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The democratization process can be successful only if it is conducted simultaneously in several areas. This process, often described as the Kurdish and the Alevi initiatives, intends to soften the collision of facts of belonging to different ethnic and religious groups and of being a citizen of this country.
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The habits of living as a nation “created” by the state are strong. Every institution, legal procedure and bureaucratic mechanism as well as the mentality of civil servants has been forged from this perspective. The priority has always been given to the state, and individuals were appreciated more the closer the stood by the state and supported it. Policies were based on the state’s interests instead of the citizens’ well-being. Nobody had the chance to understand how these “interests” were designated as no one had enough information to discuss the threats to national interests. Knowing what is threatening national interests without understanding what these very interests are has become a national reflex, just as individuals have developed the habit of repeating well-memorized formulas, convinced that these are their authentic thoughts. But it appears that some of these frequently repeated “opinions” did not leave much of a mark after all, maybe because some of them were obviously not credible. That’s why, once the spirit of the initiative was put in place, people poured out every feeling they had kept hidden until now. A system based on the citizens’ well-being can only be established if protecting the citizens becomes the main focus, but such a system means the serious transformation of the military, the judiciary, higher education, the security services and diplomacy. As in every situation in which a transformation is needed, the resistance of some actors is expected. Such resistance aims to block the transformation of the basic mentalities and to obstruct the needed legal and administrative reforms. This blocking helps neither democratization nor the preservation of the old authoritarian tendencies, it only creates turmoil. Additionally, when one tries to put well-being, peace and cooperation at the center of its foreign policy, a similar approach is needed in the domestic political scene, too. Hence, Turkey needs to undergo domestic transformation while seeking to restructure its political, economic and cultural relations with its near neighbors. The public seems to be quite convinced that these foreign policy initiatives should be pursued because they see that they will assure concrete benefits. Besides, almost everyone is quite aware that a foreign policy based on antagonism and military tension will not help anyone. However, many people do not see how the improvement of the situation of Kurds, Alevis, non-Muslims, gays or women would improve the overall situation of the country. Besides, the government’s rhetoric about becoming a more democratic country is sometimes perceived as simply a political tactic to get more votes. In fact, this would be natural for a political party. Nevertheless, claiming that the democratization issue is only a political party’s electoral rhetoric runs the risk of transforming this process into a classic political struggle. This can also give the impression that all these debates have nothing to do with ordinary people and that they are just some kind of quarrel between the government and the judiciary or the military. That is the reason why it will be very difficult to accomplish the democratization process unless non-Kurds and non-Alevis support the Kurdish and the Alevi initiatives and unless NGOs and individuals from different backgrounds do their bit.
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| 18 November 2009, Wednesday |
| BERİL DEDEOĞLU |
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Benzer Haberler 
