National Settings and Transnational NGOs: Comparative Study of Amnesty International in Argentina and Turkey by Nil Uzun Submitted to Central European University Department of Sociology and Social Anthropology In partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Master of Arts Supervisors: Prof. Balázs Vedres Prof. Don Kalb CEU eTD Collection Budapest June, 2010 Abstract The proliferation of so called NGOs have roused several discussions addressing the definition of the term, the roles these organizations take, the opportunities they provide, the threats they introduce to local communities and different methodologies for studying them. Among these arguments, global deductive approaches tend to underestimate the different outcomes of national historical trajectories on transnational embeddedness while purely local approaches fail to consider similar patterns emerging from different localities. This study examines the ways in which national histories and institutional fields might influence the role of transnational NGOs and in return the types of interactions between them and the local organizations. By analyzing the role of Amnesty International (AI) in Argentina and Turkey, this research seeks out an approach which explores the critical junctures that connect local, national and transnational processes. This comparative case study reveals that AI occupies strikingly different positions in these two countries, at the same time human rights fields present several similar characteristics. By investigating these cases, I argue that particular network structures are historically produced through the interactions of national and transnational actors, so that the roles of transnational organizations within these networks are constrained and enabled by national institutional settings. CEU eTD Collection i Acknowledgments I am profoundly thankful to my supervisor Balazs Vedres whose guidance and support from the initial to the final level enabled me to develop an understanding of the subject. I am also grateful to Don Kalb for his enthusiasm in my research, his constant support and accessibility, as well as his critical insights on the topic. A number of individuals, their works and guidance in Buenos Aires, Budapest and Istanbul have provided me not only the insight about the complexities of human rights field but also the warmth friendship. In that sense I am thankful to Güneú Çelikkol, Maria Lara Goyburu, Adriana Azcorra, Martin Demingo, Laura Rodriguez, AslÕ Pelit, Maria Lis Baiocchi and Lucas Gilardone. No words can express my gratitude to dearest Natalia Andrea Peral. Her genuine support has gone much beyond the project and without her help and friendship this project would be much difficult and less fun. I am appreciative of Ayúe Ça÷lar, Prem Kumar Rajaram, Alexandra Kowalski and John Clarke for their invaluable contributions to this thesis; Eszter Timar for her constant help with the writing process as well as the administrative and academic staff of the Department of Sociology and Social Anthropology who together enabled me to have a friendly and peaceful experience throughout the year. I am thankful to my friends and colleagues in the Department of Sociology and Social Anthropology of CEU with whom I have been constantly and enthusiastically supported and challenged by throughout the year. I am especially grateful for those who were there until the last moment, for making this process easier in any possible way. I am heartily grateful to Gürkan MÕhçÕ for his patience, understanding and companionship in each step of this journey. Finally, I am most thankful to my parents, my partners in crime, Rengin and øbrahim Uzun, to whom this thesis is dedicated. Without them, I would not be who I am now. CEU eTD Collection ii Table of contents ABSTRACT.....................................................................................................................................................ø ACKNOWLEDGMENTS.............................................................................................................................. øø TABLE OF CONTENTS..............................................................................................................................øøø LIST OF TABLES AND FIGURES.............................................................................................................øV INTRODUCTION .......................................................................................................................................... 1 CHAPTER 1: ALTERNATIVE THEORIES OF NGOS AND THE COMPARATIVE CASE OF ARGENTINA AND TURKEY ....................................................................................................................... 