Nationalism in post-1980 Turkey : with special reference to True Path Party

Abstract

Turkish political system, experiencing a process of change after World War I, has been deeply influenced by the metamorphosis of the political elite and of the all other political actors. The fact that the metamorphosis is not an ongoing linear process, the breaks that Turkish democracy faced are also the milestones of this change. 1980 military intervention, defining its raison d'etre as the lack of reconciliation among the politicians, initiated a new phase in Turkish political system. In this context, and in the context of Turkic republics proclaiming their independence one after another, PanTurkism and New-Ottomanism being discussed again, and ethnic questions coming to the agenda in Turkey and in the world, this study endeavors to investigate if and to what extent some of the political elite in the True Path Party are subscribed to ethnic rather than territorial nationalism, the latter being the nationalism conception of the Republic of Turkey from its very beginning.