A Legal Assessment of Transition From the Ottomans to the Turkish State

(On the occasion of its centenary) 

Final events that led to the demise of the Caliphate Ottoman state and the rise of the democratic Turkish state are specific to their own making, as is the case for every fundamental change in a political system or organization. Consequentially, the changes may be subject to different political or legal interpretations. A brief legal assessment of the transformation of the Turkish political foundations is presented here.

The Ottoman state was successful for about three hundred years from its inception in the 13th century until the middle of the 16th, when the European states were awakening from the darkness of the Middle Ages. The restrictions of the Muslim religion introduced to the Ottoman rule upon its assumption of Caliphate in 1542, at the time the Christian world was opening to worldly advancements, caused Ottomans to fall behind in progress. Eventually in the late 18th century, the Ottoman state became the “sick man of Europe”. Hence, the Empire became the international political playing field by Russia for territorial aspirations using the pretext of protection of Christian population within the Ottoman Empire, or by Britain for colonial aspirations of economic gains. As part of this power struggle between eastern and western powers, western European powers nudged Ottomans several times during the 19^th century to modernize their state system to ward off Russian interventions. Sultan finally agreed in 1876 to a Constitution of Parliamentary monarchy. However, having reserved for himself the Constitutional authority to suspend the Parliament, he did just that in a mere eleven months after he ceremonially inaugurated it. He agreed to reconvene it only in 1908 under pressure from the military seeking modernization.

We may thus say that the parliamentary system in the Ottoman political life existed for all practical purposes as of 1908. However, the Parliament’s work was interrupted with the intervening wars with Italy over Libya in 1911 and 1912, Balkan wars over the Western Thrace in 1912 and 1913, then WWI from 1914 to 1918, and finally forced to suspend its work in 1920 after a raid of the Parliament by the occupying WWI Allied forces. In other words, it never had a chance to focus on anything to improve the political or social life of the country, from dealing with the adversities of wars. Half-hearted modernization efforts in thirty years since 1876 to keep the western powers satisfied with their plans to ward off Russian dominance over Ottomans were too little too late to vitalize a system glorious in its first 300 years but decayed in the following 300 years upon assumption of Caliphate.

That Parliament’s naïve participation in WWI as a result of a ploy by Germany led the Ottoman state to a disastrous ending not only of the war but also of the state. The Ottoman Government agreed to the armistice of Mudros in 1918. A comparison of the provisions of Armistice agreements signed separately between one victorious and one vanquished power of WWI reveals an obvious bias by one power (Britain) against Ottomans. As may be seen from the comparative provisions highlighted below in yellow, there is no provision for occupation by the Allied forces in the other defeated countries Bulgaria and Austria, or there is limited occupation of only some defined territories in Germany. In contrast, there is the open-ended right to occupy any strategic point in Turkey. Likewise, there is the surrender of defined war materiel (highlighted in purple) in the armistice signed with other vanquished powers, while the agreement with Ottomans provides once again an open-ended “compliance with such orders as may be conveyed”. This arrogance typical to the British Empire sparked the long-simmering anti-autocracy and anti-occupation feeling among both the Ottoman military and public (Like the ominous Peace Treaty signed with defeated Germany later created the Nazism and WWII).

1. Mudros armistice of 30 October 1918 provisions with Ottomans drawn by Britain contained the following differences from the armistice agreements signed by other states who surrendered to Allied powers: Allies have “the right to occupy any strategic point” (Art. 7, without providing a definition to the term Strategic point, or who and how would determine it), a “control” of all railways (Art. 15), may demand “compliance with such orders as may be conveyed (by Allied powers) for the disposal of equipment, arms, ammunition”, and transport (Art. 20), and that the Turkish prisoners be kept “at the disposal of Allied” powers (Art. 22).

The Peace Treaty (ending the Armistice) of Lausanne was concluded on 24 July 1923 (signed by the new Turkish state), four years and nine months after the Armistice, after a three-year liberation war ending with the victory of a country on which a Peace Treaty (of Sevres) was served, in the first place, to erase it from the map almost in its entirety. Lausanne treaty was the only victorious peace treaty by a vanquished nation in WWI.

2. Salonica armistice of 30 September 1918 provisions with Bulgaria drawn by France contained the following: Bulgaria will evacuate all Greek territory it occupied; it will continue to administer all territory in Bulgaria; demobilize army, except a force to maintain order; deliver all arms, ammunition and horses to Allied powers; permit passage of Allied troops through Bulgaria.

The Peace Treaty (ending the Armistice) of Neuilly was signed on 27 November 1919, within two months of the Armistice.

3. Villa Giusti armistice of 3 November 1918 provisions with Austria drawn by Italy in consultation with other allied powers, contained the following: cessation of hostilities; demobilization and immediate withdrawal of Austrian forces from occupied territories; Austrian forces to be “reduced to pre-war strength”; half of Austrian “artillery” to be “ concentrated within localities to be designated by the Allies”; evacuation of German troops within 15 days; freedom of movement for “Allied armies”; surrender by Austria all subs and navy ships.

The Peace Treaty (ending the Armistice) of St. Germain was signed on 10 September 1919, eleven months after the Armistice.

4. Compiègne armistice of 11 November 1918 provisions with Germany drawn by France contained the following: cessation of hostilities; immediate German evacuation of all territories occupied; evacuation by Germany of Rhine lands; occupation of the same territories by Allies; surrender of a detailed list of materiel to Allies; detailed conditions on the use of communications, railways, etc. by Germans; the upkeep of occupying Allied troops at the cost of  Germany; reparations for damages and restitution of gold and cash taken by Germany during the war; prescribed limitations on German navy.

The Peace Treaty (ending the Armistice) of Versailles was signed on 28 June 1919, within seven months of the Armistice.

It is also noteworthy that while the armistice with Bulgaria and Germany were signed by the Chief Commander of Allied forces, or by France, and the one with Austria by the Italian High Commander in consultation with other Allies, only the armistice with Ottomans was signed by a British local Commander without consultation with other Allies (which in fact caused protests from France and Italy). Over-the-top British actions following the armistice based on its vague provisions, despite the French and Italian warnings, gave way to the Turkish independence war.

Allied forces occupied Istanbul on May 15, 1918, and started intervening in the Ottoman administration’s daily decisions, especially those regarding the Liberation movement in Anatolia under the leadership of Atatürk. They occupied the Ottoman Parliament on March 16, 1920, on the premise that it was not willing or was incapable of stopping the Liberation movement. This action conveniently gave Atatürk a legal ground to call, three days later, on March 19, a National Assembly to convene in Ankara. The communiqué he issued on that day to all the commanders, officials and the press reflects how skillfully he presented to the nation the Parliament’s suspension as the end of the Ottoman state by foreign powers, which was his ultimate goal anyway, and which also helped his efforts to arouse survival feelings among people necessary for their morale to fight: “Finally, the occupation in Istanbul today brought to an end the seven-hundred-year existence and sovereignty of the Ottoman state. It is clear the Turkish nation is called to defend its potential for civilization, its right to exist and to independence, and its future”. (The Speech, Vol. I, p. 561, THS 3^rd edition 1989). The closed Parliament’s representatives who could escape Istanbul to travel to Ankara, and those expeditiously elected by local high officials around the country met in Ankara 37 days later, on April 23, 1920. The Allied forces’ action in Istanbul on March 19, 1920 gave legitimacy to the national liberation movement and became the beginning of the transition of the state from a Caliph/Sultanate autocracy to a democratic republic.

