Political radicalisation and political destabilisation within the framework of constructivist theory: Analysis of EU crises in the 2000s

The main subject of this thesis is the analysis of political radicalization and political destabilization through constructivist theory. For this purpose, the phenomenological sociology origins of constructivism are revealed in the thesis. Using the concepts and analyzes of phenomenological sociology, an answer was sought to the question of when the individual questions the structure and wants to transform it. For this purpose, the relationship between crisis and change is explained through the radicalization of the individual. The concept used in making this statement was the individual's crisis of meaning. It has been argued that when an individual is faced with a problem that the structure can not cope with it or has difficult solving, such as war, migration, or epidemic, he is dragged into a crisis of meaning and begins to question the structure. The main reason behind the questioning of the structure is that the crises in question have a constructive aspect that calls into question the promised legitimacy of structure. The effect of such a crisis on the individual appears itself in the form of reverse socialization. These assumptions were concretizee based on the crises experienced by the EU in the 2000s. The 2000s witnessed a series of crises that thretaened the stability of the EU. So much so that today, crisis has become a separate field of study in the literatüre. These crises were accompanied by various challenges arising from external dynamics. For this purpose, the Euro crisis, migration crisis and values crisis are inclueded in the analysis in the thesis. The dissolution of transatlantic relations, economic instability and the Covid-19 pandemic are included as challenges and crises arising from the international level. Brexit was excluded from the study because it was considered a symptom rather than a crisis. The promissory legitimacy of the Union as a social structure is based on a permanent claim to the future, peace and prosperity. Its basic narratives are shaped around this claim. However, the Union, which has found itself in anomie due to the crises experienced in recent years, is faced with de-Europeanization as a form of radicalization, an example of reverse socialization. On the one hand, this has led to an increase disintegration studies in the literature. On the other hand, there have been discussions about the crisis of values and the resulting revival of nationalism and whether the nation-state has returned. Keywords: Constructivism, phenomenology, de-Europeanization, crisis, European integration, structure, social reality, anomie