Özet:

Cities and countries have established cultural, economic and political relations from very ancient history to the present day. The proximity of cultural similarities, common problems, similar dynamics and interests has prepared the ground for municipalities to cooperate with each other in national and international areas. Today, the brother-city practice, where local governments perform diplomatic activities in the international field, is the national and international partnership of municipalities. Particularly, partnerships between municipalities of different countries provide many benefits, such as local policy transfers and the internationalization of municipalities. The two ancient countries of the Middle East geography have shown many examples of fraternity, including the Turkish and Islamic Republic of Iran, which are not officially announced. In this study, the application of the brother city between the Erzurum Metropolitan Municipality and the Urumiye Municipality was studied by the quality analysis method. The study found that cultural, bureaucratic, political, literary and commercial relations were developed between these municipalities, which are a stop in the brother city journey of Turkey – although the process of becoming a brother city is long and tired. An important aspect of the findings of the study is that according to Urumiye Municipality officials, the level of administrative control of the central administration on local governments in Iran is higher than in Turkey.

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