One can observe various changes occurring within the legal framework concerning citizenship throughout Republican history. This legal framework was debated, criticized and amended in numerous times because of the concerns related with modernization, Westernization, and Europeanization (Soyarık 2005, İnce 2012). More specifically, the emergence of identity politics embodied in the demands of recognition by Kurdish minority, Alevi community and headscarf issue of the pious women was critical amongst the challenges to the foundations of Turkish citizenship conceptualization. While Kurds has demanded to be recognized as a distinct ethnic group, Alevis have asked accommodation of their religious practices by the state. Epitomized in the headscarf issue, pious individuals demanded their religious identity to be included in public sphere (İçduygu et al. 1999: 201-202).
Emergence of such demands in the post-1980 era indicated a significant challenge against the legitimacy of strong state in Turkey (Keyman and İçduygu 2003: 223). The plurality of identity claims demonstrated the need for a reconfiguration of state and society relations. Within that framework, EU accession process emerged as an external anchor through which demands for institutional and legal reforms were voiced.
The most prominent challenge was posed by the Kurdish minority in Turkey (Yeğen 2004: 53). As the foundations of the Turkish citizenship conceptualization denotes a specific ethnicity, i.e. Turkishness, to its members in terms of the practice of citizenship, it has created a particular identity in the minds of citizens, which lead them to associate their status with a singular national identity. Being excluded from this official definition of the ideal citizen since the beginning of the Republic, mobilization of Kurdish minorities’ demands for recognition have forced a new citizenship definition to be instilled. These demands have challenged not only the identity aspect of the official conceptualization, but also the top-down outlook concerning the state-society relations. More specifically, although citizenship by definition separates demos from outsiders,
grassroots mobilization for recognition of rights and liberties carries the potential to change the scope of demos. Hence, such mobilization disputes the omnipresence of state in terms of granting rights and liberties and suggests that citizenship is also a status of recognition that is demanded by different groups, who were excluded in practice.
The issue, then, is whether the state and the official understanding of citizenship have been capable of meeting those challenges. İnce (2012: 7-9) argues that Turkish citizenship, which is characterized “on the basis of a single religion and single language”, needs to be redefined by divorcing from nationality in order to address the demands posed by ethnic minorities. A similar observation was made by Kadıoğlu (2007: 291) where she argues that the legal framework that regulates citizenship in Turkey has relatively “denationalized” through “a move towards group-differentiated citizenship” via the legal and institutional reforms initiated by the EU accession process. In other words, political mobilization of identity demands by Kurds and other minority groups and the impact of EU process as an anchor for democratic reforms contributed to relative denationalization of Turkish citizenship.
In addition to the domestic identity demands reinforced by the EU-motivated legal reforms, external issues such as increasing international migration have caused observable changes in the citizenship understanding. For instance, İçduygu et al. (1999: 198) argue that, international migration had resulted in individuals becoming members to more than one nation state. More specifically, the status of guest workers residing in Europe who had become members of these countries have influenced the Turkish policy makers’ take on citizenship. The status of these individuals has forced policy makers to enlarge the scope of laws regulating dual citizenship in order to establish and strengthen links with nationals living abroad. The outcome was the legalization of dual citizenship in 1981 (Keyman and İçduygu 2003, cited in Kadirbeyoğlu 2009:421). Yet, because of the fact that German citizenship law of the time was prohibiting dual citizenship, another solution was offered by the Turkish Parliament in 1995: a special non-citizen status for the Turkish emigrants in Germany, so-called the “pink card” (Kadirbeyoğlu 2009: 423). Pink card provided a privileged non-citizen status those immigrants so that they can reside, acquire private property, inherit, open businesses and work in Turkey, while it did not grant voting rights (Kadirbeyoğlu 2009: 423).
During the parliamentary debates, some of the members of the parliament criticized this offer by arguing that such a status would encourage “Armenians, Jews, Rums”, who had renounced their Turkish citizenship rights, to reclaim this status
(Kadirbeyoğlu 2009: 424). Kadirbeyoğlu argues that such a reaction shows that arguments concerning dual citizenship or special non-citizenship status were not designed to make Turkish citizenship more inclusive; they were specifically aimed at Turkish emigrants. In addition, this example displays the continuity of the exclusionary logic.
