Rise of political Islam in Turkey

Abstract

The main concern of this essay is to study the rise of Political Islam in Turkey and to find out its impact on Turkey’s internal political development and its European Union (EU) membership aspirations both currently and during the transformation period. It is still an open topic of discussion for many scholars: some of them argue that rise of Political Islam in Turkey is a negative phenomenon which brings to the distortion of internal state balance as well as to the worsening of Turkey-EU relations, others argue the opposite. I am inclined to the first argument and by this essay I will try to defend the argument. The essay will give a full description of the two central concepts for this study: secularism and Political Islam. Then it will give some historical overview on the establishment of the new Turkish Republic (since 1920s), elaborating on Turkey’s secularization or sometimes called Westernization period, to show the role secularization played in Turkey’s modern nation-state building. The essay will discuss about the rise of Political Islam in Turkey (since 1980s), the way Islamization of the Turkish society is reached, the challenges it brings for Turkey. It will look at the influence of Political Islam on the balance between Turkey’s secular and religious forces (between Kemalist elites and new emerging social groups) to find out its impact on Turkey’s internal political development. Also it will look at the impact of Political Islam on Turkey’s relations with the EU, trying to find out whether it has a negative or positive influence on them.