Atatürk led an exhausted nation to reorganize and fight. He carefully and patiently observed the legality of the liberation. Although the declaration announced the end of the Ottoman state, the National Assembly did not rescind the Ottoman Constitution and not replaced it immediately with another. It modified only the nature of the state simply by adopting a law on January 20, 1921, which moved the ownership of the sovereign powers of the state from the Sultan to the people and placed in the Assembly the authority to govern while maintaining the application of Sharia laws. This refrain from rushing to introduce an entirely new Constitution was predicated by prudence to maintain unity around the cause of the liberation war against Allied occupation. However, the statement “Sovereignty belongs to the people unconditionally and without any limitation” was a subtle but stern harbinger of the abolition of Sultanate system, which later were to become the indelible principle of the new Republican Constitution. The Assembly also identified itself as the “Turkish” National Assembly for the first time, on February 8, 1921; this was likewise a subtle indication of eventual abandonment of the religion-based state in favor of the nation based.

It is important to note the way the sovereignty of people is formulated in the Constitution. It does not say “The nation is sovereign”, or “People are sovereign”, or “People own the sovereignty”, or “Sovereignty is reserved to the people”, or even just “Sovereignty belongs to the people”. It makes clear that the sovereignty is not that of the state but is that of the people. It is expressed in the most categorical term possible: without any condition, qualification, or prerequisite, and without limits, reservations, or restrictions. The intent of this categorical dry language, without explanatory additions, was to keep the focus of the people and of the world on the objective of the military action being a people’s fight for freedom, no other entity’s. Rashness to an all-out change of the system in the middle of the liberation war would have wasted limited resources available and would have been difficult to achieve given the prevailing sensitive legal, military, and public circumstances. To note, the Ottoman Constitution provided that Sultan, being the Caliph is “holy and enjoys immunity” (Art. 5), “He reserves the right to convene, suspend, or dissolve the parliament…” (Art.7), “… Assembly members … take an oath to obey the Constitutional provisions, the country, and the Sultan. …” (Art. 46).

The National Assembly abolished the Sultanate on November 1, 1922. The abolishment was made effective not as of its date of adoption, nor April 23, 1920 (the date of convening the National Assembly), but retroactively as of March 16, 1920, the date the occupation forces raided the Ottoman Parliament. The legal effect of this retroactivity was to nullify all Ottoman governmental decisions taken against the National Assembly, legitimacy of which were questionable for operating without a Parliament.

On the other hand, considering the pervasive religious sensitivity and the on-going liberation war, Atatürk did not take this opportunity to abolish also the Caliphate; the National Assembly designated the deposed Sultan’s cousin as Caliph on November 18, 1922, after Sultan escaped under British cover on November 17. As strange as it may be, the nominal Caliphate continued even four more months after the adoption of the republican regime on October 29, 1923. However, having been divested from any state and governing authority, it was effectively downgraded to the religious representation of the majority of the population. It was not until March 3, 1924 that Caliphate was finally abolished.

All this cautious and gradual approach was to allow time for laying the groundwork for the understanding and acceptance of a system of individual freedoms by a public who lived in servitude to Sultan/Caliph for centuries. Atatürk did not want the National Assembly act like the revolutions the world has been accustomed to, an overnight change with forceful edicts and disruption of national institutions. He was conscience of the historical fact that for any social change to be successful it had to be truly and deeply understood, accepted, and internalized by the people. A societal novelty must be the property of the society. He personally travelled throughout the country several times to achieve this and to converse with public directly.

The republican regime was declared on October 29, 1923. A new Constitution was adopted on April 20, 1924, to replace the Constitution of 1876 and the law of 1921 discussed above. The Constitution introduced, among others, non-discrimination on grounds of religion and race, equality of people, independence of judiciary, freedom of individuals and of the press, privacy of communications, and Turkish as the official language. Characteristic to Atatürk’s prudent, gradual, and persuasive approach, Laicism was instituted as late as in 1928 amendment, even four years after the abolition of Caliphate. The Constitution was amended once again in 1934 to include voting rights for women. Many laws promulgated between 1924 and 1934, like the adoption of the Latin script, and of international standards from calendar to measurements were for the purpose of taking the state and the people away from the grips of the obsolete religious world to the contemporary world. The legal transformation to conform to a modern system took about ten years.

Whether the accomplishment of a legal framework for modernization in a short time was matched in the following eighty-five years by a parallel and commensurate social modernization is not within the purview of this article.                                                    March 2020 

A Parody of Comparing Tayyip with Atatürk

I hope the article by a Georgetown University doctoral candidate published in the European edition of Politico does not reflect on the academic level of the University, or on the editorial quality of Politico. For the author who seems to aspire to achieve the highest educational level is an obvious example of writing without sufficient knowledge and research. The faculty members who are guiding him towards his aspired degree may take note of his shoddiness. The author did not follow extensive media reports about Erdogan’s Islamist, Ottomanist, and contemptuous rhetoric on Western policies, some of which appeared even in the same publication as his was published, Politico (e.g. several Steven Cook articles).

The similarities alleged in the article to exist between the two Turkish presidents are “populist nationalism and aggrieved egalitarianism”. Since the author did not define these terms, we have to follow facts. There was no question of nationhood in the Ottoman “ummet” system of religious classification during the khalifate period from 1517 onwards. Atatürk had to revive Turkishness of the earlier Ottoman period in order to found a republic based on “nation-state”, the social cohesion for most states of that time. In other words, Atatürk did not need nationalism for being popular in a democratic competition; he simply introduced a national identity for a new Republic. It is true, however, that Erdogan exploits populist nationalism for his political ends; to fight against Kurds, and to attract votes which otherwise go to the extra-nationalist party (MHP).

As to “aggrieved egalitarianism”, again since the author did not provide his understanding from this term, we will proceed with facts. Atatürk did not have grievances against anything or anybody except against the disappearance of his country from the map due to the incompetence of the Ottoman rule and to the colonial invasion by world powers. He was a popular war hero and a popular reformer president. He tried to elevate the social status of the people, but never mentioned egalitarianism. Whereas, Erdogan is surely aggrieved, an angry, a jealous, a scornful, a vengeful, a half-educated man, who came out of nowhere. He exploits egalitarianism, like he does nationalism, for political means; and, he enriched himself and his cronies through illegal means, built for himself the biggest palace, while mistreating the underprivileged (slapping, degrading, kicking people).

The author’s claim that Erdoğan inherited these traits from Atatürk must be taken as a joke. It is known by the well-read world that Erdogan is the complete opposite of Atatürk. He clearly and loudly repeated, in words and in actions, that he is set out to undo the reforms introduced by Atatürk.

The comparison of “Erdoğan’s attacks on Ataturk’s regime bear an uncanny resemblance to Ataturk’s own attacks on the Ottoman sultans” is also ludicrous. Atatürk’s attacks were for saving the country. Erdogan’s attacks are for demolishing the country.

