An Exploration Of Turkey's AKP's Accession Policy

Turkey’s Justice and Development(AK)party has been in power for 18 years since it was founded in 2001 and came to power in 2002.During this period,the basic position that AK chose and persisted in applying to join the EU shows that its accession policy is characterized by continuity,but its accession process is also characterized by variability.Scholars have noted that the analysis of AK’s policies towards the EU from the perspective of the accession process led by AK mostly focuses on the analysis of the reasons for the volatility of the process.As for the analysis of the reasons for AK’s adherence to the EU accession policy,it mainly focuses on the perspectives of the rising strategy of marginal political parties,the consolidation of ruling legitimacy,the promotion of democratization,and the pressure of concept identification,etc.Although the four perspectives have certain explanatory power,they all have certain deficiencies.This paper focuses on analyzing the factors that influence the continuity of AK’s accession policy.Based on the evolution of Turkish political party system and Islamic political parties,and combining the dynamic process of AK’s party identity transformation with its leading accession process,this paper analyzes the accession process by stages with the main line of the transformation and development of the political party,so as to try to explain the reasons for the continuity of AK’s accession policy.The Justice and Development Party(AK)has a strong religious color.Although it emphasizes its non-Islamic party attribute in the construction of its party identity transformation,this paper considers the party to be the regeneration party of the evolution of Turkish Islamic parties in view of the innumerable connections between the party and Turkish Islamic parties.Based on this,by combing the political party system in Turkey and combining with the change of the relationship between the army and the political party,this paper analyzes the influence of the evolution process of the Islamic political parties in Turkey on the transformation of political party identity.At the same time,it analyzes the challenge and opportunity of the existence of the military guardianship regime to the survival and development of Islamic parties.Furthermore,it shows that the Justice and Development Party’s choice of completely close to the EU policy is the most effective way to eliminate the legitimacy of the military guardianship.In the first stage of its accession to the EU,AK has achieved the self-shaping,western recognition and institutional confirmation of its party identity transformation.In the second stage of its accession to the EU,it aims to maintain the identity of the center-right political party and effectively eliminate the power of the army.In the third stage of accession,due to the two-way interaction between the accession process and the political parties,the party presents a complicated attitude towards the accession policy,that is,it needs both the tool and the legitimacy,and it needs the reality of the European policy,so it keeps the continuity of the accession policy.