idealistic or Western-centric, since each country or community may have an
understanding of meaningful participation which is not necessarily centred on
deliberative democracy or the principles of the Aarhus Convention. Instead, as seen
in environmental justice literature, meaningful participation may provide a more
contextual outlook on socio-environmental injustices. For instance, Solitare (2005)
highlights that her implementation of the concept stays within the limits allowed by
US legislation and the legislation of individual states. A similar approach can be
taken for this research. Accordingly, the field-study findings and comprehensive
analysis of the legal framework of Turkey’s HEPP process demonstrates that local
populations expected a degree of meaningful participation, as indicated by Solitare
(2005) and the US EPA (2013), within the limits of Turkey’s legislative framework.
For this research, as a result of findings from our field-study (i.e. interviews, narratives, videos) about the HEPP process in south-western Turkey, the conditions of
meaningful participation can be defined as follows:
1. Consideration and inclusion of locals in the policy process;
2. Representation of the concerns and recommendations of locals in the policy
process;
3. Ability of locals to influence the policy process;
4. The efforts of state institutions and administration to ensure public participation.
When the general HEPP process of Turkey and the relevant legal framework are
uncovered, it is possible to see instances of these four components of meaningful
participation. For example, the Environmental Impact Assessment (EIA) by-laws
(2003, 2008, 2013, 2014) underline that companies whose projects fall under
Annex I of the by-laws are required to conduct public participation meetings and
reflect the locals’ concerns and recommendations in their final project files to obtain
EIA clearance before they initiate HEPP constructions. This clause straightforwardly implies that the by-laws urge companies to include local communities into
the HEPP process and encourage them to raise their voices. In doing so, the by-laws
explicitly aim to achieve the representation of locals’ concerns and recommendations in the HEPP process, and pave the way for the locals to influence the policy
process. The same by-laws also require the state agencies to monitor the conduct of
those public participation processes, which suggests that the State has to ensure
their proper conduct. Above all, as revealed further in the following sections, an
understanding of ‘meaningful participation’ is not too distant or idealistic in the
Turkish context. In fact, the notion was frequently referred to in the narratives of
interviewees, and was detected in the relevant legal, official and organizational
documents.
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R. C. Sayan and A. Kibaroğlu
understanding of meaningful participation which is not necessarily centred on
deliberative democracy or the principles of the Aarhus Convention. Instead, as seen
in environmental justice literature, meaningful participation may provide a more
contextual outlook on socio-environmental injustices. For instance, Solitare (2005)
highlights that her implementation of the concept stays within the limits allowed by
US legislation and the legislation of individual states. A similar approach can be
taken for this research. Accordingly, the field-study findings and comprehensive
analysis of the legal framework of Turkey’s HEPP process demonstrates that local
populations expected a degree of meaningful participation, as indicated by Solitare
(2005) and the US EPA (2013), within the limits of Turkey’s legislative framework.
For this research, as a result of findings from our field-study (i.e. interviews, narratives, videos) about the HEPP process in south-western Turkey, the conditions of
meaningful participation can be defined as follows:
1. Consideration and inclusion of locals in the policy process;
2. Representation of the concerns and recommendations of locals in the policy
process;
3. Ability of locals to influence the policy process;
4. The efforts of state institutions and administration to ensure public participation.
When the general HEPP process of Turkey and the relevant legal framework are
uncovered, it is possible to see instances of these four components of meaningful
participation. For example, the Environmental Impact Assessment (EIA) by-laws
(2003, 2008, 2013, 2014) underline that companies whose projects fall under
Annex I of the by-laws are required to conduct public participation meetings and
reflect the locals’ concerns and recommendations in their final project files to obtain
EIA clearance before they initiate HEPP constructions. This clause straightforwardly implies that the by-laws urge companies to include local communities into
the HEPP process and encourage them to raise their voices. In doing so, the by-laws
explicitly aim to achieve the representation of locals’ concerns and recommendations in the HEPP process, and pave the way for the locals to influence the policy
process. The same by-laws also require the state agencies to monitor the conduct of
those public participation processes, which suggests that the State has to ensure
their proper conduct. Above all, as revealed further in the following sections, an
understanding of ‘meaningful participation’ is not too distant or idealistic in the
Turkish context. In fact, the notion was frequently referred to in the narratives of
interviewees, and was detected in the relevant legal, official and organizational
documents.
144
R. C. Sayan and A. Kibaroğlu