The statement, “the villagers were still waiting to become masters of their country, and they expected Erdoğan to deliver where Ataturk had failed” shows an obvious malevolence on the part of the author. Atatürk was president only fifteen years, yet his accomplishments from nought during a recession-filled inter-war years have been noted by numerous world leaders and thinkers. There were, no doubt, many failures in Turkey’s administration, but they must be attributed to the incompetent leaders who ruled for 64 years after Atatürk. Nevertheless, villagers became masters of their country in the course of that period, not because of Erdogan. Those “masters” elected and keep electing Erdogan to lead them.

The author’s last statement, “Ataturk’s elite ….. the unmistakable Hitler mustaches that many proudly wore as well. Now, as Erdoğan becomes increasingly autocratic, ….. Ataturk’s sins somehow excuse jailing journalists”, is proof of his real motive for writing the article. Because, the mustaches of some of Atatürk’s entourage have nothing to do with the author’s attempt to prove the similarities between the two men as regards “populist nationalism and aggrieved egalitarianism”. This must be a stretch of imagination in desperation to find an explanation for Erdogan’s autocratic rule, which even suggests that the article may have been written under contract, not on facts.

January 2, 2016

Turkish Resistance

Turkish Resistance

(A talk delivered on Nov. 9, 2014)

           We have just viewed a documentary about the extraordinary transformation of a society from neglect by its own state, to becoming a nation state, to gaining national identity, freedom, and dignity. This was not a small feat, difficult to grasp in abstract. To appreciate its value in today’s terms, you can visualize Saudi Arabia adopting a republican parliamentary system, changing its script, and recognizing the equality of women. What I would like to emphasize though, is the objective of this unfinished Turkish transformation. The objective was, “to catch up with the contemporary civilization”. All that struggle was for taking the nation from a rotten theocracy to democracy. You heard, in the documentary, from his mouth, the word democracy. The word was not used in those days as used so commonly as today, though in distorted ways in many countries. Ataturk believed “cultures vary; civilization is common to the humanity”. This is a concept of participation of all cultures in the making of The Civilization; a continuous work for not being left out of human progress; a beacon for all nations. Andrew Mango superbly described the objective of Turkish reforms, “The motive for all these changes was not imitation of, but participation in an universal civilization and culture”. Ataturk, while entrusting to the youth the progressiveness towards civilization, said, “If we will remember how this victory was won, we will easily appreciate the importance and greatness of the duty that falls upon the nation to protect and preserve it. We need to further it, not to keep it constant or, God forbid, to reverse it”.

I will try to demonstrate whether Turks advanced, protected, or reversed this transformation towards contemporariness. I will take three subject areas as examples, because, I believe the state of education, human rights -as the status of women in the society-, and democracy –as freedom of speech and secularism- are the best measures of a society’s contemporariness.

First, the state of basic education in Turkey. (Slide 1*) Soon after the introduction of the multi-party system in Turkey, immediately after WWII, Imam Schools of religious teaching started opening, and they mushroomed in increasing numbers since. Their number now exceeds 60.000, ten times the number it was in 1995. Mandatory Koran and religious courses were introduced in all the schools, which are required also to provide prayer rooms and time for prayer. In June 2012, Turkey signed an agreement with Iran for cooperation in education. The agreement provides for the exchange of information and resources in education from pre-school to university level, and for joint activities. Preparations for opening a joint university in the city of Van are underway. (Slide 2*) The objective of this education policy was clearly defined by the governing party’s leader, “we will raise a pious generation”. On the other hand, the average education expenditure per child in elementary through high school in Turkey is the lowest among the 35 OECD members states. Well, he succeeded in raising a pious generation. Turkey’s official Statistics Administration 2009 data shows 68.5 % of the population is either illiterate, literate but unschooled, or has elementary schooling (12.75, 23.75, 32.0 % respectively). This finding closely follows the results of a survey, carried out by the Bahcesehir Un. in the same year, on the most important value for Turks. Religion was the most important for 62%, secularism for 16%, and democracy for 13%. We can safely assume, therefore, that approximately 1/3 of the electorate can make a rational decision in voting, leaving them at the mercy of the 2/3 totally or partially illiterate people. This is, in a nutshell, the state of basic education in Turkey, which is supposed to be on the path to contemporary civilization. Political scientist Leslie Lipson said in an ASA symposium, “The quality of every democracy is the quality pervading the mass of its citizens”. Here is another quote from the great historian Crane Brinton, “In this world, if you set out to build a society in which human beings behave as much like ants as possible, you are not likely to get a society in which they behave like lions.”

Turkey’s record on the status of women in society is not better than it is on education. (Slide 3*) Women are constantly reminded by politicians –hence by their husbands- to cover up, better yet to stay indoors, and take care of their home, husband, and children, and have even more children. A senior member of the Cabinet suggested recently that women should not laugh loudly in public. Another politician opined that pregnant women’s presence in public is against the religious values. The party leader, during a visit by some women’s organizations about a year ago, stated right in the face of his visitors, “men and women are not equal, women are complementary to men”. (Slide 4*) True to this social policy, parents require their daughters to cover up even at the pre-school age, and encourage them to marry as early as age 14. A 2010 survey by Hacettepe Un. indicated that almost 40% of Turkish women between the ages of 15 and 49 were married by the time they turned 18. Naturally then, 64% of unschooled and even 8.8% of schooled women find domestic abuse of women normal. In the five-year period 2002-2007, 5.367 women were murdered in order to cleanse the honor of their family with their blood. (Slide 5*) Accordingly, Turkey ranked 125th among 142 nations, in the World Economic Forum’s 2014 Gender Gap Index, down 20 places since 2006;  a downward trend indeed in a short period of time. For any civilized person, this behavior and mentality is utterly incomprehensible, and in my personal vocabulary, it is a disgrace that has no place in contemporary civilization.

Now the picture of democracy in Turkey. (Slide 6*) Turkey, in terms of freedom of speech, has the honor of topping the world list of imprisoned journalists. Opposition media is silenced in many different ways that I will not go into details. Turkey's Savings Deposit Insurance Fund seizes control of companies, a la Putin style, thereafter transfers their ownership to cronies by sham bids. The party uses its absolute majority in the parliament to shut down all ensuing investigations. A grafting scandal among the cabinet ministers and their sons, including the PM’s son, could not be investigated because a media ban was imposed, and police, prosecutors, and judges involved were exiled to remote towns. (Slide 7*) Public protests are brutally silenced by police, arrests, prosecutions, and media attacks. The party leader, the prime minister, the president –now effectively combined in the same person- personally files suits- hundreds of them- against any action discrediting him. He even asks the public to spy on their neighbors, teachers or students who protest against the government. (Slide 8*) Believe it or not, all of this is done in the name of democracy. Democracy is interpreted in a manner that the government actions are one-and-the same as the public will. Therefore, any opposition is prosecuted as threat to public will. Hence, you have a police state, not a democratic state. (Slide 9*) After having cut the wings of the military, a formidable police force was formed almost equaling the 700.000 strong military. The number of police reached 350.000, and the 200.000 rural force is attached to the Ministry in charge of the police. The party leader stated, “The State’s well being is in the hands of the police force”. He means, of course, in his own hands, not in the hands of the people or even of the judiciary. Accordingly, Turkey’s human rights record is the worst among the European Human Rights Convention participants. Do Turks believe that these oppressive actions are really their own will?

