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Turkey

The modern state of Turkey emerged in 1923 in the Anatolian heartland of the multi-ethnic Ottoman Empire, following a war of independence led by Mustafa Kemal, who was later named Atatürk (“Father Turk”) by the national assembly. Kemalism, the blend of Turkish nationalism and staunch secularism associated with Atatürk, has been the ruling ideology of this Muslim country ever since, but not without serious, ongoing challenges.

One challenge is the grievances of millions of Kurds concentrated in the country’s southeast. Kemalists called the Kurds “mountain Turks” requiring assimilation into full Turkishness. The army crushed Kurdish revolts in the 1920s and 1930s. In response to more recent state attempts at assimilation, which included bans on Kurdish-language publications and schooling, Kurdish groups sought cultural and political autonomy. In 1984, the Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK) launched another rebellion, which the army defeated in 1999 after forcible depopulation of thousands of Kurdish villages.

Though Turkey has been a multi-party democracy since 1945, defenders of Kemalism have resorted to anti-democratic measures to stave off perceived threats to the system. The army has staged two coups, in 1960 and 1980, and two “coups by memorandum,” the last of these in 1997. Despite recent reforms, the army retains substantial independence from civilian control, and takes a hard line on the question of Cyprus, where Turkish troops have been stationed since 1974 in defiance of UN resolutions. The military also underpins the strong US-Turkish alliance. Turkey is the only Middle Eastern member of NATO.

Still another challenge is the unresolved role of Islam in the polity. The state has suppressed various kinds of religious practice, for instance banning headscarves in schools, and successive Islamist parties were arbitrarily dissolved in the 1990s.

In 2002, a “soft Islamist” successor party won a sweeping victory in parliamentary elections. Paradoxically, this party has brought Turkey closer than ever to joining the European Union—an aspiration long associated with secular forces. Today, amidst renewed fighting with the PKK, the obstacles to EU membership appear to be growing.


Facts and Figures »