of that and it has nothing to do with anything we’re talking about.
So, in other words, it would remove the objection of a block of opponents. So I guess that Turkey’s religion really is an obstacle, isn’t it? Thank you for conceding.
I agree. So long as these conditions persist, Turkey will not be admitted the EU. And if they can improve in these regards to such an extent that the EU can no longer object on these grounds, they will be. But because of their culture and religion, Turkey will not be cut any slack that another country with a similar heritage might be.
!!! I’ve never heard of any country having a law that forbids a foreigner from owning real property! Is this typical in Europe? Or in the Middle East or North Africa? Is it the law in Turkey?
Another thing – people keep talking about anti-Turkish “racism” – do Europeans really view Turks as a different “race”? I mean, in physical appearance, they aren’t very different from the (modern) Greeks, are they?
Some infomation of varied quality (I only googled for a few minutes) on Eastern Europe/former USSR [8 years old], Hungary, Turkey, the Czech Republic. I also remember from press reports that Denmark had negotiated an exemption to EU rules on nondiscrimination towards EU citizens (so we Germans don’t buy all of Denmark for weekend homes 
), and that Poland’s EU accession package included a stay of a few years on free ownership of land (they also fear German deep pockets). Commercial investors usually get around this by owning a local corporation that owns the land. BTW when Googling I saw that Mexico also restricts foreign ownership of real estate, withing 30 miles of the coastline/60 miles of the border.
No, they are not. If I wanted to distinguish Turkish and other European people on the street I’d go by cultural indicators, in dress and, mainly, accents. Anyway, In Germany and I think large parts of Europe it’s taboo to refer to people’s race. Talk about ethnicity all you want (in a non-disparaging way) but don’t mention race. When I first came upon an example of an US employee database in a database tutorial I was flabbergasted: they use a field for a racial classification? Unthinkable in most of Europe, I think.
On the other hand the term “racism” is often used in a sense which includes discrimination against a group of people that is not, or not much, different in physical appearance.
Correct.
You mean the two retired politicians, both from Christian Democratic parties. You might as well claim that apples are better than oranges, quoting the head of Unlimited Apples Inc. And btw, do you know that Germany actually supports Turkish membership?
Right on.
The problem is that you oversimplify. You see (to some extent at least) Europe = Christian and Turkey = Muslim, therefore EU != Turkey. But if culture and religion is your only criteria, then there wouldn’t be any EU at all.
You’re really digging yourself in deep here. Let me repeat what I said: The EU is still first and foremost a trade agreement and up until recently Turkey didn’t even come close to fullfilling any of the requirements needed as a trade partner.
And the fact that the EU is based on a broad trade agreement has everything - not nothing, but everything - to do with what we’re discussing here. Turkey simply doesn’t fulfill the economic requirements. Have you forgotten the economic meltdown in Turkey a few years ago? Do you really think that the rest of EU will admit Turkey, the biggest population next to Germany, in to the EU and the Euro currency, without any economic discipline whatsoever? Try to imagine the amount of damage that could do to the economy in the rest of Europe.
You say that Turkey is often seen as a non-European country. Care then to explain how come there has been discussions recently about linking a program for peace in Israel & Palestine with a trade agreement with the EU? Care to explain why possible new members or trade agreements following Turkey and Balkan are with Ukraine, Belarus, Moldavia, and even Georgia, Armenia? Care to explain why the Council of Europe is holding up a vision of an 800 million strong unified Europe (the EU is currently 450 million)?
There’s a quiet revolution taking place (and I’m not saying it’s all a good thing) .
FYI, the EU and Turkey has had a strong relationship for a long time, beginning in 1963. Let me point you to a couple of sources:
The EurActiv page about EU-Turkey relationship:
http://www.euractiv.com/cgi-bin/cgint.exe?204&OIDN=2000765&-tt=el
The conclusions of the European Council from 1997 to 2003 (I’m only quoting from the last one, December 2003):
http://europa.eu.int/comm/enlargement/turkey/pdf/european_councils_.pdf
Come on. You used a strawman. You could as well claim that giving a disabled man a wooden foot would make it easier for him to walk to the store, but it’s still a moot point if the store is 2000 miles away, he wouldn’t be able walk that far anyhow. It’s like leveling a 100 feet mountain when there’s 10000 feet mountain furter down the road that cannot be leveled. But it would remove one obstacle, right?
Whatever the religious and cultural heritage, Turkey will not be admitted if they don’t clean up the economy and their human rights record, and that’s the main hurdle.