Secularist Demonstrations and Democracy-Coated Militarism in Turkey

Despite bringing about Turkey's most comprehensive democratization reform in its history, the conservative (yet progressive) Justice and Development Party (JDP) was subjected to heavy criticism by the state institutions due to the presidential candidacy of Abdullah Gül, the country's Minister of Foreign Affairs, and former Prime Minister. Although an accomplished diplomat known for his moderate views, Gül became a persona non grata since his wife wore the Muslim headscarf, which, according to the Kemalist elite, is a symbol of political Islam and thus incompatible with the country's secularist character.

The first reaction to Gül's candidacy came from the Turkish military in the form of a harsh warning, which implied a threat of intervention. After a short while, Kemalist circles organized new legs of huge demonstrations to protest a prospective JDP-elected president. These demonstrations were, from one viewpoint, a reflection of widespread concerns about secularism, which is the foremost defining characteristic of the Turkish regime. But from another, they were examples of mass mobilization to produce a political cul-de-sac in the country's path of democratization.

Democracy-Coated Militarism?

In their academic article "Democratization and the Danger of War," Edward Mansfield and Jack Snyder argue that developments such as "social change, institutional weakness, and threatened interests tend to produce a political impasse along the route toward democracy." Under the above 'threatened interests' context, Mansfield and Snyder demonstrate how, in the periods of democratization, "threatened elite groups have an overwhelming incentive to mobilize allies among the mass of people … using whatever special resources they still retain." The following (edited) excerpts from the article clearly explain the recent phenomena in Turkish politics:

• Elites mobilize mass support to neutralize mass threats.


• By mass mobilization, elites aim to maintain their ability to use the control of traditional political institutions to shape the political agenda and to structure the terms of political bargains.


• The elite mobilization of mass groups takes place in a highly competitive setting.


• When autocratic states start to democratize, many of the interests threatened by democratization are military in nature.


• A nearly universal element in these ideological appeals is nationalism, which has the advantage of positing a community of interest that unites elites and masses.

It is a well-established fact that, in the last couple of years, retired members of the Turkish Armed Forces tend to associate themselves with the concept of kuvva-i milliye, the legendary militia forces that fought the Turkish War of Independence in the early 1920s. Pro-kuvva ex-soldiers have founded a network of NGOs, employed grassroots efforts nationwide, and registered a large number of members. Some of the new-member-ceremonies that leaked to the media included pledges to kill traitors, since the new kuvva movement intended to not only influence public opinion but also fight the enemy within. The main agenda of this new neo-nationalist (ulusalcı) network includes: opposition to Turkey's EU membership for sovereignty reasons, opposition to privatization and foreign investments, and glorification of Mustafa Kemal Atatürk as a national hero.

This new-born neo-nationalist movement was highly influential in the recent mass mobilization efforts in Turkey – strongly implying that the supposedly democratic reactions against the elected JDP government can very well have a hidden agenda. At this point, it should not be overlooked that the reforms introduced by the JDP in order to bring the Turkish political system into line with the Copenhagen Criteria not only entailed an "enhanced civilian control of the military" but also constituted the biggest deviation from the Kemalist political tradition in the country's history. Since the Turkish Armed Forces considers protecting the Kemalist political tradition one of its major raisons d'être, it is highly questionable as to whether it will acquiesce to the consequences of democratization in Turkey. A careful reading of the secularist demonstrations can help with the answer to this question.

On the face of things, the huge demonstrations seemed to be merely secularist in character, yet a strongly nationalist, pro-military and anti-EU discourse was also equally existent. Furthermore, it is very hard not to notice that the main organizer of the rallies, the Association of Atatürkist Thinking, is headed by a retired general who allegedly planned a coup when in office in 2004. In all, the recent developments in Turkey deserve to be examined also under the 'democratization' context with a special focus on the 'mass mobilization' phenomenon that Mansfield and Snyder point out. As the European Commission acknowledged in its 2004 progress report, "the Armed Forces in Turkey [still] continue to exercise influence through a series of informal channels," and the analyses that ignore this fact and base their results on inadequate information are doomed to be misleading.