ISLAM AND TURKISH NATIONALIDENTITY: A REAPPRAISAL

Dav WAXMAN

ABSTRACT

The rise of Islamism in Turkey has bcen widely viewed as the primarythreat to the prevailing official conception of Turkish national identity.According to many observers it Iies at the heart of Turkey's identity crisis.This view, however, greatly oversimplifies the relationship betweenKemalist nationalism and Islam. We need to radically revise the prevalentunderstanding of Turkish nationalism as a form of sccular nationalism, andthe relationship between Turkish national identity and Islam. This artieleargues that Islam plays a pivotal role in constituting Turkish nationalidentity and that it has gradually been accommodated within the officialboundaries of Turkish nationalism. By analyzing the relationship betweenIslam and Turkish national identity and nationalism, we are able to betterassess the so-called Islamist challenge in Turkey. The debate betweenIslamists and sccularists in Turkey is about the importance, not theexistence, of Islam in shaping Turkish national identity, and the policyimplications of this. The rise of political Islam in Turkey, therefore, doesnot necessarily signal the demise of Turkish nationalism or the crisis ofTurkish national identity.

KEYWORDS

Turkey, Islam, Islamism, Secularism, Nationalism, National Identity,Identity Crisis, Kemalism.

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ı. Introduction: A Turkish Identity Crisis?

[VOL. XXX

The nature of Turkish national identity, indeed the veryexistence of Turkish national identity, lies at the heart ofdiscussions of the Turkish Republic both past and presenl. ıDomestic and foreign observers have consistently raised thequestion of Turkey's national identity since the establishment ofthe Republic in 1923, frequently to the frustration of many Turksin offıcial positions who wish to focus on more concrete and lesscontroversial matters. Despite the objections of Turkishoffıcialdom, however, the identity question has refused to go away.it has reared its troublcsome head again and again, representing apersistent theme of journalistic and academic analysis of modemTurkey.2 Do the Turks reaııy have a uniform national identity, andif so what is it? Do Turks see themselves as members of the West orEast? As Europeans or Middle Eastemers? As Turks first orMuslims first? Do the Turks reaııy constitute anation, or are theymerely an aggregation of disparate and heterogeneous groups?3What place does religion and ethnicity have in Turkish nationalidentity? These are some of the common questions frequentlyasked by Turks themselves as weıı as outside observers. Yet theypermit no easy answer. Any response invariably raises a host offurther questions and often fierce controversy. Such questions donot easily lend themselves to the mcthodological tools of the socialsciences. Measurement and testing appear woefully inadequate incapturing the ambiguous, slippery and shifting nature of national

ıAccording to the Turkish scholar Berdal Aral, "It is misleading to speak ofTurkey as though it represents a single, coherent entity". Berdal Aral,"Turkey's Insecure Identity from Lhe Perspective of Nationalism",Mediterranean Quarterly, WinLer 1997, p. 80.

2The Financial Times, for example, described Turkey as a "country caughtbetwccn two continents, beLween LwOtradiLions, two trends of history".Financial Times, "Survey of Turkey", 23 May 1998, p. 4.

3Aral , Turkey's Insecure Identity, p. 79, wriLes: "Although Turkey has madegreat strides Laward creating a naLional idcnLiLyamong various eLhnic andculLural groups, iL is sLiıı difficulL to speak of a Turkish na tion thatrepresenLs some kind of cohcrcnL, unificd, and homogeneous coııecLiviLyofindivid.!1als". Emphasis in original.

2000] ISLAM AND TIJRKlSH NATIONAL IDENTITY 3

identity. Studying national identity is, in the words of onepractitioner, "a messy business".4

The question of Turkish national identity has orten beenframed in terms of an identHy crisis.5 According to one author:"For the last 250 years the Turkish nation has undergone anidentity crisis of tremendous proportions ... ".6 Another states that:"Few countries in the modem period have had their identitycontested as bitterly and interpreted as variousIy as the RepubIic ofTurkey".7 The idea that Turks suffer from an identHy crisis hasnow gained such wide currency in press and academic circIes thatTurkish Ieaders reguIarIy address the issue in their speeches andwritings. For instancc, in a speech in Washington DC on ApriI 271999, Turkish President Suleyman Demirel declared:

We have a multiple cultural heritage and in same ways a multipleidentity. As individuals, idenlity cannot be summed up in one word. Itis the same for our nalion's identity. We certainly do not have, asoutsiders sametimes claim, an identity crisis. Turkeyand the Turksare very conscious of their idenliıy and heritage. Ordinary people inTurkey do not see ıhemselves as living in a land tom betwecn east andwest. They relish varietyand they see their country as a land emichedby a multiple heritage.8

4Michael Barnett, Paper delivered at international conference on "Identities inTransition from War to Peace", The Leonard Davis Institute forInternational Relations, The Hebrew University, JerusaIem, December 1,1999.

5See for instancc, Dov Waxman, Turkey's Idenlily Crises: Domesıic Discordand Foreign Policy, Conl1ict Studies 311, Research Institute for the Studyof Conflict and Terrorism, LeamingLOn Spa., UK, 1998.60zay Mehmet, Islamic Idenlily and Developmenı: Sıudies on ıhe IslamicPeriphery, Routledge, London and New York, 1990, "Privatizing theTurkish Economy", ch.ıo, p. 214.

7Hakan M. Yavuz, "Turkish Idenliıy and Foreign Policy in Rux: The Riseof Neo-Oııomanism", Criıique, Spring 1998, p. 19.

8H. E. Süleyman Demirel, Presidenı of the Republic of Turkey, Speechdelivered lo The Washington Insıiıute for Near Eası Policy, WashingtonDC, April 27, 1999. (hııp://www.washingtoninstitute.org/media/demirel].htm. See also Turgut Özal, Turkey in Europe and Europe in Turkey,Ankara, Republic of Turkey, Ministry of Foreign Affairs,[http://www.mfa.gov.tr/grupe/eg/eg05/20.htm] .

