Epsilon Archive for Student Projects

Abstract

Over the past few decades, participation in environmental decision-making has become a topic of considerable debate. Since there are different values and worldviews, pluralist democracy provides a relevant basis for planning participative natural resource management and implementing an inclusive environmental decision-making process. For about 15 years, widespread demonstrations to oppose
construction of small hydro power plants (called „HES‟ in Turkey) and countless lawsuits seeking for a fair, rational and inclusive construction process, brought the issue of „public participation‟(PP) into the Turkish political discussion. As a major occasion for the citizens to be effective in environmental decision-making in Turkey, the Environmental Impact Assessment (EIA) process is the focus of the study. In addition to the EIA legislation, perceptions of actors are analyzed to display the current state of the public participation issue in Turkey. Detecting existing shortcomings in the design of the PP process and implementation of three different HES project,
made it possible to acquire recommendations for improvement of the system.