Cumhuriyet Türkiyesi'nin kuruluş sürecinde ulus-devlet?din ilişkileri (1920-1937)

Abstract

Nation-state has come out as a modernization project in Republican Turkey. The substitution of the nation-state established on nationalism and laicism for a socio-politic structure which has been shaped around the religion axis for centuries and involves religious sections has led to problems having continued so far.Nation-state and religion relations were of a multi-dimensional characteristic during the foundation period of Turkish Republic. The establishment of a nation-state was seen as the most important means of modernization. Therefore, the founding and supervising role of Islam regarded as contradictory to modernization was terminated by the founder staff of the Republic, by putting laicism practices into force. Despite the Jacobin laicism practices, the exploitation of religion in accordance with the benefits of the nation-state has never been overlooked.The founder staff deciding that the beliefs of the nation should be homogeneous as was the nation itself excluded all the religious affiliations from the public sphere instead of allowing them to be inside in equal conditions. The Kemalist elite not only excluded the religion from the public sphere but also believed in the necessity that it be under control in case it might be a hindrance on the way to a nation-state. A standard and national interpretation of Islam was tried to be developed in accordance with the secular nation-state via the Directory of Religious Affairs established as the means of nation-state to supervise the religion.In parallel with the practices of laicism, the Turkish national identity has also worn a secular appearance. The Turkish national identity has evolved into an ethnic characteristic as to the dosage of secularism. Having an ethnic and secular characteristic, the national identity described homogenously resulted in the exclusion of ethnic and religious variations, thus leading to the politics of Turkification. However, the determining role of Islam in national identity has still kept going and, even not in theory, being ?Muslim? has survived as a requirement for being a ?Turk? in practice.