4 THETUR~SHYEARBOOK [VOL. XXX

Nar is this arecent dcvelopment, simply a product of thegeneral preoccupation with issues of cultura! identity influenced bythe current postmodernist zeitgeist. Over twcnty years ago, afonner Turkish ambassador wrote that: "Taday many peoplewonder whether Turkey is suffering from an identity crisis?"; andanather expressed his exasperation at the continued discussion ofTurkey's "search for identity", stating: "I think it is time for Turkeyto say 'Turkey is Turkey' ...Turkey will have much to gain bysaying her ambiguous idcntity is an identity in itself, which is thatof a country between two worlds and there are advantages to drawfrom that"9. The rhetorical proclamations and protestations ofTurkish officia!s have, however, failcd to satisfy skeptical observers.If anything, rather than putting the issuc to rest, their numerousstatements have only served to place the issue of Turkish identityhigher on the political agenda.

This article will therefore make some observations on theplace of Islam in the official construction and articulation ofTurkish national identity. It will be argued that Islam plays apivotal role in constituting Turkish national identity. As well asstrongly infonning Turkish national identity, Islam has alsagradually and, at times, grudgingly, been accommodated within theofficial boundaries of Turkish nationalism.IO By analyzing therelatianship between Islam and Turkish national identity andnationalism, wc would also be able to better assess the so-calledIslamist challenge in Turkey. The rise of Islamism in Turkeyduring the 1980s and 1990s has been widely viewed as the primarythreat to the prevailing offıcial conception of Turkish nationalidentity. According to many observers it lies at the heart ofTurkey's identity crisis.ll Such an analysis often implicitly posits adichotomous and essentially adversarial relatianship between

9Seyfi Taşhan, "Turkeyand the West", Foreign Policy (Ankara), Vol. VII,No. 1-2, 1978, p. 7; Mümtaz Soysal, "Discussion on 'Turkey betweenEurope and the Middle East"', Foreign Policy (Ankara), Vol. VIII, No. 3-4,1980, p. 27. ,

IOln the words of Hugh Poulton, "Since AtaLürk'stime, Turkey has evolvedinto more of a Sunni staLe,where Sunni Islam is seen by manyas anessential component of 'Turkishness"'. Hugh Paulton, Top fiat, GreyWolf and Crescent: Turkish Nationalism and the Turkish Republic,London, Hurst & Co., 1997, p. 283.

IIWaxman, Turkey's Identity Crises, p. 16.

2000] ISLAMANDTIJRKlSHNATIONALIDENTTIY 5

secular Kemalist nationalism and Islam. The project of Kemalistnation-building is seen as antithetical to Islam, and the fortunes ofboth are tied up in a "zero-sum game", whereby the success ofKemalist nationalism entails the diminution of Islam, and viceversa. Such a characterization, however, greatly over-simplifıes therelationship between Kemalist nationalism and Islam. It is thecontentian of this article that the process that has been occurringhas not simply been one of the rise of Islamism and theconcomitant decline of Kemalist nationalism. Rather, it is a dualprocess involving the Islamization of Turkish nationalism, and thenationalization of Islam, or in the words of Turkish scholar BülentAras, the "construction of a Turkish st yle of Islam and theIslamization of the Turkish nationalist ideology" .12 The 1980sonly marked the escalation of this process, which was in factunderway from the very beginning of the Turkish Republic.

2. Scholarly Treatment of the Construction of TurkishNational Identity

Most scholars analyze the development of Turkish nationalidentity within the broader rubric of Turkish modemization, layingtheir emphasis upon formal, legislative reforms initiated by the so-called "state elite". There exists an overwhelming consensusamongst scholars of modern Turkey that Turkish modemizationand nation-building has largely been top-down, state-Ied, andelitisı. Hence, its characterization as a "project" rather than a"process", the latter impl ying a societally-generatcd movement.13

12Bülent Aras and Kemal Kirişçi, "Four Questions on Recent TurkishPolitics and Foreign Policy", Middle East Review of International Affairs,Vol. 2, No. i, March 1998. Similady, Yavuz, Turkish Identity andForeign Policy in Flux, p. 30, writes that: "Islam has bcen reinterpretedand reincorporated graduaIIy and subl1y into official Turkish nationalism.This process can be seen as an Islamizalion of Turkish nationalism, butalso as the Turkifıcation of the Islaroic tradition".

l3ln the words of Ayşe Kadıoğlu, "The process of Enlightenment in theWest became a project in the context of Turkish modemization". AyşeKadıoğlu, "Republican Epistemology and Islaroic Discourses in Turkey inthe 1990s", The Muslim World, Vol. LXXXVlll, No. i, January 1998, p.6. Similarly, Çağlar Keyder distinguishes between "modemization-from-above" and "modernization as a self-generating societal process".

6 THETUR~SHYEARBOOK [VOL. XXX

The "motor"" for Turkish modernization, it is agreed, has been thestate and its narrow governing clique.14

By extension, the state elite are see n as the architects ofTurkish national identity. As Hakan Yavuz writes: "Thedetermination of national identity, in particular af ter 1925, wasmade strictly at the level of the statist Republican elite andpointedly excluded the mass of society".lS Similarly, ÇağlarKeyder states that: "Turkish nationalism is an extreme example of asituation in which the masses remained silent partners and themodernizing elite did not attempt to accommodate popularsentiment...The masses in Turkey generally remained passiverecipients of the nationalist message propounded by the elites"16.

The outcome of the "silcnce of the masses" in articulatingTurkish national identity is that it is regardcd as a purely alien andartifıcial construct. "The question of national idcntity [in Turkey]",

According to Keyder, the difference is that in the case of the former, themodernizers are agenL'>who wield state power and maintain their interests.Çağlar Keyder, "Whither the Project of Modernity? Turkey in the 199Os",in Sibel Bozdoğan and Reşat Kasaba (cds.), Reıhinking Moderniıy andNaıional Idenıily in Turkey, Seaııle, University of Washington Press,1997, p. 39.

14Employing Ellen Trimberger's thesis conceming the autonomy ofrevolutionary groups and its relationship to modernization projects (see"RevolUlion from Above: Military Bureaucraıs and Developmenı inEgypı, Peru, Turkey, and Japan," New Brunswick, New lersey,Transaction Books, 1977), Keyder, ibid., argues that due to the Ottomanstate tradition, the absence of large landowners, and the liquidation of thedomestic bourgeoisie (due to the Young Turks' wartime economicnationalization policies, the War of Independence, and the expulsion of theChristian minoritİes from Turkey upon independence), the newburcaucratic staLCelite enjoyed a large degree of autonomy and faced litt1edomestic 0pposİtion. Marcover, the new native bourgeoisie that didemerge was beholden to the bureaucratic elite and the statist economicpolicies from which it had been created (i.e. "Nationalistdevelopmentalism" - etatism in the interwar years and the import-substitution policy after World War Two).

lSYavuz, Turkish Idenıity and Foreign Policy in Flux, p. 25.16Keyder, Whiıher ıhe Projecı of Modernily, p. 43, in fact identifies the gap

betwecn the modernizing elites and the "silent masses" a,>the central axisof modern Turkish history.

