Islamic Political Identity in Turkey

74 islamic political identity in turkeydeWne the existential threats to the state and maintain the parameters of theKemalist system above and around the governments. In Turkey, the militaryrather than the people or their elected representatives is the ultimate sovereignin the deWning of security threats. This conXation of the state with military autonomyand interests has eVectively militarized the state and turned the stateinto a security agent. The military’s understanding of Kemalism as a “modernization”project to create a secular and national society supposedly justiWes itsautonomy. As the protector and executioner of modernization projects, themilitary deWnes secularism and nationalism as the two pillars of the Kemalistmodernization project. It views any challenge to secularism and nationalism withsuspicion and frames them as “antimodern” reactionism and “divisive.” 55 Institutionally,Turkish military oYcers are well educated and have a corporate identityand sense of mission to be “guardians of Kemalism.” They are recruitedmostly from the lower and middle classes, and as cadets in the military highschool from age 13, they are indoctrinated in the Kemalist dogma of a secular(that is, a nonreligious), national (Turkish), and Western-looking Turkey. Thiscorporate military identity, which includes professionalism, guardianship, anddistaste of civilian politicians, has an inherent impetus to “guard and guide” thesociety and prevent the formation of independent power centers outside thecontrol of the state. 56In addition to the NSC, the new constitution granted authority to the presidentto make appointments to the Higher Education Council (YÖK: YüksekÖ;retim Kurumu), dissolve the Parliament, appoint justices to the ConstitutionalCourt and the Military Court of Appeals, and appoint all members of the SupremeCouncil of Judges. 57 The constitution also prohibited any connectionamong trade unions, professional associations, interest groups, and politicalparties. Furthermore, since much of the pre-1980 ideological violence had beencentered around university campuses, the coup leaders created the YÖK withthe goal of purging left-leaning professors and centralizing the curriculum andadministration of the universities. The YÖK also had the power to hire and Wrefaculty, determine curriculum and research agendas, and set the dress code forfaculty and students. 58The 1982 constitution demonstrates that the Turkish military, despite itssurface-level reforms, was not interested in shedding its real power as the sovereignguarantor of the state and Kemalist ideology in favor of a true civiliandemocratic government. In response to the totalitarian vision of the state—itsintervention in every aspect of social life—as formulated in the 1982 constitution,social groups reacted with liberal agendas, demanding free spaces and nostate control of the economy and education. This liberal reaction unleashed anew debate about the legitimate boundaries between the state and society andbetween the individual and society. This new post-1980 political and economicsetting eventually facilitated the activities of Islamic groups and SuW orders.The military wanted to have a regulated and gradual transition to electoralpolitics. They therefore barred over seven hundred ex-politicians from politicsfor a period of Wve to ten years. The NSC empowered itself to screen new politicalparties and candidates and legalized only 3 of 17 parties that applied for par-