2008_10_SRP_CornellKaraveli_Turkey
2008_10_SRP_CornellKaraveli_Turkey
2008_10_SRP_CornellKaraveli_Turkey
Create successful ePaper yourself
Turn your PDF publications into a flip-book with our unique Google optimized e-Paper software.
50<br />
Svante E. Cornell and Halil Magnus Karaveli<br />
success-story, home to a religiously conservative class of entrepreneurs<br />
which has prospered by plugging into the global economy. The city has<br />
frequently been cited in Western media as proof of how religious<br />
conservatism can connect to the outside world through trade. But economic<br />
openness has so far not translated into cultural openness. Culturally, Kayseri,<br />
never cosmopolitan, is even more isolated today than it was a decade ago.<br />
There are no cinemas and theatres in the city, and the number of book-shops<br />
has decreased during the last twenty years; those few remaining only offer<br />
books on religious subjects. 30<br />
Yet, economic globalization is also a challenge to traditional religiosity. The<br />
tension between indulgence in almost hedonist consumption and<br />
preservation of piety, the simple life-style and humility traditionally<br />
prescribed by Islam, is giving rise to ideological dissensions within the<br />
Islamic movement. There is growing awareness among Turkish Islamic as<br />
well as non-Islamic intellectuals about the risk posed by materialism; if the<br />
pious, religiously anchored values that have supplied Turkish society with its<br />
principal moral glue are undermined, the relative social stability which Islam<br />
has guaranteed will evidently be at risk.<br />
Politically though, globalization has had the effect of strengthening religious<br />
conservatism. <strong>Turkey</strong>’s dependency on the global flows of capital and<br />
investment has sensitized the secularist establishment, not least the military,<br />
to the expectations and demands of international actors. In fact, the Turkish<br />
General Staff has never staged an intervention without being sanctioned by<br />
the United States. The fact that the generals, albeit probably grudgingly,<br />
have had to reconcile themselves with the continued rule of the AKP owes a<br />
lot to the expectations of and to the pressures exerted by the international<br />
environment. At a time when Washington seeks to stabilize Iraq and<br />
Afghanistan, and when Iran looms as a challenge, instability in <strong>Turkey</strong>, as a<br />
result of the closure of the ruling party, would of course have been<br />
unwelcome from an American perspective.<br />
30 Kadri Gürsel, “Merak edilecek bir kent”, [A city worth interest], Milliyet, 29 June<br />
<strong>2008</strong>.<br />
(http://www.milliyet.com.tr/Yazdir.aspx?aType=HaberDetayPrint&ArticleID=88751<br />
2)