2000] ISLAM AND 11JRKISH NATIONAL IDENTITY 7

writes Ayşe Kadıoğlu, "was hardly posed as 'Who are the Turks?',but rather as 'Who and/or how are the Turks going to be?'. Thelatter question was clearly more prevalent throughout Turkishhistory indicating the manufactured character of the RepublicanTurkish identityıl. 17 According to this argument, the manufacturedand artificial character of Turkish national identity accounts for itsfailure to finnly take root within large sections of Turkish society.Thus, Turkey's supposed idenLİty crisis stems from the manner inwhich Turkish national identity was constructed. The Republicanstate elite's condescending and insensitive stance towards popularidentifications and sentiment is held to be responsible for theidentity crisis that has continued to afOict Turkey. "RepublicanTurkish identityıl was too narrowly-based, too synthetic, toosuperficial, to provide a viable and sustainable national identity forthe citizens of the new Turkish republic.IS

This argument however should not be carried too far.Although the state elite have consistently becn the primary agentsin the construction of Turkish national identity, they havenonethelcss had to pay attention to the characteristics of theRepublic's populaıion. Turkish national identity, like all nationalidentities, could not be conslructcd entirely in a vacuum, so tospeak, whatever the wishes of the state elite might have been. TheTurkish state elite necessarily had to fashion the new Turkishnational identity in relatian to their society. Of course, this does notmean that they willingly accommodated the needs and aspirationsof Turkish society in all iıs diversity. Quite the contrary, their self-declared mission was to revolutionize the society for the good of

17Ayşe Kadıoğlu, "The Paradox of Turkish Naıionalism and theConslrucıion of Official Idcntity", in Sylvia Kedourie (ed.), Turkey:Identily, Democracy, Politics, London, Frank Cass, ı998, p. ı77.

ISAs Keyder, Whither the Project of Modernity?, p. 45, wriles: "The mainproblem with Turkish nationalisı hisıoriography was ıhaı iı did not resulıfrom a negoıiaLion belween whaı ıhe naıionalisı elites wcre trying loachicvc and whaı could have molivaıed thc masses lo participate, nor did ilcomc lO lerms with lhe cvenls thaı loomed largesı in the expcrience of theparticipanıs", i.c. the cxpulsion and exchange of the Greek and Armeniansubjecıs of the empire. "Thus iı became possible for ıhe nationalisı cliıesıo lrcal the conSlruction of hisıory and national idenlily in an enlİrelyİnslrumenlal fashion; ıhe version thcy eventually seıLicd on was woefullydeficİent İn ils accommodalİon of popular elemenl,>."

8 THETUR~SHYEARBOOK [VOL. XXX

the people. Yet they did not trust Turkish society to take part in itsown revolution. Instead they favored a paternalistic state, in whichauthoritarianism was exercised in the name of future demoeracy."The function of the Kemalist state was not that of an arbiterbetween conflicting classes and other social groups; its mainfunction was to formuIate and implement 'correet' politiealdecisions for the benefıt of the nation as a whole". ı9

The state was thus endowed with the task of protecting theenvisaged ideal "civilized" nation against the encroaehments andassertions of the "barbarians" within. "The Republican state whichfostered a Jaeobin mentality. led to the creation of an official,monolithic. absolute Turkish identity cither by supprcssing or byignoring the multiple identities that came to be imprisoned in theperiphery".20 But these multiple idcntitics rcfused to go away, thereal people could not be banishcd and the state elite has beencontinually confronted with popular reaction. foreing the m tomake aceommodations to demoeratic and cultural aspirations.Turkish national identity is an outeome of these accommodations,a product of the perpetual negotiations between the state andsociety. This is most c1early apparent when one looks at Islam'srole in the construction and artieulation of Turkish nationalidentity.

3. Kemalist Nationalism, Islam and Turkish NationalIdentity

In the eyes of many observers of the Turkish Republic, bothpast and present. Kemalism was hostile to Islam and sought toreplace the religious identification hitherto prevalent amongst theTurkish population with a national idcntifieation. Perceiving Islamas a reaetionary and potentially threatening force which couldobstruct the modernization and nation-building bui1ding theyenvisaged for the new Turkish Rcpublic. the Kemalists allegedlysought to banish Islam from the public sphere and displaee it in theprivate sphere through an attachment to seeular Turkishnationalism. The new Turkish national identity they sought to

19Aral. Turkey's Insecure Identily, p. 80.20Kadıoğlu, The Paradox o/Turkish Nationalism, p. 192.

2000) ISLAM AND TIJRKISH NATIONAL IDENTITY 9

instill was to be thoroughly modem, free of any archaic religiouscomponents. The official Kemalist conception of the nation wasclearly expressed by Recep Pekcr, the secretary of the RPP, at auniversity conference in 1931:

We consider as ours all those of our cİlİzens who live among us, whobelong political1y and social1y to the Turkish nation and amongwhom ideas and feclings such as 'Kurdism,' 'Circassianism' and even'Lazism' and 'Pomakism' have becn implanted. We dcem it our duty tobanish, by sincere efforts, those false conceptions, which are thelegacy of an absolutist regime and ıhe product of long-standinghistorical oppression. The scientific lruth of today does not allow anindependent exislence for anation of sevemi hundred thousand.or evenof a million individuals ...We want to state just as sincerely ouropinion regarding our Jewish or Christian compalriots. Our partyconsiders these compalriots as absolutely Turkish insofar as theybclong to our communily of language and ideal.21

Despite this offıcia] rhetoric, howevcr, it was not real]y thecase that Kemalist nationalism was free of religious components.Whilst the Kemalists eliminated Islam from their offıcial definitionof the nation, in practice, influenced by the ideas of Ziya Gökalpand other pre-war Ottoman intellectuals, they elaborated a kind of"Turkified Islam" which they hoped would strengthen Turkishnational identity.22

Throughout the Republie's history, Kemalist nationalism hasmaintained a complex and dynamic strategie relationship withIslam. During the War of Independenee between 1919-1922, theKemalist elite used Islamie discourse to boister its popularIcgitimaey and unify the loeal Anatolian notables, religious leaders,and peasantry. For example, the founding charters of the TurkishRepublie and the dec1arations of the conferenees in Erzurum (July1919) and Sivas (September 1919), referred to those "Muslims whoform one nation" or to "all Islamie elements of the population",whilst the "Turkish nation" was hardly mentioncd. Thereafter, in

2lQuoted in Paul Dumonı, "The Origins of Kemalist Ideology", in Jacob M.Landau (ed.), Aıa/ürk and /he ModerniZalion of Turkey, Bauldcr, Co.,Westview Press, 1984, ch.3, p. 29.

