Decentralization problematic in Turkey in the process of European integration: A comparison with France and Poland

In the first half of the 20th century, Europe experienced two world wars, and in the second half, it has been the scene to the integration thoughts and actions to prevent and make it from happening again the political, economic, cultural and social destructions caused by the war. The integration phenomenon that started in the economic field brought political integration with it towards the end of the century and EU has become a distinctive supranational organization. In the 1990s, the post-Sowiet countries' desire to become a member of the EU and this resulted in a common public administration problem and emerged the European administrative space opinion. After this dates, candidate countries had to adapt to the Union in the administrative sense as well as in the economic field and have implemented a series of reforms in their administrative systems for adaptation. Among these reforms, decentralization reforms undoubtedly have a special importance. In the study, it was aimed to evaluate the effects of the Union on the administrative reforms carried out by member and candidate countries. In this context, decentralization reforms, EU affect in these reforms has been examined and implications has been demonstrated for the reforms realized and to be carried out in the future. For this purpose, the study consists of three parts. In the first part, conceptual discussions on the EU integration process and decentralization issues are included. In the second part of the study, decenrtralization reforms by France has been examined, and EU impact has been sought in the process of these reforms. Then, the decentralization process of Poland, which became a member of the Union later, and the EU influence were examined in decentralization process. In the third part of research, local government system in France, Poland and Turkey were compared within the basic principles of local self-government and then the positive and negative experiences of these countries about decentralization processes were compared and inferences were made.