A similar perspective of exclusionary logic coupled with utilitarianism was in place when the Bulgarian Turks were granted Turkish nationality, when there were no policies regarding the immigrants in Turkey (Kadirbeyoğlu 2009:425). The process of accepting Bulgarian Turks into the Turkish citizenry was related with the changing foreign policy priorities; Bulgarian Turks’ mass migration and acquisition of Turkish citizenship in 1989 was framed in terms of “kinship”, while in 1991 Iraqi refugees, composed mostly of Kurds, were made to wait at the gates (Danış and Parla 2009: 139). The kinship argument granted a privileged status to Bulgarian Turks in 1989 while practicing the exclusionary logic in the case of Iraqi Kurds. Yet, Danış and Parla (2009: 141) point out that this privileged status itself is being affected by changing priorities in political and economic spheres, which causes any privilege to be fictitious and temporary. In fact, later Bulgarian Turk migrants were not incorporated into the citizenship regime as swiftly as the 1989 migrants (Danış and Parla 2009: 142).
It was during 2000s when the citizenship understanding imposed by 1982 Constitution started to change. As the EU accession process was considered as a political goal during early 2000s by the AKP governments, various legal changes were carried out to meet Copenhagen political criteria for membership. For instance, with the amendment of Article 13, “safeguarding the indivisible integrity of the state with its territory and nation” was no longer a ground for restriction of fundamental rights and liberties (İnce 2012: 142). In addition, children of Turkish mothers and foreign fathers are now granted citizenship with the amendment in Article 66, where previously only those with Turkish fathers had the privilege. Also, in 2008, conscientious objection was removed from the grounds for loss of citizenship. Yet this change did not alter the Criminal Code and Military Service Law which effectively penalize conscientious objection. In fact, military courts have continued to sentence conscientious objectors albeit numerous decisions of the European Court of Human Rights convicting Turkey for violating Article 9 of the European Convention of Human Rights4.
4 Such cases include Ülke, Erçep, and Savda, decisions which are discussed in detail in ECtHR fact sheet on this
The most significant change was the amendment made in 2004, which provided precedence to international agreements in cases concerning fundamental rights and liberties when disputes occur between domestic and international law. This amendment was an outcome of the EU process and signified a shift in the state-oriented outlook to a more rights-based one in terms of Turkish citizenship. In 2007, AKP government initiated a process for a new constitution. The draft was clearly more liberal in terms of citizenship definition and rights and liberties. Buried under heavy criticism, this process was short- lived. In other words, understanding of citizenship in legal and educational spheres did not experience a complete overhaul to meet challenges posed by mobilization of identity demands and EU membership process.
These examples demonstrate how Turkish citizenship framework has tried to absorb internal and external challenges in a “pragmatic” manner (Kadirbeyoğlu 2009: 426). In the case of dual citizenship, for instance, this pragmatic outlook has forced political actors to relax the affinity between national identity and citizenship status due to economic concerns related with Turkish emigrants in Europe. In other cases, such as the partial recognition of identity demands by Kurds, Alevis or non-Muslim groups, the changes in the legal framework have happened due to the pressures to conform to the international standards (Kadirbeyoğlu 2009: 431-432). At the same time, there is still an underlying exclusionary outlook which coincides with the pragmatic perspective.
These changes and continuities happen in a context where political landscape is influenced by mobilization of demands and alternative conceptualizations by outsider groups. It can be argued that political actors have an influence over how these demands are organized and mobilized, as well as how they are received. As political parties are agents of mobilization of demands in the society, one can establish links between positions of political parties and the changes and continuities discussed in this section. For instance, Dalton (2009) argues for correspondence of certain understanding of citizenship with political party preferences, while Coffé and Bolzendahl (2011, 2013) point out to the emphases political parties put on specific citizenship rights and liberties, which are reflected in the perceptions of supporters of these political parties. These studies suggest that there is a link between how citizens understand citizenship, their party preferences and parties’ positions on citizenship and corresponding rights and liberties. Turkish political party landscape can also be analyzed through such a perspective, which will be discussed in the Chapter 4.