22lbid., p. 30. ..," .... " ..." ..."."'".,, ..... 0 •• " ••••• "" •• ,JO •••••• ~.-.

10 THE TURKISH YEARBOOK [VOL. XXX

constructing Turkish national identity, the Kemalists incorporatedIslamic elements creating a nationalized Islam.23

The fact that Islam informed Turkish national identity evenduring the heyday of Kemalism (1923-1950) is revealed inRepublican regulations concerning immigration and naturalizationwhich reflected the close association between Islam and Republicannational identity. Artiele 4 of the Law of Settlement, for instance,stated that "only those who belong to Turkish ethnicity andculture" would be permitted LOseLlle permanently in Turkey. Thegovernment regarded Albanians, Bosnians, Torbes, Pomaks, andMontenegrian Muslims as culturally "Turks" and helped them re-settle in Turkey. By contrast, the Gagauz Turks of Moldava, whohad converted to Orthodox Christianity, were not considered to beculturally Turkish. As Ali Haydar, a prominent exponent of secularTurkish nationalism, wrote in 1926, "it is impossible to make non-Muslims sineere Turkish citizens" .24

Perhaps the elearest indication of ısıamos role in constitutingTurkish national identity was the massiye "population exchange"between Turkeyand Greece carried out from 1923 to 1930involving almost two millian people. Religion, rather than ethnicityor language, was the criterion for differentiating populations andhence determining their future nationality. "What took place",writes Bernard Lewis, "was not an exchange of Greeks and Turks,but rather an exchange of Greek Orthodox Christians and OttomanMuslims. A Western observer, accusLOmed to a different system ofsocial and national classifıcation, might even conelude that this wasno repatriation at all, but two deportations into exile of ChristianTurks LO Greccc, and of Muslim Greeks to Turkey" .25 Thus,according to Kemal Karpat, "A student of contemporary TurkishcuIturc and society is bound to conclude that the Turkish nation is

231n pursuit of this aim Mustafa Kemal ordered the call to prayer in allmosques to be in Turkish, not Arabic, and wanted the Koran to betranslated ima Turkish (funds for the laııer were voted by the NationalAssembly in 1926 although the project ulıimaıely failed). Poulton, TopHat, Grey Wolf and Crescent, p. 115.

24Quoted in Yavuz, Turkish Iden/ily and Foreign Policy in Flux, p. 26.25Bemard Lewis, The Emergence of Modern Turkey, London, Oxford, New

_ . _ York, Oxford University Press, second editian, 1968, p. 355.

2000) ISLAMANDTURKISHNATIONALIDENTITY 11

in some ways an extension of the Muslim nation that emerged outof the Muslim millet in the nineteenth century". 26

Non-Muslim minorities in the Republic, a1though accordedspccial status under the terms of the 1923 Lausanne Treaty, of tenfaced discrimination and prejudice.27 The most notorious exampleof official discrimination against non-Muslim citizens of theRepublic was the Capital Tax of 11 November 1942. Religion andethnicity were the criteria that dctermined how much tax a personhad to pay, with non-Muslim s paying up to ten times as much asMuslims. Defaulters, almost aıı of who m were Greeks, Jews andArmenians, were deported to labor camps where conditions wereharsh and mortality rates high. This measure came amidst a sharprise in anti-Semitic and anti-minority feeling in Turkey during theperiod 1941-1943.28 "At a fundamental level, then, Turkishidentity, even during the Republican period could not escape itsreligious basis" .29 This continued and intensified with the

26Kemal Karpaı, "The Oııoman Eıhnic and Confessional Legacy in lheMiddle Eası", in Milton J. Esman and Itarnar Rabinovich (cds.), Eıhnicity,Pluralism, and the Sw/e in the Middle East, Ithaca and London, ComeııUniversity Press, 1988, ch. 3, pp. 51-52.

27Prejudice against non-Muslim Turks continues lo ıhis day in Turkey. Forinstance, in a sıudy carried out in 1999, of more than 2000 respondenlSfrom differenı regions of Turkey revealcd high levels of prejudice by Turksagainst Armenians, Greeks, lews and Gypsies. Anoıher sıudy found ıhat61 percenı of respündenls would noı wanl lO have Chrisıian neighbors.Cited in Nida Bikmen, Nalionalldentity and Ethnic Prejudice in a TurkishSample, unpublished ıhesis, Boğaziçi Universiıy, Istanbul, 1999, p. 55.

28Poulıon, Top Haı, Grey Wolf and Crescenı, pp. 117-119. Moreover,official anLİ-Semiıic and anli-minorily policies were noı limiled to thisshort period. During the preceding decade of the 1930s, a number of anLİ-Jewish measures were inlroduced and an anti-lewish campaign wasorchesıraled by the Turkish press. For example, a 1934 Law of Seıılement(law 25 ıo) regulaıing lhe disıribuıion and seulement of Turkey'spopulation, forecd the removal of ıhe historic lewish communities ofEdirne and ıhe SlrailS zone. These inslances conlradict ıhe common daimmade by Turkish officials to lewish and Israeli audiences that there hasnever been anıi-Semiıism in lhe hisıory of ıhe Turkish Republic or ilSpredecessor, ıhe Oııoman Empire. Such inslances of anti-Semiıism,however, paH in comparison to ıhose occurring in continenlal Europe atlhe time.

29Yavuz, Turkish Idenıily and Foreign Policy in Flux, p. 26.

