The integration of 2.7 million Syrian refugees into Turkish society is a litmus test for the country's democracy. Visiting a refugee camp in Kilis earlier this month, President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan said he considered members of the audience brothers and sisters. He added that Turkey would grant citizenship to them if they wanted it. The president's remarks fueled a national debate about the future of Syrian refugees. Opposition leaders voiced their strong objections, as #IDontWantSyriansInMyCountry started trending on Twitter.

There are two important aspects to the debate: 1) Technical issues regarding the integration of refugees into Turkish society and 2) the emergence of Syrian refugees as a litmus test for Turkish democracy. The decision to grant citizenship to Syrian refugees is an effort by the government to break the current deadlock over the humanitarian crisis. Mixed signals coming from Europe, furthermore, compel Turkey to take additional steps to address the humanitarian crisis. With the Syrian civil war's end not in sight, there is a good chance that a large chunk of Syrian refugees will stay in Turkey for good.

With Syrian children born as refugees in Turkey enrolling in kindergarten, the authorities have no choice but to take urgent action regarding social integration. We cannot move forward with temporary solutions. In order to prevent the ghettoization of Syrians, Turkey must take the necessary steps to provide them with education and employment without further delay.

At this point, Turkey does not grant refugee status to Syrian asylum seekers due to a geographical reservation it made to the 1951 Geneva Convention. Had the country granted refugee status to them, it would entail a number of additional responsibilities for Turkey including financial assistance, education and employment.

In this sense, the decision to grant citizenship to Syrian refugees represents the next step after the temporary protection regime - which has been in place for several years. In fact, the new effort kicked off with the February 2016 decision by the Council of Ministers to declare Syrian refugees eligible for work permits. Over the past months, significant progress has been made to improve the living standards of some 400,000 Syrian nationals who worked illegally in Turkey. Now, the country has moved to make it possible for Syrians, who own more than 40,000 companies in Turkey, to become naturalized citizens in an effort to promote their integration into Turkish society.

The citizenship debate, furthermore, relates to a broader discussion about the ways in which Turkey defines itself. The decision to grant citizenship to Syrian refugees exceeds the limits of humanitarian relief and focuses on the future of Syrians in Turkey as a long-term political question. Unsurprisingly, the opposition's initial response was to accuse President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan of going after 1.5 million additional votes in an effort to reform the constitution and create a presidential system. The Republican People's Party (CHP) and the Peoples' Democratic Party (HDP), meanwhile, claimed that the president would like to settle Syrian refugees in predominantly Kurdish and Alevi provinces. Having pledged to send Syrian refugees "back to their country," CHP Chairman Kemal Kılıçdaroğlu will presumably come up with a new set of racist arguments against the naturalization of Syrian refugees. Within hours of the announcement, people have argued that "Syrians will have a lot of children to increase their numbers to 20 million within the next decade. Others maintained that they would soon ask for Arabic-language schools and call for autonomy in Hatay. The HDP base, meanwhile, has already started accusing Syrian refugees of being DAESH members.

Moving forward, the Syrian citizenship debate will serve as a litmus test for Turkish democracy. If the opposition's obsession with President Erdoğan is any indication, it won't take long for them to test the limits of xenophobia and racism.