FINANCIALIZATION OF THE RENEWABLE ENERGY TRANSITION AND ITS POLITICAL AND SOCIAL IMPACTS: AKHISAR CASE

2023-10-16
Deveci, Abdulkadir
The exacerbating adverse effects of the climate crisis drive the political and economic actors to maneuver from the accustomed political and economic behaviors and attitudes, especially in the last two decades. Energy transition as a seventh sustainable development goal of the United Nations becomes one of the solutions offered by those actors. This thesis focuses on the financialization of the renewable energy transition and its political and social effects at the global, national, and local levels. Firstly, the thesis elucidates how the global paradigm shift in the energy transition parallels neoliberal structuring. Secondly, the effects of financialization on emerging countries and the Turkish political economy between 1980 and today are discussed with a literature review. Thirdly, the Turkish energy transition path is analyzed, and the impacts of financialization on the policy-making process are elaborated with a discursive analysis of the parliamentary minutes' records from 1996 to July 2023. Fourthly, the results of the social impact assessment of the solar energy transition process are conducted through semi-structured interviews with different sectors, and the local municipality in the Akhisar region is analyzed to see the impacts of the financialization of energy transition at the local level. The impacts at different geographical levels are discussed together in the conclusion chapter.
Citation Formats
A. Deveci, “FINANCIALIZATION OF THE RENEWABLE ENERGY TRANSITION AND ITS POLITICAL AND SOCIAL IMPACTS: AKHISAR CASE,” M.S. - Master of Science, Middle East Technical University, 2023.