Abstract In spite of the fact that human rights appear, based on proclamations made by EU representatives, to be of critical importance in the EU's negotiations with Turkey, human rights reform has not been a primary target of pre-accession aid to Turkey. Why is human rights reform not a central priority in the EU's allocation of aid in this case? First, Commission representatives and Members of the European Parliament disagree over the relative importance of the status of human rights in the pre-accession reform process. Second, the format of the aid allocation process magnifies inconsistencies in the EU's approach to human rights reform.