The proposal fits with the overall research that in recent years has focused on the role of the European Civil Society in the prospect of creating the European Public Sphere. It investigates the process of europeanisation the Organised Civil Society in Turkey, by taking the organisations active in the Youth sector, as a key case study. The overall objective is to shed new light regarding their positioning in a country that has since long negotiating its access to the EU. The project will be based on a policy analysis of the Youth policies, by employing an innovative methodological approach that takes into consideration the operationalisation of the analytical concept of europeanisation into four main typologies (that are ‘policy europeanisation’, ‘political europeanisation’, ‘societal europeanisation’, and ‘discursive europeanisation’) that will drive the field work to be conducted along two years of time.
The combination of different qualitative modalities of data collection and the reference to insights coming from different disciplines that are overall grounded in the European Studies area, but bring their own specific contribute into the field (such as political sociology, public policy analysis, international relations, social psychology) is going to characterize the approach to policy analysis that will be employed in this project. The final goal, and the results outcoming from this proposal are to identify a set of best practices to be converted into practical suggestions and policy recommendations for policy makers both at the supranational and at the national levels, in order to 1) improve the strategic planning of European Funding in Turkey 2) find out the best strategies to engage with Civil Society activists 3) unpack the best options and employ the best policy outputs in order to adapt the EU’s policy making to a peculiar political, social and cultural context such as the Turkish one.