An analysis of the positions of Turkish trade union confederations towards social dialogue

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Tezin Türü: Yüksek Lisans

Tezin Yürütüldüğü Kurum: Orta Doğu Teknik Üniversitesi, İktisadi ve İdari Bilimler Fakültesi, Siyaset Bilimi ve Kamu Yönetimi Bölümü, Türkiye

Tezin Onay Tarihi: 2008

Öğrenci: ZEYNEP EKİN AKLAR

Danışman: İPEK EREN VURAL

Özet:

As part of her membership negotiations with the EU, Turkey is expected to adopt the “acquis communataire”, which requires her to adjust her administrative structures to European standards in a variety of policy spheres, including the social policy and social dialogue. Within this context, this thesis aims to analyze the approaches of the Turkish trade union confederations towards the practices of social dialogue at the European level, as well as their experiences of social dialogue mechanisms in Turkey through the data gathered from in depth interviews with the officials of the three trade union confederations, TURK-IS, DISK, HAK-IS, and some of their member unions. While all Turkish trade union confederations find social dialogue mechanisms fairly operational at the EU level, in relation to Turkey they all agree that such mechanisms are far from meeting their expectations. Beyond this common point the conceptualizations of social dialogue, interpretations over its structure, functions, and features, as well as the evaluations accounting for its underdevelopment in the Turkish context, show considerable variation across the three confederations.