Environment between law and justice: Legal consciousness of environmental movements in Turkey, 1990-2024

This dissertation explores sources of legal consciousness of environmental movements in Turkey by focusing on three local-based rural movements (Akbelen, Avdan, Deştin). Legal consciousness, which refers to both state and non-state law, is briefly defined as one's view and understanding of law, rights, and justice. I suggest that the legal consciousness of environmental movements in rural areas derives from "historical/territorial rights" and "relations of production" for local communities, and the understanding of "commons" for the environmental organizations/defenders, rather than the administrative law for environmental protection. The motivational ground of the struggle for local communities is the rights that they believe they have since they have lived for generations and made their livelihoods by agriculture in spaces under environmental assault. Both local communities and environmentalists see those spaces as "commons". That is why they defend that they are right in their struggle. This argument is discussed through the roles of space, law and legality, and institutions and institutionalization, based on field visits, interviews, and (social) media research. The ties with space play a triggering role in the motivations of a struggle; in the field of law and legality environmental movements run a counter-hegemonic struggle; and their engagement with law and the institutions (environmentalists, state, experts, and media) facilitates their institutionalization (and vice versa) and create venues for transformation and sharing of legal consciousness.