A study suggests that the political parties in Turkey are the reason behind the rise of the anti-refugee attitude. An immediate nationalist feeling emerged when President of Turkey Recep Tayyip Erdogan proclaimed that the Syrian refugees could be naturalized. This article argues that political parties in Turkey and the EU’s stance securitize the Syrian refugee crisis through their political discourses. They also use the sociological and political situation in which the Syrian refugees exist. This has a great influence on how the Turkish citizens perceive the Syrian refugees and has a profound effect on how the locals in Turkey treat the refugees. To the extent that such political parties’ discourses have led to the rise of xenophobia towards Syrian refugees.
However, the public discourse associated the Syrians with crime, economic problems, and internal insecurity. As such based on the statistics of the World Bank the GDP fell from 934.186 million in 2014 to 859.797 million in 2016. All of which securitized the existence of the Syrian Refugees. In addition to that, the Turkish humanitarian stance started to shift towards the EU stance after the “EU-Turkey deal”. The EU has been trying to import its securitized migration control practices in the Third World countries. Therefore before the crisis in Syria, the border control of Turkey is backed with strict observing mechanisms. To illustrate more, before the Syrian crisis the borders of Turkey have been securitized through various activities.
The Syrian Refugee crisis is found in the examination of the coverage of the British National press in which migrants are depicted negatively as illegal immigrants and failed asylum seekers. As such they have always been seen as economic and security threats. Not only are the refugees depicted as a threat but also as outsiders. To add more, the media coverage in Europe and how it shifted the way it perceives the refugees. As such after the significant amount of Syrians fleeing war-torn Syria that was when the media in Europe started to refer to such events as Europe’s refugee crisis or Europe’s migration crisis.
Hence throughout the events of 2015-2016, the media in Europe played a crucial role in framing the new arrivals and the ongoing events in terms of a crisis. That’s how journalists framed the biggest movement of Syrian people across boundaries and the Syrian humanitarian crisis as a threat. As such significant newspapers consistently shed a light on how refugees and migrants cause which later on would be used as a narrative. Such frames affected how Europeans perceived migrants since Europeans depended heavily on the flow of information presented by the Media to understand what is going on. Hence the EU identified Turkey to be the main gate for the refugees to cross to Europe. The EU perceived the refugees as a threat to its collective identity, due to the dilemma of national security versus human security that is securitized by the EU.
To illustrate more the human security and its essence of human rights provision to all humans and thus to the refugees who are seen as outsiders to the state’s national interest. Hence the refugees might be perceived as a threat to the state’s interest. As they are non-citizens who are provided with a citizen-state protection system, they rely heavily on specific legal regimes that are mainly supported by humanitarian goodwill for their protection.
In the Syrian refugee’s case, both proponents and opponents of providing humanitarian aid blame the refugees for being a burden on the hosting countries. As refugees interact with the hosting economy and this might result in a negative consequence which is food insecurity and shortage. Hence in this case refugees are linked to deteriorating food conditions, increased pressure on natural resources, worsened health conditions, and disruptions in the labor markets. So the link between refugees and food security on the global level as recommended by cross-country correlation shows that countries that are more likely to receive a high number of refugees are faced with deteriorating food security.
Therefore the EU adopts a common policy towards asylum seekers which is mainly rooted in societal, political, and professional processes as a way to articulate an endangered society. This common policy adopted is a result of the multitude of challenges faced by the Western nations nowadays as such economic, financial globalization, and the rise of poverty. To add more, the deterioration of living conditions in cities and the revival of racist and xenophobic parties. It’s related to securitization as such relating refugee and asylum seekers to criminal abuses that take place in the internal market of the European states and portraying them as terrorists. Hence through a wide politicization process, the migrants tend to be perceived as a threat to the protection of national identity and welfare provisions. This process is mainly linked to the politics of belonging to the European nation.
Studies on the Syrian refugee crisis have shown that the EU policy toward the Syrian refugees was framed through securitization. They have also shown that speech and practice act like “to combat irregular immigration” led to the securitization in the EU member states. Also, phrases like “the EU is facing an unprecedented crisis” can be found in the EU official documents. All such acts and phrases have led to the aggravation of the securitized discourses against the refugee crisis.
Hence the massive influx of refugees in Europe managed to threaten politicians and locals. The rise of xenophobia and anti-migration sentiments forced the government officials to build up fences, control the border, and take extreme measures as a way to protect the EU integrity. Hence the refugee crisis has been associated recently with terrorism and threat social and economic conditions. According to the EU and European countries, the influx of refugees is perceived as other also as alien to the European culture, faith, and values.
