Great transformation
by
MÜMTAZ’ER TÜRKÖNE

There is a normalization in relations between the military and the democratic power. This normalization paves the way for two major structural changes. The first one is the change in the structure of the nation-state. Turkey is becoming a more tolerant country based on mutual respect. The second one is the structural transformation of the economy associated with increased wealth. Based on these two solid benchmarks, it is very likely to predict what sort of election atmosphere Turkey will have after the new year and what will be the possible results of the election slated for June, as well as what sort of process will be in the new Parliament for the drafting of a new constitution. After the Eid al-Adha, or the Feast of the Sacrifice, Parliament will start on a busy agenda of budget negotiations. It is very natural for Turkey to have a frenetic election atmosphere in the new year as it will be an election year. Let’s start with the economy:

Turkey is becoming richer

The government recently started to implement a comprehensive program to support small and medium-sized enterprises and export companies. Business circles welcomed the plan. These comprehensive incentives alone are indicative of important implications. The Turkish economy is undergoing a powerful structural change. The government has taken bold steps to strengthen the foundations of the economy. Turkey is becoming richer at a pace never seen before.

Anatolia, as a region, has never seen welfare and prosperity. Poverty has always been a fate for the people in this geographic area. For the first time, this fate is changing. Thus, the prospects for getting richer should be placed first in any analysis of the transformation in Turkey.

Actually, the financial crises in 2000 and 2001 had put an end to the military tutelage system. Those who saw the state not only as a power, but also as the center of economic power and who tried to take over this power eventually went bankrupt. They soon lost the very grounds on which they kept on fighting. They wound up along with the bankrupt state. It was the bankruptcy of the collaborationist economy based on unearned income and their military accomplices. Ultimately, the state was no longer the only source of economic wealth.

For the first time, democracy emerged as a hope for economic salvation in 2002. The Justice and Development Party (AK Party) assumed the political representation of the rising power of enterprise management and reinstated and improved the political stability that was vital for the economy to survive and thrive. The rising economic power was that of Anatolian capital that is capable of production, competition and marketing under free-market conditions. For this reason, the great transformation implies in the first place a change in the dominant economic classes.

Conservative values in economy

Turkey now has strong conservative capital which values the market security that would be readily scorned and disrupted by the capital that seeks unearned income and by military tutelage.

This is the main driving force of the transformation. Capital needs a secure milieu to thrive and produce surplus value. Military interventions serve to destroy this milieu in cooperation with the capital that seeks unearned income and the collaborationist capital. This is because businesses that thrive on unearned income tend to be pro-military. Their partnership peaked during the infamous Feb. 28 process.

The emerging capital relied on conservative values that provide a reliable atmosphere as it pushed beyond its boundaries. Thus, we need to assess conservatism more as a quest for economic reliability than as a political vision. In the end, the conservative capital that ensured security and reliability of their own markets by forming organizations based on conservative values and cooperation among themselves exhibited an incredible level of dynamism. They took wing in an effort to get rid of the state’s shadow hovering over them. In this process, they gave Turkey a real boost.

Turkey’s economic structure is changing. The elites in the Turkish economy and politics are changing. The old elites have to console themselves with nostalgia and a retreat to their modest boundaries. This transformation will inevitably be accompanied by a cultural one. Emerging new classes will establish the hegemony of their own cultures. Turkey is experiencing its unique process of cultural reconstruction. Conservative values are sought to be secured via universally accepted fundamental rights and freedoms or simply in rule of law and democracy. Culture is improved by the bourgeoisie. A new culture is developing.

Nation-state

The nation-state is the typical form of state in our age. In today’s world, nations have to assume the form of a nation-state in order to survive without being eaten by other nations. You can abandon this form only after the rest of the world opts out of it. A nation-state is defined as a state that represents the will of a society of people who have acquired a sort of harmony among themselves and who are willing to share the same fate. Those who reduce a nation to a race, a culture or a religion, i.e., a reference that is supposed to be shared by everyone, will never understand the concept of nation-state. A nation is defined as a community of people who have lived together in the past and accumulated many memories and who are eager to live together in future. A state that represents the sovereignty of such a nation is a nation-state. Thus, a nation-state is based on consensual relations both among the people and between the state and the people.

Those who believe that the main problem is to ensure the survival of a nation-state now have to resort to methods that are the opposite of what they employed in the past. This is because the force that will bind the society together is no longer the uniformity of the people, but the existence of a respect for diversity. This respect is already an old and established asset of our history and culture, and it is already in our cultural genes.

What President Abdullah Gül said last week as he visited a church and a synagogue in Hatay gives the coordinates of this mentality of nation-state. “Everyone is a valuable citizen of the Turkish Republic. This land is a home, country for all of us. We are here and living together with tolerance and fraternity. Everyone may have different religious beliefs, but we are trying to improve our country through mutual respect, love and solidarity,” he said. Translated into words by the president, these sentiments are shared by what makes up a nation.

The revival of respect for diversity is an ever-growing dynamic in Turkey. For Turkey to remain in one piece and solve the Kurdish issue as its biggest problem, this dynamic must dominate the country. Now a different history will be written and read. For instance, Turkish history should be an account of how diverse cultures and beliefs managed to live together in peace, not of a past of historic Turkish heroism or glorious battles. No student should graduate from a high school if s/he does not compare the Ottoman millet system with what was in place in Europe in the same period.

The president’s visits to churches or synagogues in the country, inoculating safety into their minds, should be seen as a sign of this new dynamic. It should, at the same time, be seen as the sole method for maintaining the Turkish nation-state system.

The nation-state’s architecture has changed. Tolerance and respect for diversity make a very strong cement. This architecture -- in which differences are used as cornerstones using this cement and with inspiration from experiences -- is ready to push us toward a rich future.

A party that has managed to conduct such important structural transformations will be the undisputed favorite of the election slated for June, won’t it?