The effect of Syrian refugees living in Turkey on the security perceptions of society: Gaziantep and Balıkesir examples

Early stages of the world history witnessed human mobility due to the lack or unbalanced distribution of ground and underground resources and climate conditions in the geographies where people lived. Lately, in addition to natural causes mentioned above armed conflicts, occupations, discriminations, human rights violations, developed technologies and their awareness, demand of better life and the desire to achieve liberties have transformed mobility into forced, regular and irregular migration. The events in Syria turned into civil war starting with the Arab Spring in the early 2011 in the Middle East. Taking part of international actors made Syrians migrate internally and internationally. In this context, Syrians mass migrated to Turkey over 3.5 millions by the end of 2018. The distribution of this number of people to each city of Turkey has affected the Turkish society in terms of social, economy, politics and security. The main goal of the research is to identify the security perception caused by the Syrians who stay in Turkey for more than 7 years while their discussions about their permanent or temporary status continue. The security perception of Turkish society about Syrian Asylees is measured by newly developed 35-question questionaire consists of physical security, socio-economic and cultural and political dimensions. In order to measure this perception about Syrians, scattered all over the provinces, most similar system design which frequently used in social sciences and allows to make comparison is used. The cities Gaziantep and Balıkesir which are best fitted to the design are awarded and the questionnaire is applied. Finally, security perception is measured comperatively.