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Vol. 17 No. 3 September 1996 Section 8 Page ThirdWorld Quarterly, Vol 17, No 3, pp 503± 523, 1996 `AllahuEkber ’,Weare Turks: yearningfor a differenthomecoming atthe periphery of Europe BANUHELVACIOGLU If we dissuadeTurkey from becomingEuropean, we willhelp strengthen the religiousrevivalists. Presidentof France, Jacques Chirac, July 1995 1 Fear not!How canthis faith be smothered by that monster called `Civilization’ ! whichhas but one tooth left in its jaw?¼ Independence is the right of myrighteous, God-worshippingnation’ . MehmetAkif Ersoy, from theNational Anthem of the Turkish Republic 2 Republicanlaicism was thereforea Janus-likeaffair: on the progressive side the Caliphatewas eliminatedin 1924, but on the other, platoon practice in of® cer trainingin the1950s still culminated with the storming of a hillwith cries of `Allah, Allah!’ Serif Mardin 3 As earlyas 1954,Howard Reed, among other outside observers, noted the revivedpublic and private interest in Islam duringthe Democrat Party era in Turkey.What he identi® ed as thekey issue inthe 1950s is oneof the main dynamicsthat has beenregulating the politicisation of religion both in the past andat the present moment; that `the revived interest in Islam is posingserious questionsto responsible Turks who are tryingto integrate this natural religious feelinginto Turkey’ s secular,progressive, revolutionary society without usher- ingin an obscurantist reaction’ . 4 In1957, Dankwart Rustow, also re¯ ecting on theDemocrat Party’ s religiousplatform, argued that `whether we can speak of religiousrevival in Turkey today depends largely on how we de®ne that term’ . 5 Thethird outside observer of the political role of religionin thehistory of the TurkishRepublic is GHJansen.Writing in the 1960s, he too noticed that `the averageTurk is deeplyand devoutly Muslim’ . Hisre¯ ection on the Democrat partyplatform in the 1950s summarises Rustowand Reed’ s points.When `the pressure againstreligious observances’ were relaxed, `Turkish Islam came tothe surface onceagain as strong,as superstitious,as mysticand as intolerantas if Ataturkand his ª Revolutionºhad never been’ . InJansen’ s view,religious `revival’is amisnomer.In Turkey `there was noreligiousweakening and hence BanuHelvacioglu is attheDepartment of Politics, Ryerson Polytechnical University, Toronto,Canada 0143-6597/96/030503-21$6.00 Ó 1996Third World Quarterly BANU HELVACIOGLU therecould be norevival:there was merelya submergenceand a reappearance’. 6 Finally,in 1977 Serif Mardin, who has writtenextensively on the social and politicalconstitution of Islam bothin the contexts of the Ottoman Empire and ofthe Turkish Republic, reiterated one of the enigmatic questions that concerns thepresent conjuncture: `the most striking behavioural characteristic which needsexplanation is thecontinuing intensity of religious belief among large groupsof Turks in the last twenty-® ve years followinga quartercentury of secularpolicy’ . 7 Atthe moment we are facedwith three logically insoluble issues. One,if everythingthat needs to be said about `religious revivalism’ in Turkey has alreadybeen said by `Western’ observers in the 1950s and the 1960s, why is it necessary toaddress Jacques Chirac’s statementin his speech to the European Parliamentin 1995? Two, as observedby some Westernand Turkish scholars, ifreligion is atrademarkof the social and political fabric in Turkey, what explainsthe polarisation between secular and Islamicist positions in Turkey at themoment? Three, considering that the national anthem of the Turkish Republicis ®lledwith both nationalist and religious themes, why is therea ferventconfrontation between Turkish± Kemalist nationalists and Sunni± Islamic politicalgroups in Turkey today? Asimpleanswer to all three questions is historicalamnesia and an oblivious, ethnocentricattitude to the historically, politically and regionally speci® c dy- namicsin the formation of any culture, be it of European,Christian, Turkish or Islamicorigins. Historical amnesia and the condition of cultural/ politicalindif- ferenceto the speci® c dynamicsof the politicisation of religion, ethnicity and nationalismare globalproblems which need to be put under critical scrutiny both insideand outside Turkey. In examining the con® guration of political Islam in domesticpolitics, it is alsoimportant to note that the increasing support for the WelfareParty (the political representative of Sunni Islam inthe parliament) sincethe early 1990s has culminatedin twoelectoral victories. The ® rst was the 1994municipal election results which brought the Welfare Party to powerin 25 provinces.The second was the1995 parliamentary election from which the WelfareParty emerged as theleading party, with 21% of popular votes. The generalpolitical response to the increasing signi® cance