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Social Security Reform in Turkey: Different Usages of Europe in Shaping the National Welfare Reform

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The EU and the Domestic Politics of Welfare State Reforms

Part of the book series: Work and Welfare in Europe ((RECOWE))

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Abstract

Social security reform in Turkey involved the restructuring of pension and health care systems and the administrative reform of social secu-rity institutions with enacted reform laws in 2008. This study focuses on the usages of Europe in the social security reform process in Turkey adopting an actor- based Europeanization theoretical framework to understand how EU membership process has shaped the development of social policy at the national level in Turkey (Graziano, Jacquot and Palier, introduction to this volume). The reform represents a major restructuring of the pensions, health care system and the administra-tive structure of the social security institutions formulated and imple-mented by the Justice and Development Party (JDP [Adalet ve Kalkınma Partisi – AKP]) government from 2003–08. The reform of the pensions, health care system and administrative structure represents a change in the multiple dimensions of the policy structure: national health insurance aimed at covering all segments of the population as a policy goal, changes in the parameters of pension system concerned princi-ples and financial instruments and administrative unification changed the operational mechanisms. Accordingly, changes included elements of universalist policy orientation such as the administrative unifica-tion and health care reforms as well as elements of “retrenchment” represented with the reform of the pension system.

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Authors
  1. Cem Utku Duyulmus
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Editors and Affiliations

  1. Universita Bocconi, Milan, Italy

    Paolo R. Graziano

  2. Centre d’études européennes, Sciences Po, Paris, France

    Sophie Jacquot

  3. Centre d’études européennes, CNRS, Sciences Po, Paris, France

    Bruno Palier

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© 2011 Cem Utku Duyulmus

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Utku Duyulmus, C. (2011). Social Security Reform in Turkey: Different Usages of Europe in Shaping the National Welfare Reform. In: Graziano, P.R., Jacquot, S., Palier, B. (eds) The EU and the Domestic Politics of Welfare State Reforms. Work and Welfare in Europe. Palgrave Macmillan, London. https://doi.org/10.1057/9780230307629_12

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