Ph.D. Theses
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Browsing Ph.D. Theses by Author "Çalışkan, Koray,"
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Item Disappearing onion producers in Karacabey: a micro analysis of farmers and land after structural reform(Thesis (Ph.D.) - Bogazici University. Institute for Graduate Studies in Social Sciences, 2013., 2013.) Döner, Fatma Nil.; Çalışkan, Koray,In the last decade, for the first time in Anatolian history, farmers have no longer been the largest working population. The decreasing number of farmers and the shifts in their strategies for agricultural production, employment, livelihood, and market incorporation are a direct result of SAPs of the post-1980 era. This dissetation investigates the multifaceted impacts of structural adjustment reforms, as well as the hardships and the challenging processes that farming families have faced during the last three decades in Turkey. The original contribution is to show ongoing rural transformation in a micro-environment of Bursa Karacabey, by emphasizing what the SAPs mean on the ground. Surveys and statistical data reduce farmers to production units so many goods and services they generate become invisible from a neoliberal perspective. Therefore, here, the challenge is to tease out the political, social, and economic consequences of the SAPs in a micro-environment with special emphasis on the experiences of farmers who are facing impacts of structural reform one-to-one. For the majority of small farmers, SAPs continuously diminish the level of income and farming on its own becomes unable to provide sufficient livelihood for rural dwellers. This dissertation teases out the process of easing away from a strictly agrarian existence and engaging in multiple activities by examining recent trends in rural employment, occupational shifts, changes in the main income sources, emerging economic activities, and spatial relocation in Harmanlı village. It illustrates how rural inhabitants in the village manage their subsistence and overhaul consumption patterns, gender roles, and environment in order to surmount the vicissitudes of structural reform with reference to the political dimensions of livelihood adaptation and relations with the state. In this dissertion, the attention given to real experiences of rural producers instead of statistics enables us to investigate micro-level impacts of SAPs and what kind of coping strategies derive in Harmanlı village. Besides, a comprehensive analysis on livelihood strategies reminds us that resistance to free-market system begins with the mechanisms used by households to preserve subsistence level and social reproduction. Finally, a critical perusal of the rural-urban linkages which are useful lens for understanding the complexities of rural inhabitants’ livelihoods and their coping strategies including some form of mobility, diversification of income sources and occupations, and rural dwellers’ mechanisms of confrontation enriches our analysis in this dissertation.Item The politics of uncertainty in a global market: the hazelnut exchange and its production(Thesis (Ph.D.) - Bogazici University. Institute for Graduate Studies in Social Sciences, 2012., 2012.) Bilbil, Ebru Tekin.; Çalışkan, Koray,The purpose of this dissertation is to examine how the market works on the ground. It analyzes the hazelnut market in Turkey and explores the interaction between the market agents. It reveals how this interaction relates to the presence, production and circulation of forms of uncertainty. It also ascertains what uncertainty means in market settings and what role production, representation, dissemination and limiting of uncertainty play in market relations. In market relations, intentionally or unintentionally, individuals try to forecast, value, prevent and qualify (as risk or loss) uncertainties. They assume that they can perceive, measure and avoid uncertainties on the basis of probabilities, level of knowledge about unknowns or ability to overcome. As such, uncertainty is assumed to be given yet with inadequate attention into its constitutive dynamics, actors of its making and its role in the market creation. The dissertation examines how uncertainties are constructed and what role this construction plays in constituting the market exchange and relations. The conclusions reached are that economizing uncertainty becomes a market device in production, exchange, circulation, pricing and policy making. The dissertation starts with an analysis of the market reform policies and agricultural transformation in Turkey. Next, it traces the processes of the production and calculation of hazelnuts, examining how hazelnuts are produced and measured under uncertainty, and how uncertainty is created in the calculation of hazelnuts. It then explains exchange relations and price politics created at different spheres and with different expectations. After that, it explores the struggles and controversies among market groups over the production, calculation, exchange and pricing of hazelnuts and policy making. Subsequently, it analyzes what the politics of uncertainty means and how it is produced in the market setting. Following uncertainties and observing their making in markets require a research program that draws on literatures concerning economics, political science and sociology. The research program includes the discussion of material things, individuals, formal and informal institutions and prices as well as their interactions. The research was based primarily on qualitative interviews, participant observations, case studies and document analysis conducted between 2006 and 2009.