6 1.1 NGOS AND ALTERNATIVE APPROACHES .................................................................................................. 6 1.2 HUMAN RIGHTS MOVEMENTS AND AMNESTY INTERNATIONAL ............................................................... 15 1.3 ARGENTINA AND TURKEY...................................................................................................................... 18 CHAPTER 2: METHODOLOGICAL DISCUSSIONS............................................................................... 21 CHAPTER 3: HUMAN RIGHTS FIELDS IN ARGENTINA AND TURKEY: CENTRALITY OF AI.... 26 3.1 HISTORICAL PRECURSORS AND EMPIRICAL REMARKS ............................................................................. 27 3.2 CENTRALITY OF AI TODAY .................................................................................................................... 34 CONCLUSION............................................................................................................................................. 41 APPENDICES............................................................................................................................................... 43 REFERENCES ............................................................................................................................................. 48 CEU eTD Collection iii List of Tables and Figures Tables Table 1 Data set of human rights organizations in Turkey Table 2: Data set of human rights organizations in Argentina Figures Figure 1 Network of human rights organizations in Argentina based on web links Figure 2 Network of human rights organizations in Turkey based on web links List of Abbreviations Organizations in Argentina ABUELAS Abuelas de Plaza de Mayo AEDD Asociación de Ex Detenidos Desaparecidos AI Amnistia Internacional in Argentina AMBRU Asociacion Miguel Bru APDH Asamblea Permanente por los Derechos Humanos CELS Centro de Estudios Legales y Sociales CPM Comisión por la Memoria EQN Equipa Nizkor FAMILIARES Familiares de Desaparecidos y Detenidos por Razones Políticas HIJOS Hijos por la Identidad y la Justicia contra el Olvido y el Silencio IIDH Instituto Interamericano de Derechos Humanos LIGA Liga Argentina por los Derechos del Hombre MABIERTA Memoria Abierta MADRES-A Asociación Madres de Plaza de Mayo MADRES-F Madres de Plaza de Mayo – Línea Fundadora MEDH Movimiento Ecuménico por los Derechos Humanos SERPAJ Fundación Servicio, Paz y Justicia Organizations in Turkey AI Af Örgütü AKDER AyrÕmcÕOÕ÷a KarúÕ KadÕn HaklarÕ Derne÷i BUIHHA østanbul Bilgi Üniversitesi ønsan HaklarÕ Hukuku AraúWÕrma Merkezi DOD Düúünce Özgürlü÷ü Derne÷i HEL Helsinki Yurttaúlar Derne÷i IHD ønsan HaklarÕ Derne÷i IHGD ønsan HaklarÕ Gündemi Derne÷i IHH ønsan Hak ve Hürriyetleri ve ønsani YardÕm VakfÕ, CEU eTD Collection IHOP ønsan HaklarÕ Ortak Platformu IUIHHA østanbul Üniversitesi ønsan HaklarÕ Hukuku AraúWÕrma ve Uygulama Merkezi KAOS Kaos Gey ve Lezbiyen Kültürel AraúWÕrmalar ve DayanÕúma Derne÷i MAZLUM ønsan HaklarÕ ve Mazlumlar için DayanÕúma Derne÷i MULTECI Mültecilerle DayanÕúma Derne÷i OD Özgür Düúünce ve e÷itim HaklarÕ Derne÷i STGM Sivil Toplum Geliútirme Merkezi iv Introduction Scholarly discussions on ‘proliferation of transnational non-governmental organizations (NGOs)’ point to the significance of these actors in terms of their role in decision making processes of international governmental organizations (IGOs) such as the United Nations (UN) and the World Bank (WB) (e.g. Thakur 1994; Clark, Friedman and Hochstetler 1998; Martens 2005; Alger 1997). They seem to provide political opportunities for externalization of local contentions and have the ability to modify local political agendas (e.g. Tarrow 2001; Tarrow and della Porta 2005; McAdam, Tarrow and Tilly 2003). Several scholars also demonstrated the impact of material constraints on the organizational structure of these transnational NGOs (e.g. Smith 2005; Cooley and Ron 2002). Most of these accounts, whether optimistic or critical, tend to generalize how these institutions operate, what impacts they bring upon policy-making processes and what kinds of interactions occur on transnational and local scales. Also, purely local approaches fail to consider the interaction between national and transnational forces and dismiss the similar outcomes of these interactions in different locales. On the other hand, several anthropological studies critically highlighted how “local organizations (…) make sense of global ideas and norms, and how the global is transformed in response” (Levitt and Merry 2009:443). But these studies mostly concentrate on the differences claiming that “vernacularization is a widespread practice that takes different forms in different kinds of organizations and in different cultural historical contexts” (ibid: