Page 173 - Syrians in Türkiye - Special Report

GRAND NATIONAL ASSEMBLY OF TÜRKİYE THE OMBUDSMAN INSTITUTION

presence of poor countries such as Ethiopia and Uganda among these 6 countries shows
that there is a humanity and solidarity crisis rather than a refugee crisis in the world.
Considering that the refugees in Türkiye constitute 4.38% of the country’s population,
if the EU hosted the same number of refugees according to its population of 511.8
million, they would accept more than 23 million refugees. Considering the fact that
only 1.5 million refugees remain in this rich and developed region of the world, it is
very important to explain the injustice of responsibility and burden sharing. This fact
also reveals what the underlying crisis really is.
XVII. UNIVERSITIES AND RESEARCH

Türkiye has faced an influx of more than 3 million refugees over just 5 years after April
2011 and has remained alone in dealing with the greatest humanitarian crisis of its history.
In this regard, its academic institutions have a significant potential in terms of sound
evaluation and determination of strategies. With a different narrative, the contribution
of the academy community is vital for the determination of the permanent resolution of
this human tragedy together with its historical, political, sociological, demographic, and
economic dimensions, for the determination of incomplete or well-functioning aspects
and to propose a long-term structural solution to decisionmakers. The importance
of this contribution is particularly evident in ensuring healthy integration of Syrians
into Turkish society. As noted in the relevant sections of this report, independent of
the permanent or transitory points of view, there is a need for very serious academic
research and policy proposals on integration of the Syrians living in our country in areas
such as economy, work, education, healthcare, sociocultural aspects, and so on.

Unfortunately, however, this guiding capacity of the academic world has not been yet
fully utilized. One of the major reasons for this is the limited number of academic
centers on refugees and migration in Türkiye. Indeed, there are only 24 universities that
have migration research centers among nearly 200 universities in Türkiye, and only very
few of them actively work. It is important to encourage academic institutions to conduct
on-site fieldwork and research that will guide policy makers. In particular, it is important
that immigration and/or refugee research centers be established in universities in cities
where large groups of refugees reside, that as much financial support as possible be
provided to such centers, and incentives for field work be developed.

Besides, the Turkish-Arab university to be established will contribute to relationships
with Arab countries and will contribute to a better mutual understanding of these two
communities and employment opportunities, particularly for academics from Syria.

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