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baskent.edu.tr

Program of Political Science and International Relations (English)

POLI450

CURRENT ISSUES IN TURKISH POLITICS

Course Code
POLI450
Semester
-
Theory+Practice
3 + 0
ECTS
5
Course TypeElective Course
Course LevelBachelor's Degree
Year of Study-
Semester-
ECTS5
Name of Lecturer(s)
Learning Outcomes

At the end of this course, the students;

  1. Develop an understanding of the current issues in Turkish politics from historical, sociological, economic, political and global perspectives.
  2. Analyze the political regime changes in Turkey through different theoretical perspectives
  3. Grasp the changes in the relationships between the executive, legislative, judiciary in Turkey.
  4. Gain the ability to analyze different political perspectives on current issues such as the characteristics of the new presidential system, transformation of the security and judiciary systems, media and women?s rights.
  5. Explore how hegemony and counter-hegemony are formed in the Turkish political sphere.
Mode of DeliveryFace to face
PrerequisitesNo
Recommended Optional Programme ComponentsNo recommended optional programme components.
Course DescriptionThis course aims to equip students with the knowledge and analytical skills necessary to identify and understand the causes and consequences of current issues in Turkish politics. Identifying the decline of Turkey?s centrist political traditions as the main determinant of the current state of Turkish politics, the course first addresses actors, issues, paradigms and underlying reasons responsible for it so as to provide a background. The course then discusses the emergence, evolution and impact of what turned out to be a formidable predominant political force since the landslide elections in 2002. Turkey?s political regime, secularism, Europeanization, foreign policy will be the topics taken up in this respect to make sense of the profound impact of the predominant political force. Thirdly, social and political mobilization of identities and political alternatives as the counter-veiling political forces to the-new-regime-in-making is discussed to assess the future prospects of democracy as well as the resilience of the Turkish revolution and its political nature. The course will conclude with a discussion of the 2023 election results. Overall, the course aims at enabling the students to grasp the attempt at changing nature of the political regime and national identity intellectually and politically.
Course Contents
WEEK TOPICS
1st Week The Decline of Turkey's Centrist Political Traditions, and the Failure of the Restoration Attempt
2nd Week The Decline of Turkey's Centrist Political Traditions, and the Failure of the Restoration Attempt
3rd Week The Rise of Political Islam
4th Week The Rise of Political Islam
5th Week The Landslide in 2002: What is the Nature of the New Political Force?
6th Week The Landslide in 2002: What is the Nature of the New Political Force?
7th Week Midterm Exam
8th Week The Issue of Defining the New Regime
9th Week The Issue of Defining the New Regime
10th Week Turkish Secularism, then and now
11th Week Turkey?s Europeanization and De-Europeanization
12th Week Foreign Policy as an Instrument of Redefining the National Identity
13th Week Kurdish and other Identity Issues (Alevis, Women, LGBT)
14th Week Resilience, Resistance and the Question of Alternative(s)?
Recommended or Required ReadingRecommended Reading for General Introduction: Ersin Kalaycıoğlu Turkish Dynamics: Bridge Across Troubled Lands (Palgrave: London, 2005).

Heath Lowry, Betwixt and Between. Turkeys Political Structure on the Cusp of the 21st Century in Morton Abromowitz, ed, Turkeys Transformation and American Policy (The Century Foundation Press: New York, 2000).
Ümit Cizre & Menderes Çınar, Turkey 2002: Kemalism, Islamism and Politics in the Light of the February 28 Process, South Atlantic Quarterly, 102 (2003): 309-322.
Çağlar Keyder, Whither the Project of Modernity Turkey in the 1990s, Rethinking Modernity and National Identity in Turkey, eds. S. Bozdoğan and R. Kasaba, Univeristy of Washington Press: Seattle, 1997.
Reşat Kasaba, Kemalist Certainities and Modern Ambiguities, Rethinking Modernity and National Identity in Turkey, eds. S. Bozdoğan and R. Kasaba, Univeristy of Washington Press: Seattle, 1997.
Ayşe Zarakol, After Defeat: How the East Learned to live with the West, Cambridge University Press, Cambridge, 2011, pp. 1-12.
Esra Özyürek, Nostalgia for the Modern: State Secularism and Everyday Politics in Turkey, Duke University Press: Durham, 2006.
Ümit Cizre, Ideology, Context and Interest: the Turkish Military, in Reşat Kasaba (ed.), The Cambridge History of Turkey, Vol 4. Cambridge University Press: NY, 2008.
Haldun Gülalp, Globalization and Political Islam: the Social Bases of Turkeys Welfare Party, IJMES, 33, 3 (2001): 433-448.
Ahmet Yıldız, Politico-Religious Discourse of Political Islam in Turkey: The Parties of National Outlook, Muslim World, 93, 2 (2003): 187-209.
Yüksel Taşkın, 12 Eylül Atatürkçülüğü ya da Bir Kemalist Restorasyon Teşebbüsü Olarak 12 Eylül, MTSD 2: Kemalizm, ed. A. İnsel, İletişim, İstanbul, 2009.

