Preface
When we began the process of preparing an edited volume on Turkish environmental law and policies, the plan was to prepare a book on the concerns and
challenges of Turkish environmental law and policies and also on learned lessons,
new perspectives, and solutions with the tentative title ‘Environmental Law and
Policies in Turkey: Addressing the Concerns and Challenges.’
Indeed, the main objective was to study the key themes of Turkish environmental law and policies in order to conceptualize the concerns and challenges; to
improve the research through analysis of how to understand the lessons learned to
date while covering all aspects of Turkish environmental law and policies today;
and, with a prospective academic perspective, to focus on how to advance and solve
them by well-argued new perspectives and alternative methods. So, it had three
main dimensions: the past, present, and future of Turkish environmental law and
policies.
However, the process has been more intense and tough than we guessed. Due to
the very complicated structure and huge number of legal documents and institutions
concerning the main research subject of ‘Turkish environmental law and policies,’
adhering to the main objective with its three dimensions has not been easy in many
respects. So, from the outset and during the whole process, we had a critical
problem to deal with: how to draw the framework of that complicated structure in
order to simplify the issue and make it more understandable despite all its aspects
and, while doing this, avoid restricting its scope and meaning and pursue our main
objective with its three dimensions. To resolve this problem, we decided to shift the
topic and the focus from concerns and challenges to just law and policies and to just
provide the main framework of the operation of the system with its main regulations
and institutions and learned lessons.
The book still consists of chapters specifically on the concerns and challenges of
Turkish environmental law and policies, e.g. environmental cases in Turkey by
Emel Türker Alpay, addressing the challenge of food security by Sezin İba Gürsoy,
exploring environmental justice by Caner Sayan and Ayşegül Kibaroğlu; and all
other chapters, one way or another and more or less, discuss the concerns and
challenges of their topics; but now, predominantly and more precisely, it involves
vii
When we began the process of preparing an edited volume on Turkish environmental law and policies, the plan was to prepare a book on the concerns and
challenges of Turkish environmental law and policies and also on learned lessons,
new perspectives, and solutions with the tentative title ‘Environmental Law and
Policies in Turkey: Addressing the Concerns and Challenges.’
Indeed, the main objective was to study the key themes of Turkish environmental law and policies in order to conceptualize the concerns and challenges; to
improve the research through analysis of how to understand the lessons learned to
date while covering all aspects of Turkish environmental law and policies today;
and, with a prospective academic perspective, to focus on how to advance and solve
them by well-argued new perspectives and alternative methods. So, it had three
main dimensions: the past, present, and future of Turkish environmental law and
policies.
However, the process has been more intense and tough than we guessed. Due to
the very complicated structure and huge number of legal documents and institutions
concerning the main research subject of ‘Turkish environmental law and policies,’
adhering to the main objective with its three dimensions has not been easy in many
respects. So, from the outset and during the whole process, we had a critical
problem to deal with: how to draw the framework of that complicated structure in
order to simplify the issue and make it more understandable despite all its aspects
and, while doing this, avoid restricting its scope and meaning and pursue our main
objective with its three dimensions. To resolve this problem, we decided to shift the
topic and the focus from concerns and challenges to just law and policies and to just
provide the main framework of the operation of the system with its main regulations
and institutions and learned lessons.
The book still consists of chapters specifically on the concerns and challenges of
Turkish environmental law and policies, e.g. environmental cases in Turkey by
Emel Türker Alpay, addressing the challenge of food security by Sezin İba Gürsoy,
exploring environmental justice by Caner Sayan and Ayşegül Kibaroğlu; and all
other chapters, one way or another and more or less, discuss the concerns and
challenges of their topics; but now, predominantly and more precisely, it involves
vii