He received his LL.B. from Istanbul University in 1986, his LL.M. from the University of London in 1990, an M.A. from Istanbul University in 1991 and a J.D. from the University of Bremen in 1997. He was awarded the prize for best doctoral study of the year in the field of social sciences at the University of Bremen. He has been a research fellow at Istanbul University and the University of Bremen and has also been a lecturer at Koc University. Mr. Budak has authored and edited multiple publications, and speaks Turkish, English and German.