Onur Bakıner, A key to Turkish politics the centerperiphery framework revisited, Turkish Studies, 19:4 (2018): 503-522.
Şerif Mardin, Center-Periphery Cleavage: A Key to Turkish Politics, Daedalus, 102, 1 (1973): 169-190.
Michael Wutrich, An Essential Center-Periphery Electoral Cleavage and the Turkish Party System, IJMES, 45 82013): 751-773.
Paul T. Levin (2023): Reflections on Şerif Mardins center-periphery thesis, Turkish Studies,
İhsan D. Dağı, Transformation of Islamic Political Identity in Turkey: Rethinking the West and Westernization, Turkish Studies, 6, 1 (2005): 21-37.
Sultan Tepe, Turkeys AKP: A Model `Muslim-Democratic Party, Journal of Democracy, 16, 3 (2005): 69-80.
Murat Somer, Moderate Islam and Secularist Opposition in Turkey: Implications for the World, Muslims and Secular Democracy, Third World Quarterly, 28, 7 (2007): 1271-1289.
Menderes Çınar & Sayın, Çağkan, Reproducing the Paradigm of Democracy in Turkey: Parochial Democratization in the Decade of Justice and Development Party Turkish Studies, 15, 3 (2014): 365385.
Ümit Cizre, Leadership Gone Awry: Recep Tayyip Erdoğan and Two Turkish Elections, Middle East Report, 276 (2015): 36-43.
Ümit Cizre, Introduction: The Politics of Redressing Grievances the AK Party and its Leader, in Turkish AK Party and its Leader: Criticism, Opposition and Dissent, ed. Ümit Cizre, Routledge: London, 2016.
Murat Somer, Old and New Polarizations and Failed Democratizations in Turkey, in The Oxford Handbook of Turkish Politics, ed. Güneş Murat Tezcür, Oxford University Press: Oxford, 2022.
Pelin Ayan Musil, Revisiting the Concept of Moderation in the Age of Populism: the Case of the AKP in Turkey, Middle East Law and Governance, XX (2021): 1-27.
Hakkı Taş, Turkey-from Tutelary to Delegative Democracy, Third World Quarterly, 36, 4 (2015): 776-791.
Berk Esen & Şebnem Gümüşçü, Rising Competitive Authoritarianism in Turkey, Third World Quarterly,
Ahmet Bekmen, The Parcelled State: A Political and Historical Framework for the Current Intra-State Crisis in Turkey, Journal of Contemporary Asia, 54, 3, (2024): 502-522.
Haldun Gülalp, Enlightenment by Fiat: Secularization and Democracy in Turkey, Middle Eastern Studies, 41, 3 (2005): 351-372.
Planned Learning Activities and Teaching Methods
  • Lecture
Assessment Methods and Criteria
Quantity Percentage (%)
Mid-term 1 30
Attendance 1 15
Presentation of Article 1 15
Total(%) 60
Contribution of In-term Studies to Overall Grade(%) 60
Contribution of Final Examination to Overall Grade(%) 40
Total(%) 100
ECTS Allocated Based on Student Workload
Activities Quantity Duration (Hour) Total Workload (Hour)
Midterm exam 1 1.5 1.5
Preparation for Quiz
Individual or group work 14 2 28
Preparation for Final exam 1 30 30
Course hours 14 3 42
Preparation for Midterm exam 1 25 25
Laboratory (including preparation)
Final exam 1 1.5 1.5
Homework 1 25 25
Total Work Load153
Total Work Load / 30 (h)5.1
ECTS Credit of the Course5
Language of InstructionEnglish
Work Placement(s)No

Programme Qualifications / Learning Outcomes

LO1 LO2 LO3 LO4 LO5
K1 X
K2
K3 X
K4
K5 X X X X
K6 X X
K7 X
K8 X X
K9 X X X
K10 X X
K11 X X X
K12 X
K13 X