Understanding the causes and consequences of a social problem, determining the obstacles to its solution, and developing policy proposals aimed at removing the said obstacles is only possible through dialogue with parties to the problem. Using this as the starting point, the TESEV Working and Monitoring Group on Internal Displacement in Turkey (“TESEV Working Group”) carried out four separate fieldwork projects between February and September 2005 with the aim of observing, on the ground, the implementation of government policies examined in Chapter III; assessing how the Return to Villages and Rehabilitation Project (“RVRP”) and Law no. 5233 titled “Law on Compensation for Losses Resulting from Terrorism and the Fight against Terrorism” (“Compensation Law”) are implemented by authorities, how they are perceived by internally displaced persons (“IDPs”) and how effective they are in addressing the problem;determining on-site IDPs’ needs, demands and future tendencies; identifying the obstacles to return, understanding which IDPs wish to return and why, who has or has not been able to return and why, and who prefers to remain in urban centres and why; determining the social and psychological problems resulting from internal displacement; and meeting with the stakeholders of the problem - namely public officials, non-governmental organizations (“NGOs”), municipality representatives, and IDPs - in order to identify the obstacles preventing a solution to the problem.
In its fieldwork, the TESEV Working Group employed a qualitative method, which helped to understand the various dimensions of internal displacement. This method allowed conducting comprehensive in-depth interviews with all of the stakeholders about their views regarding the scope of the problem, the policies of the government, and the solution of the issue. IDPs were reached through relevant NGOs, municipal officials, and journalists. The provincial neighborhoods and villages to visit were selected in light of the recommendations of the aforementioned and with the goal of diversifying data through interviewing IDPs in different circumstances. The internally displaced households were selected randomly. In-depth interviews were held with IDPs in their homes or in public places such as coffeehouses, village squares, and community centres. In these group interviews, participants who did not speak Turkish were communicated with through their bilingual family members and acquaintances, or with the aid of NGO representatives, journalists, or municipality officials.
The fieldwork was carried out by four members of the TESEV Working Group and their assistants. While the field studies in Istanbul and Diyarbakır were carried out
by one member of the group, the fieldwork in Batman and in Hakkâri were each undertaken by two members of the group. Reports of the Batman and the Hakkâri fieldwork consist of two articles each, written separately by the two members of the TESEV Working Group in accordance with a previously agreed distribution of labor. The rationale behind choosing Diyarbakır as the venue for the first fieldwork, carried out by Deniz Yükseker in February 2005, was the fact that the city was taking the lead in the implementation of the Compensation Law, which at the time had recently come into effect nationwide. Therefore, in the Diyarbakır fieldwork, emphasis was placed on the city-center, interviews were held with public officials, lawyers, and NGOs in order to assess how the law was implemented and what results were obtained. Interviews were also held with IDPs living in the city-center in order to asses their current situation and with municipal officials and NGOs in order to determine the urban issues arising from internal displacement in Diyarbakır.
The rationale behind choosing Batman as the venue for the second fieldwork, carried out in June-July 2005 was twofold. First, Batman is among the provinces that received the highest number of forced migrants in the region. Second, the high number of NGOs working on internal displacement in this city facilitated access to IDPs. Since this research project aimed at closely monitoring the implementation of the Compensation Law from the very beginning, the TESEV Working Group wanted to examine, in a comparative manner, the practice in Batman in light of the research findings obtained from the fieldwork in Diyarbakır. With this objective, group members Ayşe Betül Çelik and Dilek Kurban carried out a fieldwork in Batman where in-depth interviews were held with public officials responsible for the implementation of the Compensation Law, members of the bar association, lawyers serving in compensation commissions, lawyers holding power of attorney for petitions, NGOs that acted as intermediaries for these petitions, and IDPs. The TESEV Working Group undertook its most comprehensive fieldwork in Batman, where both the IDP neighborhoods in the provincial center and rural areas where there has been partial IDP return were visited. This provided the opportunity to examine on-site the obstacles to return, as well as the problems and needs of IDPs who have returned and of those who have remained in cities. These observations were supplemented with interviews conducted with public officials, municipal officials, NGOs, social care experts, and healthcare workers. The report written as a result of the fieldwork consists of two parts: The first part deals with the socio-economic consequences arising from internal displacement in Batman and with the obstacles to return. The second part assesses how the Compensation Law is perceived and implemented in Batman.
In the summer months of 2005, the third fieldwork was carried out by Deniz Yükseker and a group of assistants in Istanbul. As a city that received a considerable wave of migration in the 1990s and now hosts a significant number of IDPs, Istanbul was a
natural choice of venue for research on internal displacement in Turkey. A significant part of IDPs currently live in large urban centers in western Turkey. Taking as a starting point its belief that a substantial segment of IDPs either do not wish to or cannot return home and that internal displacement is now an urban issue, the TESEV Working Group decided to concentrate on the urban problems of IDPs in Istanbul. The fieldwork report combines the impressions obtained from in-depth interviews held in different parts of Istanbul with the findings of the fieldwork carried out in Diyarbakır, and analyzes the urban problems encountered by IDPs living in these two cities.
The TESEV Working Group chose Hakkâri as the venue for its last fieldwork carried out by A. Tamer Aker and Dilek Kurban in October 2005. The major reason for this choice centered on the hearsay information concerning the problematic implementation of the Compensation Law in this province. Following research in Diyarbakır and Batman, both of which represented at the time relatively good practices in terms of the implementation of the Compensation Law, conducting fieldwork in a province where the implementation was problematic would provide a comparative understanding of the reasons for the variation in practice among provinces. Another reason for choosing Hakkâri was that it is among the provinces where massive displacement had taken place in the 1990s and which, as a result, has suffered considerably from problems arising from internal displacement. As part of work carried out in the provincial center of Hakkâri and the district of Çukurca, interviews were conducted with similar participants to those observed above. The TESEV Working Group was unable to visit villages both because security forces did not allow access to rural areas for security reasons and because there was no meaningful return to villages. The Hakkâri fieldwork report consists of two parts: the first part assesses the causes and economic, social, and psychological consequences of internal displacement, as well as obstacles to return. The second part examines the implementation of the Compensation Law and assesses the protection of human rights in the province.
1 This article is based on findings from research carried out in Diyarbakır by TESEV Working Group member Deniz Yükseker and her assistant Şefika Kumral. Within the framework of the research, TESEV Working Group conducted interviews in Diyarbakır with relevant deputy governors, the Metropolitan Mayor, representatives of the Diyarbakır Bar Association, representatives of the Diyarbakır branch of the Human Rights Association (İnsan Hakları Derneği - “İHD”) and of the Diyarbakır Migrants’ Association for Social Solidarity and Culture (Göç Edenler Sosyal Yardımlaşma ve Kültür Derneği - “Diyar Göç-Der”), employees from the Women’s Center (Kadın Merkezi - “KA-MER”) and representatives of the departments dealing with women’s issues at the Metropolitan Municipality and Yenişehir Municipality. The research team also interviewed members of 15 internally displaced families reached through KA-MER and the Diyarbakır Center for Research and Application on Women’s Issues (Diyarbakır Kadın Sorunlarını Araştırma ve Uygulama
Merkezi - “DİKASUM”). As the implementation of the Compensation Law has accelerated in the past year,
information on this subject and on the implementation of the Return to Villages and Rehabilitation Project (“RVRP”) has been updated with additional information gathered in February, March, and May 2006 from the governorship, Diyar Göç-Der and the Diyarbakır Bar Association.