Vol. 11, No. 2, 2009 “Turks Abroad: Settlers, Citizens, Transnationals”
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International Journal on Multicultural Societies (IJMS) Vol. 11, No. 2, 2009 “Turks Abroad: Settlers, Citizens, Transnationals” International Journal on Multicultural Societies (IJMS) (Revised edition) Vol. 11, No. 2, 2009 “Turks Abroad: Settlers, Citizens, Transnationals” DIRECTOR OF PUBLICATION: PAUL DE GUCHTENEIRE EDITOR-IN-CHIEF: MATTHIAS KOENIG GUEST EDITORS: CHRISTINE INGLIS, SAMIM AKGŐNŰL, STÉPHANE DE TAPIA CHRISTINE INGLIS, SAMIM AKGŐNŰL, AND STÉPHANE DE TAPIA, TURKS ABROAD: SETTLERS, CITIZENS, TRANSNATIONALS — INTRODUCTION 104 KEMAL KIRIŞCI, A “THREE-WAY APPROACH” TO INCORPORATING MUSLIM IMMIGRANTS IN THE EU: A TURKISH PERSPECTIVE 119 MICHAEL HUMPHREY, SECURITISATION AND DOMESTICATION OF DIASPORA MUSLIMS AND ISLAM: TURKISH IMMIGRANTS IN GERMANY AND AUSTRALIA 136 SERGEI V. RYAZANTSEV, TURKISH COMMUNITIES IN THE RUSSIAN FEDERATION 155 JOEL WINDLE, “SOFT” AND “HARD” LANDINGS: THE EXPERIENCE OF SCHOOL UNDER CONTRASTING INSTITUTIONAL ARRANGEMENTS IN AUSTRALIA AND FRANCE 174 MAURICE CRUL, EDUCATIONAL PROGRESS OF CHILDREN OF TURKISH DESCENT IN THE NETHERLANDS 195 JENS SCHNEIDER, FROM “KANAK ATTACK” TO THE “GERKISH GENERATION”: SECOND-GENERATION TURKISH NARRATIVES IN GERMAN CULTURE AND POLITICS 212 LIZA HOPKINS, TURKISH TRANSNATIONAL MEDIA IN MELBOURNE: A MIGRANT MEDIASCAPE 230 BANU ŞENAY, A “CONDITION OF HOMELESSNESS” OR A “STATE OF DOUBLE CONSCIOUSNESS”? TURKISH MIGRANTS AND HOME-MAKING IN AUSTRALIA 248 Turks Abroad: Settlers, Citizens, Transnationals – Introduction CHRISTINE INGLIS University of Sydney SAMIM AKGŐNŰL AND STÉPHANE DE TAPIA National Centre for Scientific Research (CNRS)/Strasbourg University elebrations and conferences to mark an anniversary of international C migration are a rare occurrence. Noteworthy then are the series of recent events marking the 40th anniversaries of bilateral agreements enabling Turkish emigration to European countries and Australia. In the 1960s and 1970s emigrants from Turkey to Europe and Australia were widely seen as experiencing severe disadvantage which is often suggested as continuing down the generations and affecting current migrants and their children born and brought up outside Turkey. Paradoxically, the events celebrating the 40th anniversary of the bilateral migration agreements are largely the initiative of the immigrants and reflect their concerns to showcase their individual and community settlement experiences in a positive light. The celebrations therefore provide a symbolic timeline against which to revisit and re-evaluate the experiences of individual migrants, their incorporation into new societies and their ongoing relations with Turkey. More specifically, the similar timing and mechanisms involved in the mass emigrations from Turkey four decades ago to different destinations create a rare opportunity to examine the factors related to the similarities and differences observed in the way the Turkish population has been incorporated in various countries. In this way the Turkish case provides an opportunity to reflect on broader policy and theoretical issues associated with international migration and relations between societies in a globalising and transnational world where the movement of peoples is part of a wider flow of goods, services, resources and cultures that have affected both the source and receiving countries. Turkish academics and social researchers have produced a substantial body of knowledge, data and analysis on Turkish migration patterns. Now it is time to propose an assessment of five decades of research on migration and its consequences. The contributions to this issue will contribute to the work already done by Abadan-Unat (2006), İçduygu and Şahin (2007) İçduygu and Kirişci (2009) for Turkey and the world and by Kaya and Kentel (2005; 2008) for Germany, France and Belgium in Europe. The challenge in comparative studies is that it is difficult to use the same terms for two different contexts such as Australia and Western Europe. While in English- speaking countries such as Australia and the United States, the term “Turks” is still used, in European studies of migration it is increasingly common to replace this term by periphrasis to designate the groups originating from Turkey. This is International Journal on Multicultural Societies (IJMS), Vol. 11, No. 2, 2009: 104-118 ISSN 1817-4574, www.unesco.org/shs/ijms/vol11/issue2/intro © UNESCO Turks Abroad: Settlers, Citizens, Transnationals – Introduction 105 because the word “Turk” has three different meanings depending on the circumstances. Legally, a Turk is a citizen of Turkey (Article 66 of the Turkish Constitution). In Europe there are more and more citizens of the country of residence so this signification is no longer