of the Welfare Party in the1990s requires us torevisitsuch claims as `religiousrevivalism’ , thesecular foundationof the Turkish Republic and the political/ culturalpolarisation be- tweenKemalist nationalism and politicised Islam. Inaddressing these issues, myargument is threefold.First, in Turkey there are indigenousvoices in the ranks of industrialists, high-ranking bureaucrats, state representativesin courts, members ofthe military, party leaders, members of parliament,academics, religious believers, self-identi® ed feminists, university studentsand cab drivers, who feign and mime Jacques Chirac’s statement. Accordingto this loosely de® ned category of secular position, Islamicists are fear-enhancingbeings. They are notonly a threatto Turkey’s modern,European identity,but they also threaten Turkey’ s rolein the European Union. 8 Second, thepolarisations between secular and Islamicist positions and between Kemalist nationalistsand Islamic political groups are inpartthe result of aninternalisation ofaeurocentric,orientalist gaze and in part the result of thehistorically speci® c 504 TURKS ATTHE PERIPHERY OF EUROPE politicaldynamics that characterise the political con® guration of Islam in Turkey.In this context, the changing boundaries of Europe after the decompo- sitionof the communist Soviet bloc is partof the enigmatic picture of Islam in Turkey.Third, in an attempt to subdue the divisive and violent polarisation in Turkeyat the moment, it is bothpolitically and ethically necessary toaddress the questionsof howand why nationalism and deeply rooted Islamic religiosity are inseparablefrom one another. Yearningfor a differenthomecoming at the periphery of Europe, in this context,is aninvitation to examine critically the intricate relationship between orientalist,eurocentric and ethnocentric perspectives as differentmanifestations ofa logocentricmode of thinking. The logic ofbipolarisation Logocentrismassumes a®xedpoint, or anoriginalsource from which difference as oppositionarises. Alogocentricanalytical framework, which problematises politicalopposition along the lines of dichomotous choices (eg secular vs Islamicist,secular nationalism vs Islamicfundamentalism) does not address the ambivalenceof thepast and the present. It is foundedon a binaryinterpretation ofhistory, and of the political and cultural formations of oppositional politics. Inso far as theinternal dynamics of political Islam is concerned,the most commonlyheld explanation in Turkey is onewhich identi® es Ataturk’s policy ofsecularisation as theoriginal source of con¯ ict between secularism and religiousopposition. 9 Inconformity with logocentric thinking, Ataturk’ s cultural reforms are analysedin thecontext of anopposition between modern, European identityfashioned after the Enlightenment project of rationalismand secularism, anda traditionalobscurantist, mystical or reactionary religious standpoint. 10 AyseOncu’ s succinctsummary of the nation-building process providesus withinsight about the main opposition between secular nationalism and Islamic religiosity.The foundation of theTurkish Republic was `a genuinerevolution in thesense ofpositinga newª projectedorderº ’ .Its success was `contingentupon policieswhich reinforced Turkish national consciousness, and identity, as distinctfrom a wider,all inclusive dar-ulIslam (thehouse of Islam) ornarrower allegiancesof tribeand community’ . Of®cial nationalism included: `the adoption ofvernacular Turkish as theof® cial language of the State, state controlled compulsoryprimary education using a Romanizedalphabet as opposedto Arabic orthography,of® cial rewriting of the national history, publication of vernacular grammars anddictionaries, commemorative ceremonies and civic holidays in memoryof military exploits, chanting of national anthem, and ¯ agwaving’ . 11 Thereare twomain consequences of this national(ist) projected order. First, `closingthe door on the Islamic± Ottoman cultural heritage [created] a nationof forgetters’. 12 Second,`urban educated Turks were socialized to view Islam asa majorthreat to the Republic, progress and development’ . 13 Onboth issues Ayse Kadiogluraises aspeci®c dimensionof thisbinary opposition. Drawing attention tothe deepened chasm between`political Islamists andWesternised, native secularistsin the Middle East’ , she arguesthat `while the former are absorbed inthe myth of asr-i saadet andprofess areturnto the golden age of Islam, the 505 BANU HELVACIOGLU latter,viewing Islam as ananomaly or an antithesis of modernity, try to erase itfrom their history by unleashing a process ofvoluntary amnesia in the name ofmodernization’ . 14 Theanalytical model, which is premisedon the bipolar dynamics of the foundationof the Turkish Republic, is alsoused in explaining more speci® c dichotomouscleavages
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