When it comes to secularism, (Slide 10*) I will simply refer to the Turkish Constitutional Court judgment of 2011 that found the administration in breach of the constitutional mandate of secularism. “The Defendant Party became the center of anti-secular activities by determined and intensive actions of all members of the Party from its leader down. The Party aims at the introduction of religious rules, and a social model based on religion, instead of secular and democratic state laws where fundamental rights and freedoms are stipulated.

The Court finds, That the Defendant Party’s proposed changes in the Constitution and the Higher Education Law, and the activities mentioned above show its intention to create the ground for changing the fundamental principles of the Turkish Republican State;

That it is determined to transform the secular Republic into a new life style and regime, and started to divide the society into believers and non-believers;

The actions mentioned above require the closure of the defendant Party in accordance with the Constitutional Articles 68/4 and 69/6.” To conclude, however, the Court found some extenuating reasons for sentencing the Party only to a small pecuniary punishment. Nevertheless, the Party’s true intention was put on record for eternity by the highest court of the land. (Slide 11*) But, Turks seem to have a short memory; they have already forgotten that the party is a convicted party, not an acquitted party. They voted again and again in favor of that party. It was easy, therefore, for the Party to disregard this ruling, like it did many European Human Rights Court decisions, and it continued on its Islamic course. The party’s leader stated, in fact, his intention on secularism very early on in his carrier, “We cannot be the guardian of the Kemalist regime”, “Our objective is a Muslim state. The 1.5 billion Muslim world is impatiently waiting for us to revolt; God willing the battle will begin”. (Slide 12*) (I believe the dangerous ME stage today could have been entirely different had the West not come up with the weird idea of “moderate Islam” as a stopgap measure against the “militant Islam”. As we all know, you cannot be half-pregnant. There cannot be moderate Islam -or moderate any religion for that matter- like there cannot be democracy without secularism. Leslie Lipson, when discussing the choice between religion and civilization, wrote, “you cannot go in opposite directions at the same time.”)

 A brief look, therefore, at Turkey’s standing in international relations would be appropriate. (Slide 13*) Consistent with its domestic Islamic agenda, the government pursues a foreign policy of support for Hamas in Palestine, Muslim Brotherhood in Egypt, and Sunnis in Iraq and Syria. Support for Muslim Brotherhood went so far that diplomatic ties between the two countries are cut; the Turkish party leader uses Muslim Brotherhood’s Rabia sign to greet the public. (Slide 14*) A recent survey by Gezici Research Co. shows that 53% of Turks support radical Islam. A MetroPoll Co. polling revealed that 11.3% support ISIS, 51% do not even consider ISIS a danger. There is obviously, underlying this public attitude and the foreign policy, an aspiration for the revival of the Ottoman greatness, and ultimately the assumption of leadership of the vast Islamic world. Turkey’s friendly policy towards the East can be contrasted with her scornful policy towards the West. At the center of this Western policy is the insistence for admission into the EU, insistence to the point that the rhetoric towards the EU is the same angry and combative language typical to the party leader. (Slide 15*) He reproaches the EU for not admitting Turkey to membership “as is”, namely with all of Turkey’s package of large population, low educational level, lack of democracy and secularism, ethnic and sectarian divisions, uneasy relations with many neighboring countries, etc. Europe is aware that Turkey is no longer the modern Turkey once was, the modern Turkey for which the groundwork was done in industrialization, the change in attire and script, as you saw in the documentary. Turkey did not pass the EU’s civilizational test, and an EU member Turkey may Islamicize also Europe. (Slide 16*) EU knows that the historic Troy’s horse is symbolically standing at Europe’s doorsteps. The party leader, copying Putin’s posture of a world leader, angrily and combatively challenges and quarrels with the UN and Western leaders. Even international companies, like Facebook, Twitter, foreign media, and credit companies get their share; the same credit companies that downgraded also the US’s credit score without being insulted by the US President. This is Turkey’s image in the civilized world. Are Turks really happy with this image?

I believe it is unfair to put the onus entirely on this Islamist party. After all, the majority brings a party to power. I know you will think, the majority of the electorate represents usually about 40% of the people, and at the last presidential election it was 30%. My personal conviction, in view of research polls and daily reports of events in Turkey, is that about half of the population does not object to (I am not saying “approve of”) the Islamic direction the country has taken. They are indifferent to where the society is headed, like they are to being called by that party leader “my nation” (in the language of emperors of the past). As if the nation is his property, he dares to slap, swear at, and mislead them. Since the public carried him to power on their shoulders, he thinks he can trample those shoulders.

There is yet another factor in the making of this sad state of affairs though. All parties that came to power before this Islamist party failed in preparing the people for a true and functioning democracy. They failed in changing people’s indifference into interest in their own management. Through manipulation of democracy, people are squeezed now between Arabization and Kurdization. Turkey seems to have lost its rudder in post-WWII pluralist political storm, when civil societies became the most important elements in checks and balances in governing. Unfortunately, this opportunity came to Turkey while Turkey was already on the path to Islamization. German historian J. Glasneck wrote “Looking back, we see that Turkish governments' reformism died with Ataturk’s death. His death is a turning point in Turkey’s history.” I will add to that observation, that the absence of people‘s consciousness of their duty to participate in governance was the death toll for Turkish reformism. (Slide 17*) A survey of civil societies in Turkey by Prof. Ozcan, in 2007, showed that one third of civil societies were formed for mosque construction; 35.000 of them, as against 96 cultural societies. This means one third of the people, who have the motivation to get organized for their well-being, seek not education or political participation, but prayer. The number of mosques in the country now is twice the schools’. This is what the Turkish democracy produced.

Coming back to the question I raised at the outset, I must conclude that Turks did not advance, nor protected the earlier attempt for contemporariness. Therefore, they must have reversed it. Because, even if they may have advanced in other areas, they retrogressed in education, the status of women in society, and in democracy.

Political scientist W. Ebenstein wrote, “if people forget their obligations, they will drive democracy to its death”. Although resurrection of the dead is not scientifically possible, in social matters there is no reason for despair. As long as there are Turks dedicated to catching up with the contemporary civilization – who are generally called Ataturkists-, there is a solution. No doubt, at this advanced stage, changing the mass’ resistance behavior, from resistance-to- reforms, to resistance-to-retrogression, will be an arduous task. Now, the anti-reformists are anchored firmly in the society. The burden of a long fight falls upon the shoulders of the progressive youth and women. Remember that social and political progress, i.e. civilizational advancement in many countries, were achieved by student movements. My envisioned solution is as follows: 1- Organize around the republic’s original objective, formulate correctly the public will, like about the state system, judicial system, government transparency, education system, secularism, etc. 2- Keep not only the government, but also the opposition parties under pressure for these objectives. Make use of the social media aggressively for this purpose. 3- Launch a program to educate the people about the relation between the rational education and progress, and their civil right and responsibility of participating in the country’s management, on a daily basis instead of from election to election. Teach the public that if they do not assert their power, governments impose their own. 4- Education of masses takes at least one generational period for it to take hold. It took Islamists fifty years to raise a pious youth resentful of reforms. Your job is even more difficult than theirs was. Do not bend under the so-called “democratic despotism and majority tyranny”. 5- Bear in mind that the Islamists’ fertile ground is democracy, liberalism, and freedom. These are their disguises, and their shield. Chris Caldwell wrote in NYT Magazine of Sept. 25, 2005, “In a Turkish context, more democracy generally means more Islam”. Therefore, do not be fooled with the dissimulation typical to Islamists. Be alert to the possibility of losing your rights in the name of democracy.