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establislunent of multiparty democracy after World War II. Turkishpoliticians, under the pressure to compete for yotes, made furtherconcessions to the religious masses and increasingly drew uponIslamic symbols and rhetoric in mobilizing the Turkish electorate.Thus, according to one scholar of Turkish nationalism: "In thedecades after 1950, Sunni Islam increasingly became integratedİnto the state nationalist ideology".30

The foregoing analysis, therefore, suggests that we need toradically revise the prevalent understanding of Turkish nationalismas a form of secular nationalism, and the relationship betweenTurkish national identity and Islam.3 ı Scholarly accounts ofmodem Turkey frequently make references to secular Turkishnationalism and posit an antagonistic relationship between Islamand Turkish nationalism and national identity. Metin Heper, forinstance, writes that: "...through the mass media, People's Houses(1932-54), flag saluting, national anthem singing, state parades andthe like, there has been a continuing and consistent socializationaimed at producing a Turkish rather than a Muslim identity".32The implication here is that the construction of a Turkish identityundermined and displaced Muslim identities, the two identitiesbeing antagonistic and thus unable to co-e xist. At the root of suchpostulated antagonism lies the di fferent communities to whichIslam and nationalism appeaL. Whereas nationalism regards thenation as the ideal form of social and political community, and the

30Poulton, Top Haı, Grey Wolf and Crescenl, p. 318.31We should also revise how we understand secularism, specifically by

contextualizing and hisıoricizing the concepı. As Andrew Davison wriıes:"What is secular, what may be meanl by secularism and its different modesin modernily, and, consequently, in ıhe praetiees, relations, andinstiıuıions associated with seeularism are historieally eontested andvarious". Andrew Davison, Secularism and Revivalism in Turkey: AHermeneuıic Reconsideralion, New Haven & London, Yale UniversityPress, 1998, p. 47.

32Metin Heper, "PoliLİcal Culture as a Dimension of Compatibility", inMetin Hepcr, Ayşe Öncü and Heinz Kramer (cds.), Turkeyand the West:Changing Politica/ and Culıura/ Ideniilies, London, New York, i. B.Tauris & Co., 1993, eh.l, p. 9. Heper, pp. 9-10, also eites a 1960ssurvey of workers in a textile faetory in ızmir, in whieh 50.3 percentanswered "Turks" and only 37.5 percent answered "Muslims" in responseto the question "How do you see yourselves?".

2000) ISlAM AND TIJRKlSH NATIONAL IDENlTrY 13

basis of political legitimacy; Islam appeals to the transnationalcommunity of the Islamic faithful (the Umma) and conccives of itas the ideal form of social, political and religious community.Nationalism confers political legitimacy upon the nationalcommunity, whilst Islam confers political legitimacy upon thereligious community. In short, Islam's transnational visioncontradicts nationalism's national vision.

This argument, however, relies upon an "Orientalist"understanding of Islam which presents it as an essential1yunchanging, static, body of ideas and practices. Thetransnationalism of Islam is rooted in its doctrinal core; its hostilityto nationalism is thus apriori, inherent in its very nature. it depictsIslamic identi ty as singular, monolithic and inflexible, unable toaccommodate nationalist demands and aspirations. This"Orientalist" reading of Islam has been largely discredited due tothe numerous critiques leveled at it over the years. It is notnecessary to re-hash these critiques here, suffice to say that Islamand Islamic identity cannot be treated in such a simplistic andreductionist manner, instead they must be contextualized andhistoricized. As Yavuz argues, "the significance of Islamic politicalconsciousness, as a forın of macro-identity, must be understood asa contextual, relational, and situational phenomenon".33 Islamicidentity, like all identities, is fluid, flexible, and subject to canstantrevision.34 it does not necessarily "crowd out" other identities,instead, Islamic identity "can function separately or provide aframework for the negotiation of other identities".35 Theboundaries between Islamic identity and national and/or ethnicidentities, therefore, are not fixed but flexible. As such, Islamicidentity can often inforın and promote nationalism and nationalidentity. Indecd, Islamic identHy has been frequently nationalized.

33Hakan M. Yavuz, "The Patterns of Political Islamie Identity: Dynamies ofNational and Transnational Loyalties and Identities", Central AsianSurvey, Vol. 14, No. 3, 1995, p. 342.

34An Islamic political identity in Turkey is far from monolithie, instead it isbeing continually eontested by various actors. Yavuz states that, "Theprocess of forming an Islamic political identity has become a terrain forcompetition among many diverse Sufi orders, Islamic inteııectual circles,and institutions". Yavuz, Turkish Idenıity and Foreign Policy in Flux, p.22.

35Yavuz, The Pa/lerns of Poliıicallslamic Idenlily, p. 346.

14 THE TURKISH YEARBOOK [VOL. XXX

This is certainly the case with Turkish national identity. There is agreat degree of fluidity between Islamic and nationalist identities inTurkey.36 The categories of Islam and the Turkish nation are notmutually exclusiye, they often overlap in practice. Thus BernardLewis concluded over thirty years ago in his now classic text, TheEmergence of Modern Turkey, "After a century of Westernization,Turkey has undergone immense changes ...But the deepest Islamicroots of Turkish life and culture are still alive, and the ultimateidentity of Turk and Muslim in Turkey is still unchallenged".37Turkish scholar ılter Turan concurs with this view in his analysis ofthe role of Islam in Turkey's political eulture. Posing the question:"Has a political community emerged in Turkey, with memberswhose religious eharaeteristics in no way affect theirmembership?"; he answers that whilst this is indeed the case at theofficial legal level, at the behavioral level it is not. Non-Muslims,Turan claims, are usually referred to as "Turkish citizens" or a"minority pcrson", but not as a "Turk". According to Turan: "'Turk'designates an ethno-rcligious charaeteristic of the politicalcommunity, an atıribute whieh is not found among some of thecitizens, albeit very few".38 Islam is thus a central component in thedefinition of a "Turk".

This fact has been incrcasingly reeognized in Turkey inrecent decades. A major reason for this has been the changingcompasitian of the Turkish elite, and specifically the emergence ofa more Islamically-oriented elite. This, in tum, was the result of themassiye expansion of religious edueation in Turkey since the1970s. For instanee, thcre were 72 imam-hatip sehools in 1970,

36Chris Houston, "Islamic Solutions to the Kurdish Problem: LateRendezvous or Il1egitimateShortcut?", New Perspectives on Turkey, Vol.16, Spring 1997, p. 5.

