Cemile Gizem Dinçer

Uluslararası göç çalışmaları, ulusal ve uluslararası göç politikalarındaki söylemlerden etkilenen ve gittikçe politikleşmiş bir araştırma alanıdır. Maddi kaynakları açısından devlet odaklı politikadan bağımsızlaşamayan göç araştırmaları uluslararası göç yönetimi söylemini meşrulaştırarak ulusdevletlerin göçü önleme çabalarında araçsallaşabilmektedir. Göç araştırmalarının politikleşen yapısı, benimsenen teorik yaklaşımdan veri toplama yöntemlerine kadar tüm araştırma tasarımını da yöntemsel ve etik açıdan etkilemektedir. Özellikle son zamanlarda göçmen kadınlara odaklanan araştırmaların sayısı hızla artarken, bu araştırmalarda kullanılan yöntem yeterince açıklanmadığı için hem bilimsel bilginin üretimi hem de etik açıdan ciddi sorunlar barındırabilmektedir. Bu anlamda ana akım araştırma yöntemlerini eleştiren, araştırma sürecini eşitsiz güç ilişkileri perspektifinden sorunsallaştıran feminist yöntem göç araştırmalarında önemli bir sorgulama zemini sağlamaktadır.


International migration studies have been a gradually politicized research field that is affected by national and international migration policy discourses. Given its financially co-dependent relation to state-centered policies, migration studies can be instrumentalized in the efforts of nation-states to “prevent” migration by legitimizing the “migration management” discourse. The politicized structure of migration studies affects the whole research design methodologically and ethically from the theoretical approach to data collection methods. While the number of research focusing on migrant women has increased enormously, due to the inadequately explained methods they can have serious problems both in terms of the production of scientific knowledge and ethics. In this respect, criticizing the mainstream research methodologies and problematizing the perspective of unequal power relations
in the research processes, feminist methodology can provide vital grounds for questioning in migration studies.

Although Turkey is party to the 1951 Geneva Convention Relating to the Status of Refugees, it extends its protection only to refugees with ›European countries of origin.‹ Under this regulation, Turkey grants only ›temporary asylum‹ to non-European refugees until the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) resettles them to a third country. In this fragmented configuration, refugees in Turkey occupy ambivalent spaces in-between national and international bodies of law, while navigating both the multiplicity of asylum authorities and the sophisticated techniques meant to evaluate their asylum claims. In line with Turkey's European Union accession, the Turkish government has recently attempted to restructure the country's migration/asylum regime, aiming to provide better protection to refugees in accordance with international human rights standards. This article critically examines the recent changes towards a) standardizing and systematizing the legal and administrative asylum procedures, and b) civilianizing the migration/asylum management that used to be coordinated largely by the police. We argue that, on the one hand, Turkey's asylum regime continues to give rise to uncertainty, unpredictability, and improvisation and, on the other hand, it presents a striking continuity with the previous regime in that it prioritizes securitizing migration/asylum management over ensuring the rights and protections of refugees.  Vol. 3, Issue 2/2017 | www.movements-journal.org