The party leader once said, “Why standing like a stalk on Nov. 10”, but you will see him tomorrow standing at the foot of Ataturk, trembling like a Nov. leaf ready to fall, because he is aware that his contempt for republican reforms weakened him and empowered the youth. (Slide 18*) The grotesque and abhorrent palace he built for himself is an offence to human values, an affront to needy populations, an attempt to hide his fear behind his megalomania, and a fortress where ultimately he will take refuge from the youth’s growing power. (Slide 19*) The time for you to act is now. Let the general elections of 2015 be your clarion call. You can turn the country from a loss for the contemporary civilization, into a gain for humanity, if each one of you has the same ideal and determination as Ataturk did.                                                  Nov. 9, 2014

Getting Off A Streetcar Named De(mocracy)* at Gezi Station

Getting Off A Streetcar Named De(mocracy)* at Gezi Station

 Many analytical views have already been expressed while the recent demonstrations in Istanbul, Turkey were unfolding. This is now a better time, after the dust settled, to try to understand the public discontent in Turkey. Public protests in Istanbul against government’s intention to rebuild a historically infamous Ottoman army barracks, which was demolished in the early Republican years to make room for a public park, appeared as an environmental issue. Deep down in this young, educated middle-class group’s mind turned out to be the government’s increasing authoritarian management serving the PM’s lifelong dream of an Ottomanist Turkey. The use of excessive police force to disperse the protesters quickly spread the demonstrations to many cities across the country. The PM’s usual arrogant and scornful rhetoric helped sustain the protests, which now entered their second month.

The background

            The mentioning of a few of the PM’s outrageous actions and statements could help us  understand where he has been taking the country in the last ten years, and why the modern educated class is finally revolting against him. Courses on Islam were made an important part of the educational system (some reports show the number of Koran courses as 60.000). Courses on early republican reforms were gradually replaced by courses on Islam. The PM publicly declared that the objective is “to raise a religious youth” (in Afyon, the Regional Director of Education instructed the local Imams, who give the Islamic courses in schools, that they are expected to give guidance to school principles). On the other hand, public funds appropriated for education is still the lowest among 34 OECD countries, according to OECD records, 2.9% of 2010 GDP in UNESCO Statistics; of about five million middle school age children (age 14-17) only about three million (60%) attend school, according to 2008-09 statistics of the Turkish Ministry of National Education; many elementary and middle schools are converted to Imam schools (of 1450 schools in Istanbul 450 were converted for the school year 2012-13); university presidents are replaced by academics with stronger Islamic adherence; the Turkish Science and Technology Administration fired the editor of its periodical for having dedicated its March 2009 issue to Drawin’s birthday, at the same time removing from its library publications by Dawkins, Moorehead, Gould and others; only 5% of the workforce is university graduates; World Economic Forum indices of 2008 show Turkey 72^nd in higher education and 66^th in innovation in world ranking. The budget of the Religious Affairs Administration amounts to $100 million (2007), while all 81 universities’ budgets combined can barely match it. There are 85.000 mosques and 35.000 mosque building private organizations, and 90.000 imams, while there are only 14.632 public and private secondary education schools, 6.204 vocational schools (of which 11.4% are Imam schools anyway), and 235.814 secondary education teachers (Turkish Ministry of National Education statistics for 2011-12). The UNDP Human Development Index of 2009 rates Turkey 79^th among 182 countries; not because of her economic but educational level.

            2010 Global Gender Gap Index places Turkey 126^th among 134 countries. Some dailies on July 21, 2010 reported a Cabinet Minister saying the illiteracy rate among adult women was 13.8% in 2009. A Bogazici University survey in 2010 on inequalities in Turkey revealed that 70% of the female population under the age of 18 neither attend school nor work. The same survey indicates that the women’s employment rate has been falling faster than it has in Iran or Saudi Arabia, from 34% in 1989 to little over 25% in 2010. A 2010 AandG, a Turkish polling company, survey shows that 47% of married or divorced women were subject to spousal violence, only 56.2% felt free. Homicide against women increased by 1400% between 2002 and 2009, according to a report by Stop Women Homicide Platform, a Turkish women’s organization. Requests from courts for permission to marry underage children had a dramatic increase, including one by the PM to marry his son in 2003. The PM in his almost daily public statements frequently lectures the people on his version of social life style. He advocates no drinking alcohol (often referring to them as drunkards); criticizes artists, removes statues, attacks TV series; even interferes in what goes on in the bedrooms by requesting at least three children families, no abortions or c-section births (progressive women deputies in Parliament called him “vagina guardian”). During a visit by some women’s organizations, the PM stated that men and women are not equal, women are complementary to men.

            He privatized many nationalized businesses by questionable bidding operations favoring his followers, privatized national lands and sold them to his supporters or to some Arab sheiks in exchange for undocumented cash flow into the country (his defense of Yasin al-Qadi when the latter was accused by the UN and the US for financing al-Qaida may be recalled). Many mega projects to gain the followers’ admiration and to carry the PM’s legacy to an eternity are presumably bankrolled by this income.

            He replaced almost the entire judiciary and public prosecutors with those who are poorly educated and of his own persuasion (EU Human Rights Court statistics for 2011 show that most of the cases it reviews are from Turkey, 9.000 in 2011 and 15.940 pending, along with countries like Russia, Ukraine, Poland and Romania, and Turkey leads the list of penalties charged by the EUHRC); the PM’s reaction to an EUHRC decision upholding the headscarf ban in public schools was that the matter was for the Islamic clerics to decide, meaning that the Sharia law should rule, not the Civil law. He changed the entire police force by dramatically increasing its numbers and materiel to match the military, and banished the military he feared from politics in compliance with EU requirements (which effectively replaced one armed force with another to ensure loyalty); hence he was able to pursue an unrelenting witch hunt against the military top brass, academia, judges, prosecutors, and journalists of the reformist/progressive old guard. He intimidated any opposition by personally filing innumerable suits against them, or by investigations and surveillance based on fabricated claims. Even school age children who take part in protests against the PM are detained and prosecuted. Dissent is not tolerated. Freedom House Reports until 2005 listed Turkey among the free countries, since then it is listed among the Partly Free.

            The national holidays celebrating the 1920s liberation war, and the reforms of the Republic are all but abolished as if an undeclared war of vengeance against the reforms that ended the Sultanate and the Khalifate.           

 The apolitical modern youth and middle-class people could no longer expect any meaningful help from the opposition parties, from the press or the military, for reclaiming the modernization reforms of the Republic. This group, increasingly falling in a minority status and being marginalized and frustrated, had no way of expressing its dissent other than by taking it to the streets.           

