Kenan Evren's and Turgut Özal's conceptualizations of secularism : a comparative perspective

Abstract

Present study aims to analyze in a comparaiive perspective. Kenan Evren's and Turgut Özal's conceptualizations of secularism. beaı-ing in mind the nature of secularism and the role of religion in the Turkish polity have changed significantly in the 1 980s and the early 1990s. For Evren, secularism is not only a guarantee of the religious freedam and conscience but also it protects Turkish national unity. But Özal puts an emphasis on the freedam side of secularism and on the protection of the rights of pious Muslims. As a paraBel development to the saftening of the Kemalist secularism in the !980s, Isiarn seems to have a function of civil religion for both Evren and Özal but with the difference that while the former emphasizes the moral side of Islam, the latter considers Islam as a ci\ril societal mntter and tries to harmanize religious values with democratic political Yalues. The study is also intended to show the influence of Ziya Gökalp's system of thought to both Evren's and Özal's conceptualization of secularism.