The Clash of Kemalisms? Reflections on the Past and Present Politics of Kemalism in Turkish Political Discourse
2008; Taylor & Francis; Volume: 9; Issue: 1 Linguagem: Inglês
10.1080/14683840701814034
ISSN1743-9663
Autores Tópico(s)Weber, Simmel, Sociological Theory
ResumoAbstract This essay focuses on the question of how to make sense of the salience of Kemalism today. Building on Max Weber’s notion of charisma and Laclau and Mouffe’s concept of hegemony, it suggests viewing Kemalism as a chain of discourses that have both charismatic and hegemonic aspects. It is suggested that the way in which Kemalism is interpreted by political actors and the dynamics between its contesting interpretations are more relevant than the original charismatic and hegemonic aspects of this ideology for understanding its significance today. It is argued that the present period does not represent the dissolution of Kemalist hegemony, as argued by some, but that it can best be understood in terms of the resurfacing clash between the security‐centered and the democracy‐centered interpretations of Kemalism. Notes 1. Suna Kili, Kemalism (Istanbul: Menteş Matbaası, 1969), p.4. 2. Max Weber, The Theory of Social and Economic Organization, trans. T. Parsons and A.M. Anderson (New York: Free Press, 1964), pp.358–9. 3. Ibid. 4. Ibid., p.359. 5. See Baran Dural, Atatürk’ün Liderlik Sırları [Secrets of Atatürk’s Leadership] (Istanbul: Okumuş Adam, 2002), p.48. See also, for instance, Cemal Kutay, Atatürk Bugün Olsaydı [If Only Atatürk Were Alive] (Istanbul: İklim Yayıncılık, 2004); Turgut Özakman, 19 Mayıs 1919: Atatürk Yeniden Samsun’da [Atatürk is in Samsun Again] (Ankara: Bilgi Yayınevi, 2002); Bedia Akarsu, Atatürk Devrimi ve Temelleri [Atatürk’s Revolution and Its Bases] (Istanbul: İnkilap Kitapevi, 1995); Şerafettin Turan, Mustafa Kemal Atatürk: Kendine Özgü bir Yaşam ve Kişilik [Mustafa Kemal Atatürk: A Distinctive Life and Personality] (Ankara: Bilgi Yayınevi, 2004). 6. Akarsu (1995), p.94. 7. Recep Tayyip Erdoğan, “Erdoğan’in KKTC Ziyareti” [Erdoğan’s TRNC Visit], available at http://www.akparti.org.tr (accessed November 16, 2002). 8. “Yeni Bir Başlangıç, CHP 2002 Seçim Bildirgesi” [A New Beginning, the Election Declaration of the CHP in 2002], available at http://www.chp.org.tr. 9. Ibid. 10. Quoted in Enver Ziya Karal, Atatürk ve Devrim (Ankara: ODTÜ, 1998), pp.56–7. 11. Ergun Aybars, “Kemalizm ve AB” [Kemalism and the EU], Kemalist Düşünce E‐Dergisi, April 3, 2003, available at http://www.haberdunyasi.net. 12. “A General Speaks His Mind,” Economist, March 16, 2002. 13. Quoted in “Turkish General Causes Controversy with Call for Turkey to Stop Seeking EU Membership,” Eurasia Insight, March 13. 2002. 14. Here the term “securitize” refers to the speech act by which some issues are made to be a security issue. This suggests that although an action or an event to provide the grounds for its dangerousness is an important factor in considering a particular phenomenon as dangerous, the process by which some events are regarded as more dangerous than others is not limited to that objective condition. As Copenhagen School scholars Ole Wæver, Barry Buzan, and Jaap de Wilde observed, economic, political, societal, or environmental problems may also constitute security problems as long as they are introduced as an existential threat to a designated object. According to the “securitization” theory developed by them, an issue becomes a security issue; in other words, is securitized, not necessarily because a genuine existential threat exists but because the issue is presented as such. See Ole Wæver, Barry Buzan and Jaap de Wilde, Security: A New Framework for Analysis (Boulder: Lynne Rienner, 1998), p.24. 15. Ernesto Laclau and Chantal Mouffee, Hegemony and Socialist Strategy (London: Verso, 1985), p.111. 16. John Thompson, Studies in the Theory of Ideology (Cambridge and Oxford: Polity Press, 1990), p.4. 17. See especially Cengiz Candar, “Atatürk’s Ambiguous Legacy,” The Wilson Quarterly, Vol.22, No. 4 (September 2002), pp. 88–96; M. Hakan Yavuz, “Turkey’s Fault Lines and the Crisis of Kemalism,” Current History, Vol. 99 (January 2000), pp.33–8. 18. Arie M. Oostlander, “Report on Turkey’s Application for Membership of the European Union,” European Parliament Session Document, May 20, 2003, available at http://www.deltur.cec.eu.int/english/oostlander.html. 19. For further information on how hegemony is sought see especially Q. Hoare and G.N. Smith (eds.), Selection from Prison Notebooks (London: Lawrence and Wishard, 1991). 