 The authorities’ handling of dissent was consistent with their past actions and style, the use of the newly empowered and strengthened police force. The PM unleashed that force with the pretense that the demonstrations were nothing but “vandalism”, “terrorism”, and “foreign conspiracy”, all taking advantage of a small legal environmentalist activism. Even foreign media (especially CNN for its live reporting on the day the police retook the Gezi Park by brute force -an Islamist daily filed complaint against the CNN and C. Amanpour), electronic medium (Twitter and Facebook), international organizations (prominently EU), “interest lobby” (presumably meaning the international financiers, namely George Soros), and some tourists in the crowd were all accused of supporting the demonstrations, and subverting peace and progress in Turkey. These accusations and of course the identification of the events as terrorism give the PM the pretext for sweeping arrests. Arrests should be expected to continue for a long time to come if the witch hunt of the past five years after his re-election were to constitute an example.         

 The PM famously said in an address, “democracy is like a streetcar, you disembark once you reach your destination”. The PM seems to have reached his “desired” destination at Gezi Park.

 What can we expect for Turkey’s future, and what are the undeniable facts? First, the facts:

1.                          No matter how much the PM denies it, not only his statements but also his deeds prove that he definitely sees the law and the social system subjected to supreme religious (Islamic) order. He attributes the failure of the preceding 65 years to secularist modernization policies. He is vengeful of the republic’s original reforms. This appears to be his personal conviction and agenda. He is a vindictive, an angry man.

2.                          The PM is changing Turkey’s social system to conform to the Islamic tradition, with the belief that this is the mandate given to him by the majority of the country. This rationalization is also upheld by the Western powers who champion freedom of religion. He has democracy, freedom, and human rights behind him to put religion in politics.

3.                          The PM has been elected by a little over 50% of the electorate, who believe that they are Muslims first and citizens second. (A recent survey by AandG, a Turkish polling company, shows that over 90% of the population has strong religiosity, and their understanding of freedom is economic freedom, rather than freedom of speech). This is the population that was not educated about the republican reforms, and that was not able to take meaningful part in politics for 65 years after the reformer Ataturk’s death. Past inapt governments did not make an effort to educate and engage the public in politics; politics was for the modern minority. Opposition parties exploited the religiosity of the majority to get them involved in politics.

4.                          The modern minority wants modernizing principles enshrined in the Republican constitution to be preserved and pursued. Yet, a reversal of majority to modernism does not seem possible for a foreseeable future, not even an increase in the numbers of modernists to form a coalition (which means instability and disfunction in governance any way). A come back of the republican party is also impossible because of public awareness of its 65 years of inapt governance that was never able to establish political and social stability, and to develop country’s economic potential.

5.                          Neither group should be expected to change course, for good reason. Religionists cannot change because of the dogmatic, communal and traditional nature of the religion; moderation will be sacrilege. Modernists would not change because reason shows that the future lies in individual freedom and advancement. Turkey is not the only country that has at least two incongruent societies. There are historical reasons for this social divide, which I will not dwell on here. It will suffice to compare some of the political and social principles of both sides: Modernists want pluralist democracy, traditionalists want majoritarian democracy; Modernists want liberal individualist society, traditionalists want to reinstate Ottoman social “ummet” system; Modernists want freedom from dominance by any one group, person or ideology, traditionalists want freedom from any dominance except from religion; Modernists want freedom from capitalist greed, exploitation and commercialization, traditionalists want capitalism and commercialization.

6.                          The problem is the way democracy is practiced by the government: majoritarian democracy. However, Turkish democracy is not the only one that interprets democracy as the ballot box.

              What is next?

              Against this backdrop of the political and social scene, we can attempt to forecast the near future of Turkey. In view of a polarized society and a polarizing government, which insists on the rule of the dominant cultural group, the political turmoil of the last 65 years may continue. Even if the PM were to give some small concessions from his authoritarian and Ottomanist policy in order not to miss his dream of inaugurating his mega projects for the 100^th anniversary of the Republic (he has been working towards leaving a legacy greater than Ataturk’s. He wants to prove that he is greater than Ataturk), his electorate’s social pressure on the minority will not subside. Chris Caldwell rightly wrote in NYT Magazine issue of Sept. 25, 2005, under the title “The East in the West”, “In a Turkish context, more democracy generally means more Islam”. In fact, this is true not only for Turkey but for any Muslim society. When constitutions were democratically re-written in Algeria, Nigeria, Iraq, Tunis, Egypt, Libya, Afghanistan, Islam formally became part of the political process. This is the natural and rightful conclusion of democracy. In a democratic system the politics and the type of democracy are -and can only be- the reflection of its people; people get what they want, what they deserve. The protagonists of democracy, the West, have no grounds for complaining about the outcome, the Islamic rule.

  In a polarized, divided Muslim society (like in Turkey, Egypt, and potentially in Tunis, Libya, and Algeria), modernists cannot achieve much more than stopping or modifying a building project. They cannot change the trend in education, gender gap, judiciary and law enforcement, so long as the financial power, fire power, judiciary power and legislative power are all on the side of the Islamists. Religion is more powerful than any other social asset. Therefore, Turkey’s Ottomanist domestic policy may succeed.

  Will Turkish government’s Ottomanist foreign policy have repercussions on the international scene? The government obviously pursues a foreign policy of reviving Ottoman glory by establishing a sphere of influence in the neighboring, Middle Eastern, and African states. (Foreign Minister reportedly stated at his Party’s 14^th Consultation and Evaluation Meeting “We have Ottoman heritage. Yes, we are Neo-Ottomanist. We have to be interested in neighboring and North African states”, although he later denied that statement. Also 2010 German Marshall Fund Transatlantic Trends reports that 20% of Turks are favorable to co-operation with the ME countries, 13% with the EU, 6% with the US, 5% with Russia, and 34% with no co-operation at all). The objective of this policy is to gain a prominent position for Turkey in the international stage, particularly in the Islamic countries and in the EU. To seek leadership among the Islamic countries by Israel bashing and by business relations based on Muslim brotherhood will not carry Turkey to ME leadership for at least two reasons. Arab spring and the current developments in Egypt demonstrate that there is an awakening also in Arab countries. Their societies will be as divided as Turkey’s at best. Second, Ottoman experience abundantly proved that Arabs are not reliable partners, religious ties are not sufficient to bring together culturally different societies. Therefore, while Turkey may aspire to such leadership, even if it resurrected the Khalifate, Arab world would not recognize it. Turkey cannot be a big or equal brother to Iran either, not only because history shows us so, but also because they are relatively equal powers aspiring to the leadership in the same region. Therefore, Turkey’s Ottomanist foreign policy will not succeed.

  Some analysts are of the opinion that the EU must expedite Turkey’s admission into the Union in order to avoid Turkey’ further slippage towards the Islamic world. It must be borne in mind that Turkey wants to join the EU with her own social values. The EU is against it, aware that this will expedite Europe’s Islamization, which has already begun with the increasing migrant population from its Mediterranean littoral neighbors. The sheer size of Turkey’s under-educated and non-modern population, and her promising economy will give her in the EU governing bodies an equal standing with Germany and France. Had Turkey been admitted to the Union as early as possible and before the end of the Cold War at the latest, and had religion was not allowed to be a tool of politicking, she would not have become Islamist. It is now too late to reverse the Islamization process. Turkey’s EU membership will become a mute issue.