The next section will analyze the existent literature on perceptions in Turkey and its findings before moving on the changing positions of political parties. The reason is that the existent literature on perceptions confirm the impact of the official understanding of citizenship while introducing demographic characteristics as determinants of perceptions. This study’s contribution, which concerns the political party preferences, will be analyzed in depth in Chapter 6.
2.5 Research on Citizenship Perceptions in Turkey
The foundations of Turkish citizenship had defined the ideal citizen as someone who is loyal to the state and nation, passive in terms of the claims towards rights and liberties while burdened by duties, and has a specific ethnic and religious identity. Reflections of this particular definition have been depicted in the relevant legal framework and in the civics education textbooks. Recognition claims and rights-based demands emerging from ethnic and religious groups in addition to the impact of external factors such as the EU accession process have influenced various changes in this official standpoint, yet they are still short of introducing a new definition of citizenship divorced from national identity, loyalty to the state and excessive emphasis on duties. In fact, some aspects of the official framework on Turkish citizenship are still intact despite the internal and external challenges.
Citizens’ own understanding of their status, rights, liberties, and duties is another sphere where one can trace the impact of the official understanding of citizenship. Investigating perceptions of citizenship provides clues about the way in which individuals understand the state and society relations, as well as their level of internalization of the official understanding through laws and school textbooks. Even though there are numerous studies on the foundations of Turkish citizenship and the changes and continuities regarding the citizenship regime in Turkey, there are not many works on the actual perceptions of citizens themselves within the mainstream political science literature on this subject.
One of the rare works that investigates citizenship perceptions in Turkey is Birol Caymaz’s (2007) work. Caymaz conducted a field research to analyze the perceptions of Turkish citizens regarding their citizenship in general. For this endeavor, the field
research questions are grouped into three categories: what citizenship means for actual citizens, feeling as a citizen, and rights and liberties.
Considering citizenship as a societal role, Caymaz (2007:4) argues that it is important to understand citizens’ own perception of their roles, statuses, rights and liberties. To trace the roots of dominant conception of citizenship in Turkish state discourse, Caymaz (2007) examines national education textbooks, namely Yurt Bilgisi, which was used during early Republican era, Yurttaşlık Bilgisi which was used between 1950s and 1980s, and Vatandaşlık Bilgisi Ana Ders Kitabı, which was used after 1986. Through these textbooks, Caymaz traces the ongoing themes in citizenship education in the state discourse within the scope of changes in the political landscape of Turkey.
Caymaz argues that, especially during the early Republican era, citizenship education had a political function in terms of establishing the notion of nationhood and a particular understanding of citizenship, with heavy emphasis on duties. In other words, education materials of that era displayed the state’s own understanding of citizenship because education itself was a medium of constructing the Turkish citizen, who is passive and realizing himself through the sense of belonging to the nation. Thus, Turkish citizenship was taught as duty-oriented bond, with an explicit emphasis on Turkish ethnic identity. As a result, any other ethnic and religious identity was suppressed in this process of construction of Turkish citizenship. Caymaz concludes this investigation by arguing that there is continuity in the state discourse, although some of these textbooks are no longer in use. This continuity displays itself in the hierarchical relationship between citizen and the state, in which citizen is defined and constructed by the state (Caymaz 2007:57). Caymaz’s observations on the depiction of Turkish citizen in school textbooks are in line with the previous works on this subject (Üstel 2004, Oğuz 2005).
Caymaz starts his empirical research right at this point. He investigates the understanding of citizenship, which is constructed as a role by the official discourse in education materials, among ordinary citizens in Turkey. Through in depth interviews, he analyzes how ordinary citizens perceive and perform that role. Between 2003 and 2004, Caymaz constructed 61 in-depth interviews and 450 surveys. Results of his research are grouped into three categories: (1) What do citizens associate citizenship with? (2) How and when do they feel as citizens? (3) What do citizens understand from their rights and liberties?
