State and Civil Society in Turkey: Interaction, Submission, Containment (the 2000s and 2010s)

The paper explores the development of civil society in Turkey, analyzes the models and mechanisms of its interaction with the state in the context of power consolidation Recep Erdoğan and his Justice and Development Party undertook in the 2000s and 2010s. After long-lasting and eventually unsuccessful attempts of European integration Turkey embarked upon a search for a new balance in the interaction between the state and civil society, characterized by an increase in authoritarian tendencies, Islamization and de-secularization, which still, nevertheless, coexist with a high level of civic activism. The paper seeks to fill a gap in the academic literature on social and political transformations of modern Turkey which primarily focuses on expanding process of Islamization and de-secularization while the issue of specific interaction between the state and civil society institutions in Turkey generally remains beyond the radar of the scholars. The source base of the research includes a wide range of primary materials on the activities of Turkish non-governmental organizations (statutes, press releases, media publications), official government documents and regulations on civil society activities. The paper argues that despite quantitatively significant growth of non-governmental organizations (NGOs) in Turkey during the 2000s and 2010s most of them have failed to become agents of further Europeanization and political modernization of Turkey. On the contrary, massive financial and institutional support from the government for Turkish NGOs has enhanced the structural fragmentation of Turkish civil society and created large number of influential loyal civil society institutions which were willing to engage with the political regime while the mechanisms of external maintenance of liberal civil society institutions (primarily through the grant programs of European funds) have shown limited efficiency or even failed.

Keywords

Turkey, EU, civil society, Kemalism, Europeanization, Islamization, political modernization, non-governmental organizations, waqfs

Received

03.10.2022

Publication date

28.02.2023

Number of characters

61634

Cite

GOST	Shlykov P. State and Civil Society in Turkey: Interaction, Submission, Containment (the 2000s and 2010s) // Novaia i noveishaia istoriia – 2023. – Issue 1 C. 164-182 [Electronic resource]. URL: https://nni.jes.su/S013038640021312-1-1 (circulation date: 21.05.2024). DOI: 10.31857/S013038640021312-1
MLA	Shlykov, Pavel "State and Civil Society in Turkey: Interaction, Submission, Containment (the 2000s and 2010s)." Novaia i noveishaia istoriia 1 (2023):164-182. DOI: 10.31857/S013038640021312-1
APA	Shlykov P. (2023). State and Civil Society in Turkey: Interaction, Submission, Containment (the 2000s and 2010s). Novaia i noveishaia istoriia (1), pp.164-182 DOI: 10.31857/S013038640021312-1

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