37Bemard Lcwis, The Emergence of Modern Turkey, p. 424.381IterTuran, "Religian and Political Culture in Turkey", in Richard Tapper

(ed.), Islam in Modern Turkey: Religion, Politics and Literature in aSecular S/Qte, London and New York, ı. B. Tauris & Co., 1991, ch. 2,pp. 37-38. Marcover, Turan, p. 39, claims that although only Muslimsare designmed Turks, this is irrespective of Lheirreligiosity: "Ironicaııy, anagnostic or an atheist may qualify as a 'Muslim' if he is of an 'Islamic'background".

2000) ISLAM AND TIJRKlSH NATIONAL IDENfITY 15

374 in 1980, and 389 in 1992.39 By 1997, there were 561 imam-hatip schools with 492,809 students.40 The vast majority of thegraduates of these schools did not go on to bccome imams orhatips, instead many went on to study at university. The parallelexpansion of higher education during this time therefore producedincreasing numbers of religiously-oriented university students,especially in the fields of political science and publicadministration. For instance, in 1987, 40 per cent of AnkaraUniversity intakes for public administration department weregraduates from imam-hatip schools. By 1992, this figure had risento an astonishing 60 per cent.41 Many of the graduates of imam-hatip school s, most of whom came from middle or lower classfamilies, thus increasingly entered the state bureaucracy. "As aresult of the entry of these new graduates, the Turkish secular elitelost its fonner dominance and coherence in political affairs".42

Many also went on to attain political power as Islamists in the1980s and 1990s entering the Islamist Welfare Party (e.g. themayor of Istanbul, Recep Tayip Erdoğan), as well as the officiallysecular center-right parties, the Motherland Party and the True PathParty.43 They also entered the ranks of business, bccoming the so-called "AnatoHan tigers" of the Iate 1980s and 1990s, and formingon May 5, 1990, the Association of the Independent Industrialists

39Sami Zubaida, "Turkish Islam and National Identity", Middle East Report,April-June, 1996, p. 13.

40Yavuz, Turkish Identity and Foreign Policy in Flux, p. 32. Of these 561schoals, only 37 had been funded by the state, suggesting the effectiyeretreat of the state in the crucial field of religious education. The state didhowever prevent a furLher200 privately-funded imam-hatip schools fromopening.

41Jeremy Salt, "Nationalism and the Rise of Muslim Sentiment in Turkey",Middle Eastem Studies, Vol. 31, No. I, January 1995, p. 19.

42Yavuz, Turkish Identity and Foreign Policy in Flux, p. 32.43The True Path Party and the Motherland Party boıh contain significant

Islamist elemenıs, inc\uding depuıies in parliamenL Thus iı would bewrong lo regard the Welfare Parıy as lhe sok political representative ofTurkey's IslamislS.As Zubaida writes: "The RP, while an openly Islamistparty, does not enjoy a monopoly on Islam in the political arena".Zubaida, Turkish Islam and Nationalldentity, p. ll.

16 THETU~SHYEARBOOK [VOL. XXX

and Businessmen (MUSIAD).44 Given the consistently dominantrole played by elites, throughout the Turkish Republic as well theOttoman Empire, the significance of this development can hardlybe overestimated. In particular, since elites have been the primaryarticulators of Turkish national identity, the diversification of theTurkish elite had a pmfound effect upon Turkish national identity.The gradual infiltration of the new more Islamically-oriented eliteinto the higher echelons of government, economy, and cultureinfluenced not only state policies, but also the articulation ofTurkish national identity. According to Yavuz: "This group ispivotal in the re-examination of the Republican legacy and in theconstruction of a new Ottoman-Islamic identity".45 In the post-i980 period, therefore, a new discourse emerged among theTurkish elite, which placed greater reference on Turkey's Muslimcharacter. The new discourse of the Turkish elite departed fromtheir earlier "Kemalist-secular" discourse in its emphasis upon theIslamic identity of the Turks and the significance of religiousvalues.

Turgut Özal, as prime minister (1983-1991) and laterpresident (1991 - 1993), untiI his sudden death, epitomized the newIslamically-oriented elite which emerged in Turkey during the1980s. Özal was instrumental in forging many of the political,economic and cultural changes of the decade.46 Özal explicitlyemphasized Islam as an integral element of Turkish nationalidentity. As he stated:

44The Association of the Independent Industrialists and Businessmen(MUSIAD) was started by a group of young pro-Islamic businessmen inIstanbuL. The organization's membership reached 400 in 1991, 1700 by1993, and 3000 in 1998. Its members' companies annual revenue in 1998was US$2.79 billion. it thus represents an increasingly powerful pressuregroup and coumerweight LO the secular-minded Turkish Industrialists andBusinessmen's Association (TUSIAD). Nilüfer Narıı, "The Rise of theIslamist Movement in Turkey", Middle East Review of InternationalAffairs, Vol. 3, No. 3, Septembcr 1999.

45Yavuz, Turkish Identity and Foreign Policy in Flux, p. 32.46Il should be pointcd out that not all of these changes were good. During

the 19805, as a resulı of Özal's economic liberalizaLİon policy, theunemployment rate inereascd, income differemials widened, and the lowerclasses share of GNP signifieanLly dcclincd.

2000] ISLAM AND TURKISH NATIONAL IDENTITY 17

What holds together, or rather brings together, our unity and ourcohesiveness is the fact that we are all citizens of the TurkishRepublic. This is the first point. Everybody who Iives in this land,everybody who was bom here and everybody within the boundaries ofthe Turkish Republic who is a citizen of this country is a first-cIasscitizen of this country with no distinction being made. Our state issecular. But what holds our nation together, what serves in a mostpowerful way in our national cohesiveness and what plays theessential role is Islam.47

Moreover, Özal attempted to personify the Turkish identityhe sought to promote amongst the population:

...Özal presented a public image of a statesman who was both adedicated Muslim and a member of the modem world, proving thatıhese identiLies are noı mutually excIusive. We might understand thisas an attempt to prove to ıhe subjects of lhe Turkish Kemalist statethat there is no necessary contradiction between being a Muslim and asubject of the secular republic, or between being a Muslim and havinga positive aııilude towards modem, i.e. Westemized life.48

This personal message was clearly conveyed by Özal whenhe wrote in his baok Turkey in Europe and Europe in Turkey:

The Turk is aware ıhat faiıh in itself docs not affect secularism, docsnot prevent him from being rational. In everyday life, there is nodifference in ıhis respeet between a European Christian and a TurkishMuslim. A synthesis has been realized bclwccn the West and Islam.This synıhesis has ended lhe idenLiıy crisis of the Turk. I am a'bcliever and open lo all kinds of innovaıions. Not having a problemof idenlily, I feci no need lo defend my own cullure, nor to attachmyself lo an ideology or an extremist naıionalism.49

47Quoted in Milliyet, 30 January 1989.48Günter Seufert and Petra Weyland, "National Events and the Struggle for

the Fixity of Meaning: A Comparison of ıhe Symbolic Dimensions of theFuneraı Services for Atalürk and Özal", New Perspectives on Turkey, Fall1994, Vol. 11, p. 95.