   There are also some analysts who are of the opinion that Turkey proves that an Islamic country can be democratic, modern, moderate, and secular; as such, it should be promoted among fundamentalist Muslim countries. These analysts must be denying the facts that in Turkey democracy means only voting rights and religious freedom, not free speech rights; modernity means to be up-to-date with material things (brought about by economic success); moderation and secularism are absurd in Islamic beliefs, unless secularism is the type of secularism applied in the US. These arguments are no more than a wishful thinking.

    The question is not whether Turkey will eventually become like Iran’s Khomeinyites, Egypt’s Brotherhood, or Afganistan’s Taliban, but whether it will be an Arab style country which is not modern, moderate, or secular, but a non-fundamentalist Islamist country that does not constitute a threat to the West.

*A metaphor of a 1947 play titled “A Streetcar Named Desire”, written by Tennessee Williams and immortalized by a movie starring Marlon Brando.

July 5, 2013

Nationalism “à la Turca”

Nationalism “à la Turca”

Many important events took place on Turkey’s historical calendar between 29 October and 10 November. November 3-5, 1914 are the dates Russia, England and France declared war on the Ottoman Empire drawing it into WWI; October 30, 1918 is the day of Moundros ceasefire between the warring parties and the start of occupation of strategic points in the Empire by the victorious Allied Powers; November 7, 1919 is the day the Turkish national liberation movement held first elections for a National Assembly (NA) independent from the Sultanate; November 1, 1922 is the day the NA abolished the Khalifate and Sultanate; October 29, 1923 is the day the NA declared the republican regime; November 1, 1928 is the day of adoption of latin script by the NA to replace the Arabic script (one of the most important reforms to challenge the nation for joining the contemporary civilization); on November 10, 1938 Ataturk died.

Therefore, there are many things for Turks to recall and reflect on at this time of the year. I chose to reflect this year on the most important of the reforms and in fact the driving force behind all of them, the “Turkish nationalism”. Nationalism was a reform in Turkey, because it did not exist in the second half of the long existence of the Ottoman Empire. “Turkish nationalism” was a reform that made the other reforms possible on the path to modernization (joining the contemporary civilization)*. Furthermore, I find this subject topical, because the current Islamist administration is claiming to be nationalist. The administration may be assuming this role in order not only to attract the votes of nationalists in the country, but also to find a solution to the Kurdish insurgence, to the Pheneriote Orthodox Church’s efforts to gain ecumenical status, and to the increasing demands by Alevis for recognition.

However, we need to consider and learn what this Islamist government means by nationalism. Based on the Government’s past and continuing record, I assume that their nationalism must be for the recreation of the Ottoman style nations, millets. They must believe in the ummet/millet system of society (panislamist view), to conform to their Ottomanist domestic and foreign policies, regardless of their public rhetoric. Their actions prove without a doubt that their aspiration is to establish a political and economic leadership over the Muslim countries in the Middle East and Africa. They have already succeeded in reinstating Ottomanism in Turkey by re-interpreting the secular and democratic principles of the state, by re-engineering the social and judicial systems. There is no reason why they cannot succeed in reintroducing the millet system by way of reinterpretation of nationalism.[1] The current international events are such that Turks and the international community are all ready to accept such an interpretation.

A cursory look at the history of “Turkish nationalism” would be sufficient to verify this view. Seljuks, later Ottomans, kept their Turkish character from the 12^th to the 16^th century as they were expanding.[2] When the state assumed the religious mantle of khalif after conquering Mecca in 1517, it started to pursue a policy based mainly on religion. Having spread over a large mass of land and sea, the Empire consisted of numerous different nations, cultures, and religions. Co-religionists were ummet. Non-muslims were “nations”, millet. The identity of citizens was recognized by their religious affiliation, not by their language, nationality, or land. Turkishness was forgotten, even suppressed, for fear of inciting nationalism among many nations living within the Empire.[3] Leaders were well aware that a society based on religious foundation made people subservient to the state; unquestioning adherence to religion impeded people from believing in themselves, thus from owning the state.

 Turkish intelligentsia in the Ottoman Empire rediscovered their Turkishness in the 19^th century. The first Ottoman Constitution of 1876 stipulated in its Article 18 that the State’s official language was Turkish, and in Article 57 that the parliamentary debates were to be made in Turkish; an Executive Order in 1894 mandated the teaching of Turkish in all schools, including foreign schools.[4] That was the century in which nationalism and nation-state concepts spread around the world as a result of the American and French popular uprisings for freedom, individual rights and equality. Nationalism became the social bond. Millets in the Empire also could not be kept isolated and away from this current. It was natural for them to rally around their national identity, and to seek independence with the help of countries dedicated to ending the Ottoman hurdle in the way of the modernizing world. This trend included several co-religionist Arab nations, despite the fact that Ottomans served as their protective guardians for about 400 years. Such was the reliance on ummet system: Nationalism had trumped religion. Turks in the Empire were left empty handed. “The Emperor was naked”. The intellectuals in the Empire and some sultans began in 1830s to embrace Turkish nationalism in order to rescue the crumbling Empire. But, the religious community upset every modernization attempt with violent oppositions.[5]

It was not until 1920 that Turks finally realized they had to dislodge religion from its pedestal to be able to reclaim their own identity, to reinstate the sovereignty of the people, and to catch-up with ever-advancing contemporary civilization. They made a historically unprecedented élan to embrace nationalism in order to fight a war for their independence, and thereafter to start on a path to contemporary modernization, all within a period of twenty years. Drastic and dramatic changes were like instating peoples’ sovereignty (secularism, republican regime), solidarity for independence (nationalism), individuals’ rights and freedom, women’s equality, starting up a new industry with state assistance, the adoption of a latin script that opened the society to the world-culture and -science (progress). The type of nationalism (called Ataturk nationalism) that was the formidable force behind all this incomparable achievement, was based on history, not on ethnicity, chauvinism, nor religion. Public solidarity based only on nationalistic feelings was what carried Ataturk to the national liberation, and energized the people to support the reforms.[6]

Unfortunately, this relentless modernization process based on national solidarity lasted only for a very short period of approximately twenty years. Having realized this feat about one hundred years later than the Western world did, Turks encountered another setback due to changing circumstances in the intervening period. German nationalism and dictatorship dragged the world to the disastrous WWII. The international community condemned nationalism. The Nazi style racist nationalism attached a stigma to the very important and useful social fact of nationalism. Yet, there is no point in continuing to vilify and bash nationalism because of a short-lived aberration in history (1930-45). Nationalism is a natural and historical fact arising from the social need for solidarity. Nationalism gave life to many countries in the world, and it continues to do so in many countries under more politically correct names, like patriotism, national interests, etc. Nationalism is the natural binding element in a society, if removed it has to be replaced by another  kind of social binding element. Religion lurking behind the curtain of history is always ready to jump in. And, it has; religiosity has been on the rise in many countries, west and east, since WWII.