20. Nur Betül Çelik, “The Constitution and Dissolution of the Kemalist Imaginary,” in David Howarth, Aletta J. Norval and Yannis Stavrakakis (eds.), Discourse Theory and Political Analysis: Identities, Hegemonies, and Social Change (Manchester and New York: Manchester University Press, 2000), p.193. 21. Louse Phillips, “Hegemony and Political Discourse: The Lasting Impact of Thatcherism,” Sociology, Vol.32, No.4 (November 1998), p.847. 22. Stuart Hall, Thatcherism and the Crisis of the Left: The Hard Road to Renewal (London: Verso, 1988), p.7. 23. From this perspective, Kemalism can be regarded as a hegemonic discourse, not in accomplishing an ideological domination but in attempting to “fix” the political order. Based on this view, the emergence of counter‐hegemonic discourses cannot be shown as evidence of Kemalism’s dissolution. 24. While Kemalism may be considered a pragmatic approach in coping with the problems of building an independent, unitary, national, and secular state from the ruins of a theocratic empire in a multiethnic society and was later used to represent diverging political views, according to Suna Kili, there is a frame of reference to which Atatürk and his closest associates subscribed. Kili lists the following as the most important: full independence, total commitment to modernization, civic nationalism, changing the identity of the Turkish state from that of the Ottoman Empire to the Republic of Turkey, and grounding the new regime on popular sovereignty. See Kili (1969), p.4. 25. Michele Barrett, The Politics of Truth: From Marx to Foucault (Oxford: Polity Press, 1991), p.66. 26. Laclau and Mouffee (1985), p.105. 27. For a discussion on the translatability of different discourses with one another, see Thomas Diez, “Speaking ‘Europe’: The Politics of The Politics of Integration Discourse,” Journal of European Public Policy, Vol.6, No.4 (1999), pp.598–613. 28. Süleyman Demirel, “Milli İradeye Karşı Olanlar Var” [There Are Some Who Are Against the National Will], in Süleyman Demirel, Başbakan ve Adalet Partisi Başkanı, Seçim Konuşmaları II [Süleyman Demirel, Prime Minister and the Head of the Justice Party, Election Speeches II] (Ankara: Doğuş Yayınları, 1966), p.25. 29. Süleyman Demirel, Büyük Türkiye (Istanbul: Dergah Yayınları, 1975), p.96, cited in Ümit Cizre Sakallıoğlu, AP‐Ordu İlişkileri: Bir İkilemin Anatomisi [The Relations between the JP and the Military: An Anatomy of a Dilemma] (Istanbul: Şefik Matbaası, 1993), p.39. 30. Demirel, “‘Süleyman Demirel’ in 9.10.1975’te Tekirdağ’da Verdiği Konuşma” [Speech Delivered by Süleyman Demirel on 9.10.1975 in Tekirdağ], in Süleyman Demirel, Milliyetçiler Birleşiniz [Süleyman Demirel, Nationalists, Unite] (Ankara: Güneş Matbaası, 1976), p.200. The same remark was also made in his speech delivered in Zonguldak on October 8, 1975 (see ibid., p.186). In his radio speech for the upcoming elections, on May 31, 1977, the general secretary of the Justice Party also made a parallel statement: “The CHP has embarked upon a leftist adventure and turned into a socialist and internationalist.” See AP Radyo Konuşmaları [The AP Radio Speeches] (Ankara: Başbakanlık Basımevi, 1977), p.41. 31. Evren, “1981 Atatürk Yılının Başlaması Dolayısıyla TBMM’de Düzenlenen Törende Yaptıkları Konuşma” [Statement Delivered in the Great National Assembly of Turkey on the Occasion of the Ceremony Organized for the Inauguration of 1981 as the Atatürk Year] (January 5, 1981), in Türkiye Cumhuriyeti Devlet Başkanı Orgeneral Kenan Evren’in Söylev ve Demeçleri [Speeches and Statements of General Kenan Evren] (Ankara: TBMM Basımevi, 1987), pp.120–1. 32. Evren, “Financial Times Gazetesi Muhabirinin Sorularına Verdikleri Cevaplar” [His Responses to the Questions of a Journalist from Financial Times] (April 18, 1981), ibid., p.241. The “September 12” in the speech refers to the military coup that took place on September 12, 1980, when the Turkish Armed Forces took over the administration of the country and dissolved the parliament by invoking their right to intervene and restore order in reaction to the incompetency of the previous coalitional governments in coping with the extreme polarization and fragmentation in Turkish politics in the late 1970s that led to armed clashes between the organized left and the militant right‐wing groups. For further information, see Feroz Ahmad, The Making of Modern Turkey (London and New York: Routledge, 1993), pp.176–83. 