Caymaz’s empirical research finds out that respondents with low level of education associate citizenship with duties and they do not refer to rights when asked about the
meaning of citizenship. Those who are more educated and have better socio-economic status emphasize other normative aspects, such as belonging to the state and nation, virtue of the duty of voting, certain rights and liberties…etc. Hence Caymaz argues that level of consciousness concerning citizenship rights is linked with level of education and socioeconomic status. Although there are differences in the sample, Caymaz states that there are common tendencies: for instance, all respondents relate citizenship to a sense of belonging to a larger entity, such as state or nation; rather than defining it on the individual level. This observation reflects the shared understanding of Turkish citizen as a passive and obedient person being loyal to the state in the literature.
In addition to Caymaz’s study, Kardam and Cengiz’s (2011) empirical study on citizenship perceptions based on generational differences can also be listed as another effort in understanding perceptions. Together with Caymaz’s findings, Kardam and Cengiz’s study also echo Dalton’s (2009) argument on the impact of age in citizenship perceptions.
Kardam and Cengiz (2011) argue that perception of citizenship is associated with individual life experiences and specific era when individual worldviews took shape. More specifically, the empirical findings suggest that there five profiles of citizenship that the perceptions correspond to: (1) republican, (2) socialist/social democrat, (3) traditional/conservative, (4) individualistic/liberal, and (5) non-citizens (Kardam and Cengiz 2011: 152).
Among these five profiles, republican understanding emerges as the most visible profile among the survey respondents. In line with the theoretical expectations emerging from the literature, those within the republican profile consider fulfillment of duties to be essential for enjoyment of rights. In addition, for the republican group, active participation in public life is a precondition for being a good citizen (Kardam and Cengiz 2011: 153). Individuals whose perceptions are in line with the republican category are mostly above 66 and highly educated (Kardam and Cengiz 2011: 152). In addition to the emphasis on duties, older respondents with republican understanding of citizenship believe that women wearing headscarf pose a significant challenge to secularism. This specific perception regarding the image of headscarf echoes the strict public-private distinction of the Republican modernization project. Symbols indicating religious affiliation were thought to be belonging the private sphere of citizens; whom need to be displaying a secular presence.
Older individuals’ perceptions are reflective of the official understanding on these levels mostly because of the time frame when they were socialized into the official understanding of citizenship. As a matter of fact, younger republicans aged between 30 and 65 do not put that much emphasis on state’s authority and duties, which is explained by the authors as a result of their early socialization during 1960s and 1970s when political activism was its peak (Kardam and Cengiz 2011:156-157). The younger respondents, born after 1980, display a more rights-oriented perception regarding citizenship, while duties, responsibilities and the importance of state receive much less reference compared to the other age groups (Kardam and Cengiz 2011: 159).
Hence, changing political and social atmosphere has potentially influenced these individuals’ perceptions regarding citizenship while the underlying communitarian outlook of Turkish citizenship is shared in various degrees among the sample. In other words, despite the differences emerging with regards to age, as younger individuals have a more rights-oriented perspective compared to the older ones, citizens do not have a shared perception on their rights and liberties which prioritizes their enjoyment and protection (Kardam and Cengiz 2011: 163). The generational gap in the perceptions is similar to Dalton’s (2009) observations and arguments on post-materialism. Inglehart (1967: 93-95) argues that in European context, younger generation is more receptive to the idea of Europeannness than the older generation because of the relatively more inclusive atmosphere that they have lived in. Yet, at the same time, the importance of duties emerges as a lingering perception among all age groups in Kardam and Cengiz’s study. Confirming this finding, a recent opinion poll5 conducted on a representative, random sample in March 2016 found out that fulfilling duties toward the state is still considered as a precondition for enjoying fundamental rights by a significant majority of the respondents (61%).
Although there are not a lot of studies analyzing perceptions of Turkish citizens, the existent ones suggest that Turkish citizenship is still perceived as a duty-laden, passive status with strong links to a specific ethnicity and religious identification. In other words, the foundations of official citizenship are still influential in perceptions although there have been challenges against it and several legal and institutional changes. The minor differences in perceptions are results of age differences, but it is not clear whether these can be mobilized for legal and institutional reforms. Turkish citizenship continues to
5 İstanbul Politikalar Merkezi, Denge ve Denetleme Ağı, KONDA (2016) “Vatandaşlık Araştırması” Retrieved from:
exclude certain identities, mobilization of which by political parties can result in fundamental changes. This possibility will be discussed in more detail in Chapter 4 that focuses on political parties.