appropriate. “Turk” also has a religious connotation: belonging to Sunni Islam or Alevism. The definition of identity in post-industrial countries such as France can no longer fit with this religious connotation. Finally, the ethnic signification is the strongest. In particular, Kurds, from Turkey and often with Turkish nationality, claim their “Kurdicity” and refuse to be identified as Turks. Therefore, in the European context, to use the term “people originating from Turkey” seems more appropriate. Many of the contributions to this issue, however, have adopted the English-speaking practice of using the term “Turkish”, but when it is used here it should be understood as including both those of diverse ethnicities from Turkey as well as those from other countries who identify themselves as “Turkish”. This issue is largely based on papers presented at an international conference at the University of Sydney in October 2007 to mark the 40th anniversary of the signing of the Bilateral Migration Agreement between Australia and Turkey on the 5 October 1967.1 This was the last in a series of similar agreements which were signed between Turkey and Germany (1961, revised 1964), Austria (1964), Belgium (1964), the Netherlands (1964), France (1965) and Sweden (1967). In addition, social security agreements were also signed with the United Kingdom (1959), Switzerland (1969) and Denmark (1970) (Akgűndűz 2008). The timing of these agreements highlights the demand for labour which the Western European countries and Australia were experiencing as they reconstructed and developed their economies in the aftermath of the Second World War. This period also coincided with changes in Turkey where emigration became seen as contributing in diverse ways to national development, including the transfer of knowledge and skills necessary in a modernising economy, the obtaining of remittances benefiting families, regions and the nation and addressing concerns relating to un(der)employment (Akgűndűz 2008). Before considering the more detailed contributions to this issue it is important to understand something about the different destination countries which attracted immigrants from Turkey. Section 1 therefore briefly outlines some of the similarities and differences in the way these destination countries have viewed migration and its role in nation-building. How these approaches relate to the patterns of migration from Turkey and the contemporary issues affecting the 1 Funding for the conference Immigrants as Citizens: Transnationalism and Incorporation as Future Directions in Turkish Relations with Australia, Europe and North America was provided by the Australian Department of Immigration and Citizenship, the Foundation for Population, Migration and the Environment (Switzerland), the University of Sydney, the Community Relations Commission for a Multicultural New South Wales, the Innovative Universities EU Research Centre, the Turkfest Committee and Affinity Intercultural Foundation. 106 Christine Inglis, Samim Akgönül and Stéphane de Tapia incorporation of Turks abroad will be discussed as a prelude to locating the contributors in relation to a number of themes taken up in more detail in Section 5. 1. The varied contexts for immigration from Turkey Australia, together with other countries such as Canada and the United States, is often referred to as an immigrant nation where the state emphasises the importance of immigrants and immigration to its project of nation-building. This approach is then contrasted with nineteenth-century European nationalism where modern states were carved and constructed out of the ashes of older, ethnically diverse empires. Following from this distinction, immigrants in European countries are cast as marginal to nation-building, whereas in Australia the rhetoric puts them at the centre of the nation-building project.2 This is to oversimplify the European situation. In Western Europe, the discourse on the nation-building process depends on the time and country. In most Germanic countries where membership is based on blood, the contribution of immigration to nation-building has been denied for a long time. Since German reunification, and various migrations of Germanic people from Kazakhstan and elsewhere abroad, historians have begun to change this discourse of unity (on this evolution see Berger 1995). In France, on the contrary, immigration was viewed positively for decades until after 1970, when the discourse began on French pure identity with the motto “Being French is inherited or deserved” (être français, cela s’hérite ou cela se mérite) transformed the meaning of identity as being based on jus soli or birth in France. In response, many scholars starting in the 1990s tried to produce a discourse on a kind of “melting pot à la française” which underlined the importance