33. See, for example, Evren (1987), pp.118–20. 34. Çelik (2000), p.197. 35. T.C. M.B.K. Direktifi ve Temel Gorüşleri [The Directives and the Main Views of the National Unity Committee of the Turkish Republic] (Ankara: Maarif Matbaası, 1960), pp.1–11. 36. Ibid., p.41. 37. Necmettin Erbakan, Refah Partisi Savunması [The Defense of the Welfare Party] (Istanbul: Fast Yayıncılık, 1997), p.90. 38. Ibid., p.109. Similar speeches Erbakan delivered in parliament are also cited in the document. See ibid., pp.111–14. 39. It must be added here that these accusations were also based on the party’s allowing female bureaucrats to wear headscarves in the office, using PKK colors in one of the party’s logos, and condoning some members of the party for delivering overtly anti‐Kemalist and pro‐Shari’a speeches in public. Soon after, on February 28, 1997, the National Security Council announced its adoption of 18 measures designed to stem the perceived growth of Islamism in Turkey, declaring Islamic fundamentalism as the most serious threat to the Republic and Atatürk reforms and obliging Prime Minister Erbakan to sign the recommendations, which in due course contributed to banning the political activities of the Welfare Party for attempting to forge an Islamic‐based state and divide national unity. 40. Vural Savaş, Refah Partisi İddianamesi ve Mütalaası [The Indictment of the Welfare Party and its Analysis] (Istanbul: Fast Yayıncılık, 1997), pp.14–15. 41. Ibid., p.33. 42. Ibid., p.43. 43. Ibid., p.14. This paradoxical attempt to dominate a domain that was to be eliminated from politics revealed that Islam was seen as an impediment to modernization and a serious threat to the central political authority. This was because, as Binnaz Toprak argues, following the foundation of the Republic, the only relevant competitor to the nation and to state‐building of the single‐party period was the traditional legitimization of public activities: in the context of 1920s and 1930s Turkey, this meant Islam. Hence, not only the separation of the religious affairs from the state affairs but also the exclusion of the Islamist discourse from the political sphere became a natural corollary to the principle of secularism. See Binnaz Toprak, “The Religious Right,” in I.C. Schick and A.E. Tonak (eds.), Turkey in Transition (New York: Oxford University Press, 1987), p.462. 44. A few more remarks should be made here regarding the differences between Turkish secularism and Western secularism. Unlike Christianity, for instance, Islam has a theological insistence on integrating the political within the religious realm. In this sense, it has the potential power of replacing both secular ideology and the secular political authority. See ibid. The implementation of Western secularism was easier because the Catholic Church, as an autonomous institution, could carry out its religious functions independently of the state. However, as religion and the state were so intertwined during the Ottoman rule, separating religion from the state affairs in 1921 was a momentous achievement. For further discussion about the role of religion in the Ottoman state and secularism in Turkey, see Şerif Mardin, “Religion and Secularism in Turkey,” in Özbudun and Kazancıgil (eds.), Atatürk, the Founder of a Modern State (London: C. Hurst, 1981), pp.204–60. 45. Savaş (1997), p.15. 46. See Erdoğan, “07.11.2002 Erdoğan Pearson Gorüşmesi” [07.11.2002 Meeting between Erdoğan and Pearson], November 7, 2002, available at http://www.akparti.org.tr. See also Erdoğan, “Hiç bir Partinin Devamı Değiliz” [We Are Not a Continuation of Any Party], May 4, 2003, ibid. 47. Erdoğan, “Türkiye’de şu Anda Maalesef Tam Sağlıklı bir Demokrasi Yaşamıyoruz” [We Cannot Unfortunately Live a Healthy Democracy in Turkey Now], December 25, 2002, ibid. 48. “Herşey Türkiye İçin,” “AK Parti Seçim Beyannamesi” [‘Everything is for Turkey,’ the Election Declaration of the Justice and Development Party], ibid., pp.6–7. 49. Ibid., pp.8–9. 50. Erdoğan, “Başbakan Erdoğan Eskişehir’de” [The Prime Minister Erdoğan is in Eskişehir], March 4, 2004, ibid. 51. Deniz Baykal, “Baykal’ın Grup Konuşması” [Group Talk of Deniz Baykal], April 25, 2006, available at http://www.chp.org.tr. 52. Ibid. 53. “Sumru Çörtoğlu’ndan Laiklik ve İrtica Uyarısı” [A Warning from Sumru Çörtoğlu on Secularism and Obstructionism], available at http://www.haber3.com/haber.php?haber_id=236810.
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