49Turgut Özal, Turkey in Europe and Europe in Turkey. Quoted in Nicoleand Hugh Pope, Turkey Unveiled: A History of Modern Turkey,Woodsıock and New York, The Overlook Press, 1997, pp. 170-171.

IS THETUR~SHYEARBOOK [VOL. XXX

The increased emphasis upon Islam as a central componentof Turkish national identity, however, was not solely the product ofTurgut Özal or the new Islamically-oriented elite of which he was amember. In fact, it was initially advanced in the beginning of the1980s by that supposed bastion of Kemalist secularism, the Turkishmilitary. In the wake of the September 1980 military coup, whichbrought to an end a decade of ideological polarization and risingpolitical violence, the military junta advocated what was termed the"Turkish-Islamic synthesis", whieh aimed at synthesizing Islam andTurkish nationalism, and promoting a "state-centered Turkish-Islamic consciousness".50 As Yavuz argues, "Through Islamizationof society, the coup leaders sought to engineer a new form ofdepo1iticized Turkish-Islamic eulture that would reunifysociety ... ".51 The "Turkish-Islamic synthesis" was fırst formulatedin the early 1970s by a group of right-wing Turkish intellectualswho were members of The Hearth of the Enlightened (AydınlarOcağı) organization formed on 14 May 1970.52 Concemed aboutthe spread of left-wing ideologies in Turkey, especially inuniversities, they sought to counteraet this trend by strengtheningright-wing nationalism.53 Since Turkey was an overwhelminglyMuslim country, they believed that this could be aecomplishedthrough reasserting the role of Islam in the secular TurkishRepublic, and fusing it with Turkish nationalism. The synthesis"aimed at an authoritarian but not an Islamic statc where re1igionwas seen as the essence of culture and social control, and shouldthus be fostered in the educatian system but not politicized".54This aim was later adopted by the leaders of the 1980 militarycoup. In order to propagate the "Turkish-Islamic synthesis", theyappointed Icading members of The Hearth of the Enlightened tokey positions in the state's cultural and edueational establishment

50Hakan M. Yavuz, "Political Islam and the Welfare (Refah) Party inTurkey", Comparaıive Poliıics, Vol. 30, No. 1, October 1997, p. 68.

51Ibid., p. 68.52This organization was itself an extension of The Club of ıhe Enlighıened

established by right-wing intellectuals in May 1962 in the more liberalelimate following the 1960 coup. See Poulton, Top Haı, Grey Wolf andCrescenı, pp. 179-181.

53They were thus natural supporters of Alparslan Türkeş's Nationalist ActionParty (MHP) and its brand of right-wing nationalism. Ibid., p. 180.

54Ibid., p. 184.

2000] ISLAM AND 11JRKlSH NATIONAL IDENTITY 19

(such as in the Turkish Radio and Television authority - TRT, theBoard of Higher Educatian Council and the Educatian Ministry).

Reacting to the penetration of Marxism in universitycampuses through the 1960s and 1970s, and the growth ofreligious educatian outside the state's control, educatian was theprimary sphere in which the "Turkish-Islamic synthesis" wasexpounded.55 In areport prepared for the military regime in 1983,the State Planning Organization suggested the reintegration ofIslamic values into public educatian in order to strengthen nationalunity.56 Turkey's military rulers, therefore, made religiouseducatian compulsory in elementary and secondary schools,enshrining it in the new Turkish constitution of 1982.57 Byactively promoting the study of Islam in the educational system,the military regime aimed to ensure state controlover Islamiceducation. In this way, Turkish youth would leam "offıcial Islam"rather than the "reactionary", "[undamentalist" variety. Moreover, inan effort to counter the numerous social, economic, political andethnic divisions that appearcd during the 1960s and 1970s,"official Islam" stressed Islam as the comman denominator amongthe various groups in the Turkish nation. Thus, it was the state eliteand state policy that helped bring about the shift of emphasis uponIslam as a central element of Turkish national identity. As such,"the recognition of Islam as an important part of national Turkishideology has planted the seeds for further Islamisation".58

55For an ouLline of Lhe educational syIlabus introduced by the militaryregime see Ibid., pp. 182-184.

56Yavuz, Turkish Identity and Foreign Policy in Flux, p. 29.57According to Article 24, educaLian in religion "shall be conducted under

state supervision and control. InstrucLion in religious culLure and moraleducation shall be compuIsory in the curricula of primary and secondaryschools. No one shaIl be aIlowed to exploit or abuse religion or religiousfeelings, or Lhings hel d sacred by religion in any manner whatsoever, forthe purpose of personal or political inOuence or even for partiaIly basingLhe fundamental social, economic, poliLical and legal order of the StaLe onreligious LeneLs". QuoLed in SaIL, Nationalism and the Rise of MuslimSentiment in Turkey, p. 16.

58Hakan M. Yavuz, "Turkey's 'Imagined Enemies'; Kurds and Islamists",The World Today, Vol. 52, No. 4, April 1996, p. 99. Yavuz also writesthaL: "In effect, the mili tary laid Lhe seeds for the rise of Refah". SeeYavuz, Turkish Identity and Foreign Policy in F/ux, p. 32.