Turkey also having started the process in 1940s finally put religion back on the pedestal in 2002 by electing the Islamist party to govern the country. True to the times, the religionists did not reverse the course to membership in universal civilization by Ottoman style uprisings and atrocities, but by modern day democratic elections. Nevertheless, the result was the same, a setback on the way to contemporary universal civilization. This was yet another example of an almost two hundred year old wavering attitude (irresoluteness) of the Turks towards “nationalism”. Although reforms were achieved at a vigorous pace within the first twenty years of the Republic, reforms were not advanced, and not even maintained in the following sixty years. The religionists took advantage of the neglect and slowly but surely made inroads to Turkish politics. They crowned their hard work in 2002 by capturing power. Ever since, the religionists started diligently to meddle with the reforms, not to abolish them outright, but to redefine them according to their “book”.

It appears that the Turkish character is not conducive to sustaining nationalist solidarity. This may be due to Turks’ individualistic mentality and life style. Turks have never developed a tradition of community, a notion of social service, interdependence, and altruistic volunteerism. Therefore, casting doubt on nationalism, instead of promoting it, easily erodes and eventually will weaken solidarity within the Turkish society. Solidarity, which is the lifeline of national security and the motor force behind national development along the contemporary universal civilization, is undermined.[7] This is a worse case scenario for a nation. Neither the international community’s current attitude towards “nationalism”, nor the current Turkish administration’s interpretation of it are encouraging to avoid that scenario. One cannot help but ask the Turkish administration whether the justification for their foreign policy re-oriented from the West towards the South is based on the perfidious act of Arabs during WWI? Whether the current Turkish aspiration for leadership of the Muslim world is based on the facts of Ottomans’ rise or fall? What type of solidarity would they rely on, the nationalistic one that gave independence and contemporary civilization to them, or the religious one that did not help keep Ottoman Empire together?

In the face of nationalist and religionist uncertainties in Turkey, Turks will be well served if they would remember that although they have been Muslims by choice for about one thousand years, they were born Turks by nature for at least four thousand years. Societies are composed of smaller social units, groups or communities (professional, local, racial, religious, etc.), also classes in societies are unavoidable; but, all these components need a binding element to be complementary of each other, in order to avoid clashes and be able to develop and live in peace. That binding element is solidarity; solidarity is what holds a society together. The type of solidarity determines the type and durability of a society. Solidarity based on national bonds is the most natural and durable. It becomes vitally important to reflect on this history for a nation who will soon be presented with a new social contract, the Constitution, re-written by the admirers and aspirers of the Ottoman ways.

October 29, 2012 

*I feel obliged to emphasize or explain some of the terms because politicians and some commentators have the habit of twisting the meaning of certain words for their own purposes.

[1]  “The current administration has been showing a nationalist face since the last election. It dons a nationalist mantle in order to survive between the two nationalist groups appeared in the country because of a Kurdish movement surging in the last twenty years. ….. It will achieve what the earlier ruling parties could not; it will assume Ataturk nationalism, however, with a redefined Ataturk nationalism ….” (free translation from “Kimligimiz ve Niteligimizin Bekcisi”, by the Author, sosyopolitikkonu.blogspot.com, Sept. 2008)

             [2] See S. Shaw, History of the Ottoman Empire and Modern Turkey, Vol. I, Cambridge U. Press 1976. O. Turkdogan, Kemalist Sistem, Alfa 1999. And, Bozkurt Guvenc, Turk Kimligi, Remzi Kitabevi 4^th edition 1996.

[3] Regarding the avoidance by late Ottomans the usage of the word Turks, although it was used by foreign observers, see T. Feyzioglu, Ataturk ve Milliyetcilik, TC 75 Yil Armagani, TTK 1998, p.8; See also O. Turkdogan, , pp. 37, 38, 80, 254-257.

[4] O. Turkdogan, p. 47. About the rise of conscience and appreciation of the Turkish language during the late Ottoman era, see O. Turkdogan, pp. 53, 76, 77.

[5]  “There were reformers and reforms at crucial times during the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries. But even the most intelligent and perceptive of Ottoman reforms at this time adhered to the basic premise that the Ottoman system was far superior to anything that the infidel might develop …” (S. Shaw, p. 175)

              “He (Osman II) believed the sole remedy for these conditions was to ‘Turkify’ both the palace and the Janissary corps. ….. He also seems to have thought of moving the Ottoman government from the devsirme center of Istanbul to some place in Anatolia where Turkish traditions and values would prevail, perhaps to Bursa or Ankara, thus presaging the reforms of Mustafa Kemal Ataturk by some three centuries. ……. Janissaries broke into the palace (May 19, 1622) …. Osman deposed and later assassinated and Mustafa I restored to the throne. The reign of Osman II ended without any of his goals being realized; moreover the assassination of a ruling sultan set a new precedent that would be followed all too frequently in subsequent years.” (Shaw, p. 192, 193)

                 “Opposition to the sultan (Selim III) had been building for a long time. The Janissaries and others threatened by his reforms had been agitating since early in his reign. Opposition also came from the ulema, most of whom considered every innovation to be a violation of Islamic law…. The revolt broke out in late May 1807 when the Janissary auxiliaries (yamaks) guarding the Bosphorus forts at Buyukdere, led by Kabakci Mustafa, assassinated a Nizam-I Cedit officer …..joined as they went by thousands of Janissaries, ulema, religious students, and others ….. to secure a fetva  declaring Selim’s reforms illegal violations of religion and tradition and authorizing his deposition.” (Shaw, p. 273, 274)

The Istanbul Observatory built in 1575, only 32 years after the death of Copernicus, and four years before the birth of Kepler, was demolished by a fetva of the Seyhulislam (the high priest) as being against Sharia. (See, T. Feyzioglu, Ataturk Yolu, 3^rd edition, Turk Tarih Kurumu, 1995, p.18)

“When geography classes were introduced in newly founded middle schools after the declaration of Tanzimat reforms sultan’s son-in-law, Sait pasha, told the sultan that showing maps in geography classes is an infidel practice, not allowed by Sharia law. We need to recall that the world’s famous map was drawn many centuries earlier by the great Turkish seafarer Piri Reis in 1513.” (free translation by the Author from T. Feyzioglu, p. 26)

While Jewish, Armenian and Greek millets founded their printing houses between 1494 and 1627, a fetva for founding the first Turkish printing house was issued in 1727. (see T. Feyzioglu, p. 14)

[6] “The principle of nation state defended by the Kemalist system has for its objective organizing and modernizing the society. “ (free translation by the Author from O. Turkdogan, p.113)

 “If there were no Turks there would not have been Ataturk.” (free translation by the Author from a poem by Behcet Kemal Caglar. T. Feyzioglu, Ataturk ve Milliyetcilik, p.31)

[7]  “Turkey seems to have lost its rudder in the pluralist political storm. There seems to exist an uncertainty in Turkish national will, national unity, and national identity. A divided and confused society can no longer take control of its own affairs (democracy); the administration fills in the vacuum and takes charge with an iron fist (autocracy).” (Adulteration of National Identity, by the Author, sociopoliticalviews.blogspot.com, Sept. 2009)