Islamic Political Identity in Turkey

the role of literacy and the media in the islamic movement 125choices available for further university education for 8mam Hatip graduates, thusrendering the option much less attractive. The Ministry of Education wantedmost students to go to the state secular schools in their most critical period ofsocialization. One of the eVects of this new regulation was the relative drop inthe enrollment of students.The Wrst civilian government of Bülent Ecevit and Necmettin Erbakan, afterthe 1971 military intervention, reversed the 1971 decision, and 8mam Hatipschools were expanded to middle and high schools. After Wve years of primaryeducation, students could go to a three-year 8mam Hatip Middle School and afour-year 8mam Hatip High School. They became integrated into the regularschool system. Finally, with the Basic Law on National Education (no. 1939) ofJune 24, 1973, 8mam Hatip Schools were designated as lise (lycees) and grantedthe same accreditation as the other state schools. Article 32 of the Basic Law onNational Education changed the name 8mam Hatip school to 8mam Hatip Liseand stressed the dual functions of these schools:The 8mam Hatip high schools were established by the Ministry ofNational Education, within the secondary educational system, totrain religious functionaires who perform religious services such asbeing imams, hatips, and teaching staV of Qur’anic courses. Theseinstitutions implement a preparatory program for vocational trainingas well for higher education. 72This law broadened the curriculum and inXuence of the 8mam Hatip highschools. For instance, in addition to the basic courses in religious training, studentswere required to take the regular mandatory courses in state secular highschools. At the middle school level of 8mam Hatips, the vocational religioustraining courses constituted 20 percent of the curriculum, and the rest of the80 percent covered academic courses. 73 In the religious vocational training curriculum,the courses covered exegesis, prophetic tradition, theology, jurisprudence,and the life of the Prophet Muhammad. At the 8mam Hatip high schoollevel, vocational courses varied from 31 percent in the ninth and tenth grade to42 percent in the eleventh grade and 44 percent in the twelfth grade. Althoughthis curriculum sought to bring religious and nonreligious courses together totrain an “enlightened” religious cadre, it often was not as successful as the statewould have liked. At one level these schools tended to be dominated by conservativeteachers and usually stressed memorization over creative thinking. Fortheir Kemalist critics, these schools also came to be seen as a Trojan horse, beingthe main source of religious conservatism in Turkey. Twenty-nine 8mam Hatipschools were opened during the period of the 1974–1975 coalition governmentof Bülent Ecevit and Necmettin Erbakan. 74In the politicization of the 8mam Hatip system, Islamic associations playeda key role. These associations carried out a sustained campaign between 1973to 1997 to build new 8mam Hatip schools by collecting money and labor fromordinary people. Within unfolding Islamic activism, a new submovement wasformed with the goal of building, maintaining, and improving the 8mam Hatipeducation system. Growing political and economic capabilities of civil society