20 THETUR~SHYEARBOOK [VOL. XXX

The rise of politica! Islam in Turkey through the 1980s andı990s, therefore, does not necessarily signa! the demise of Turkishnationalism or the crisis of Turkish national identity. If anything, ittestifies to the resilicnee of nationalism in Turkey in the faee ofsevere social, eeonomic, and politica! strains. The "nation" as theappropriate basis upon whieh to establish a politiea! eommunity isnow widely aceepted in Turkish society. In this sense, Turkishnationalism has been suceessful in inculeating the nation as theprincipal loeus of eoIleetive political identifieation.59 At the sametime, Sunni Islam has become an important component of Turkishnationalism.60 it is for this reason that, "probably a majority ofTurks do not perceive a contradiction between Islam and theirattaehment to Kemalist symbols, viewing both as integral tonational identity".61 Even those Turks who have supported politiealIslam in Turkey, in the form of the National Salvation Party, and itssuccessors the Welfare Party and the Virtue Party, no doubt adhereto the values of Turkish nationalism. Thus, according to onesurvey, 41 per cent of Welfare Party voters described themselves inKemalist terms as laik (seeular), and regarded Atatürk as thegreatest man of all time, even berore the Prophet Muhammad.62

Indecd, even the foremost spokesman of politieal Islam in Turkey,Necmettin Erbakan, eould be regarded as Turkish nationalisı. Inhis political speeehes, Erbakan regularly stressed the notions of"national unity" and a "powerful state with religious society".63 Theeleetion manifestos of Erbakan's National Salvation Partyfrequently asserted that the party defended Turkey's nationalinterests and represented the "national view". 64 Thus, one Turkish

59Turan, Religion and Polilical Culıure in Turkey, p. 38.60Poulton, Top Ilaı, Grey Wolf and Crescent, pp. 204-205.61Zubaida, Turkish Islam and Nalionalldenıity, p.lO.62Cited in ibid., p. ıo.63Yavuz, Poliıicallslam and ıhe Welfare (Refah) Parıy in Turkey, p. 76.64For example, in its ı973 general elecıion party plaıform, the NSP

dcclared: "[The] NSP is against Turkey's participaıion in the CommonMarket. NSP complains to the nation that those parties which had said'yes' to this union are running counler lo national interests. Against suchan attempt which will dcgencratc our national and moral values, destroyour national industry, and cause our na tion lo dissolve in a cosmopolitmland common medium by violating the principle of national sovereignty in

2000] ISLAM AND TURKISH NATIONAL IDENTITY 21

observer at the time wrote: "... the description by the NSP of itspolicies as the 'national view' (milli görüş), though doubtIess to alarge extent merely lip-service to secular sentiment and laws, seemspartly to indicate the success of nationalism in dominating theTurkish seene". 65 More recently, at the Welfare Party's FiflhConvention in 1997, Erbakan declared the party's foreign policygoal as the "creation of the Greater Turkey just as the Ouomansdid".66 Thus, according to Zubaida, "Turkey's brand of Islamistideology challenges the secularist components and the Europeanidentifıcation of Kemalism, historically the dominant form ofTurkish nationalism, but retains the central core of Turkishnationalism and statism". 67 In many ways, therefore, the discourseof Erbakan and the National Salvation Party/Welfarc PartyNirtueParty represents the culmination of the process of thenationalization of Islam and the Islamization of nationalism inTurkey.68

the political field, NSP, representing the national point of view, willaccomplish its dutyand free our naLİon's future from these vapid parties".In "Foreign Policy Abstracts From The 1973 Election Platforms of theTurkish Politİcal Parties", The Turkish Yearbook of InternationalRelations, Vol. XIII, 1973, pp. 164-165.

65Sina Akşin, "Turkish Nationalism Taday", The Turkish Yearbook ofInternational Relations, Vol. XVI, 1976, pp. 22.

66Quoted in Yavuz, Turkish Identity and Foreign Policy in Flux, p. 23.67Zubaida, Turkish Islam and Nationalldentily, p. ıo.68ILshould be nOLCdthat Erbakan is not the Icadcr of the Vinue Pany, since

he was banned from aCLİvepolitics following the cIosurc of the WelfarePany in January 1998 by the Constitutional Coun on the grounds that itviolated the principlcs of secularism and the law of the political parties.The Vinue Party (FP) was foundcd on December 17, 1997 by 33 form erWelfare Pany depuLİes under the Icadership of Recai Kutan. The ieadershipof the Virtue Party has been described as "socially conservative, culturallynationalistic, free-market orientcd, not anti-Westem, and is seeking toreinvent a centrist image for the VP". Hakan M. Yavuz, "Search for a NewSocial Contract in Turkey: Fethullah Gülen, the Virtue Party and theKurds", SAJS Review: A Journal of International Affairs, Vol. 19, No. 1,Winter-Spring 1999, p. 127.

22 THETUR~SHYEARBOOK

4. Condusion: A Question of Emphasis

[VOL. XXX

Despite the persistent tensions and contliets betweenseeularists and Islamists in Turkey, the vast majority within bothcamps share a belief that Islam constitutes an essential aspect of"Turkishness". For both, to be a Turk basically means being aMuslim. Given this underlying broad consensus conceming theIslamie component of Turkish national identity, does this meanthat we should dismiss all the talk about an identity debate inTurkey as simply arising from a fundamental misunderstandingabout the nature of Turkish nationalism and national identity? Thiswould be a hasty conelusion. Instead, we must reformuIate thenature of the identity debate between Islamists and secularists inTurkey. it is of ten crudely portrayed as involving a competitionbetween Turkish national identity and Islamic identity. This artielehas disputed this simplistic dichotomy, pointing to the coexistenceand co-mingling of the two identities. Rather, the debate concemsthe relative salience of Islam within Turkish national identity andthe political implications that follow from this. Islamists prioritizeIslam within their conception of Turkish national identity, andargue that the primarily Islamic nature of Turkish identity shouldbe given concrete political and social expression. For secularists, onthe other hand, Islam is an important, but by no means, exclusivesource of Turkish national identity. Islam is just one elementamongst others that informs Turkish national identity, and it is notnecessarily the most important; many secularists would no doubtprefer to emphasize the European element in Turkish nationalidentity. Moreover, secularists argue that the Islamic element ofTurkish identity should be expressed within the private rather thanthe public sphere.

In short, the identity debate between Islamists and secularistsunderway in Turkey is about the importance, not the existence, ofIslam in shaping Turkish national identity, and the policyimplications of this. As such, it is essential1y a question ofemphasis; a question perhaps Icss dramatic, but certainly no lessconsequential for the [uture of Turkeyand its citizens.