Atat Rk And The Modernization Of Turkey

"This book . . . is the earliest comprehensive essay in the English language on the German imigris who, while taking refuge in Turkey after 1933, contributed to the modernization of its higher education, and to the implementation of research activities and social reforms."--Dr. Feza Gnergun, chair for History of Science, Istanbul University.

At the start of the century Turkey maintains its ceaseless search for closer links with Europe. The essential mission of the Republic created by Mustafa Kemal after the First World War was the modernization of Turkey in accordance with the Western secular and democratic model. In Helsinki at the turn of the century Turkey was finally accepted as a candidate for EU membership and now hopes for, and expects, a new future. With this future in mind the authors of the studies in this book consider how prepared in various fields Turkey now is for the transformation in which it is engaged. Turkey's path in the twenty-first century will not be easy. There are serious issues to be faced in the management of the economy. In politics there are human rights and other problems deeply affecting Turkish democracy, and a Kurdish reality with which to come to terms. There are the problems to be faced of a revived Islam, the forward role of the military in its self-styled role as defender of the secular state, the need for the reform of the state's bureaucracy, the preservation of national unity, and the reform and development of turkey's democratic structure. Internationally Turkey lives in a volatile Middle Eastern and Central Asian environment, but one with which she has to deal politically and economically, particularly as Caspian and other energy sources are vital. Internally there are movements of population that are disrupting established social structures. These changes are reflected in literature and in the media. A new transformation is underway in Turkey. This book throws light on major factors of change in Turkish economics, politics and society. It uniquely pulls together Turkish experience over a wide area. It is promoted by the Turkish Area Study Group. - Back cover.

Amid the tensions and uncertainties that plagued the globe before the Second World War, the Republic of Turkey appeared to many as a unique and constructive model for how a state was to be reformed and governed in the modern era. For many interwar observers, Turkey was a country that seemed to have radically transformed itself into a nation that was united, strong, and progressive, one that was unburdened by its past. A general consensus held that Turkey's founding president, Mustafa Kemal Atatürk, was the chief architect and engineer of this feat, a belief that placed him among the greatest reforming statesmen in world history. This general perception of Atatürk and his revolutionary rule has largely endured to this day. As a study grounded in largely untapped archival and scholarly sources, Eternal Dawn presents a definitive look inside the development and evolution of Atatürk's Turkey. Rather than presenting the country's founding and transformation as an extension of Mustafa Kemal's life and achievements, scholar Ryan Gingeras presents Turkey's early years as the culmination of a variety of social and political forces dating back to the late Ottoman Empire. Eternal Dawn presses beyond the reigning mythology that still envelops this period and challenges many of the standing assumptions about the limits, successes, and consequences of the reforms that comprised Mustafa Kemal's revolution. Through a detailed survey of social and political conditions that defined life in the capital as well as Turkey's diverse provinces, Gingeras lays bare many of the harsh realities and bitter legacies incurred as a result of the republic's establishment and transformation. Atatürk's revolution, upon final analysis, destroyed as much as it built, and established precedents that both strengthen and torment the country to this day.

The authors trace the emergence of Ataturk and Reza Shah through the constitutional revolutions in Iran and the Ottoman Empire, which led to the introduction of European social models, the establishment of dictatorship and of secularist reforms. This produced in both Turkey and Iran highly authoritarian, nationalist, and quasi-westernised states, where the personality cult of the leader defined the politics of each country."