“Strengthening the Family” Policies in Turkey: Managing the Social Question and Armoring Conservative–Neoliberal Populism

Yılmaz, Zafer

doi:10.1080/14683849.2015.1067863

Cited by 55 publications

(15 citation statements)

References 19 publications

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“…It should be noted here that there is a growing scholarship on the JDP and its populism (Arat-Koç 2018;Bozkurt 2013;Demiralp 2018;Dinçşahin 2012;Kirdiş and Drhimeur 2016;Rogenhofer and Panievsky 2020;Yilmaz 2015;Yilmaz et al 2021a). The Party's populism has manifested itself in its development policies (Kutlay and Karaoguz 2018), foreign policy (Başkan 2018;Sezal and Sezal 2018;Ozpek and Yasar 2018), and historical narratives (Palabiyik 2018;Çınar 2018).…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 92%

Islamic Populism in Turkey

Kirdiş

2021

Religions

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In the last two decades, multiple Islamic parties have become incumbent parties and/or joined coalition governments. Such a development brought debate as to whether these parties could moderate into democratic actors à la Christian Democratic Parties in Western Europe, or whether they were aiming at the formation of an Islamist state and society through electoral means. What remains relatively unaddressed in the literature, however, is to what degree Islamic parties truly derive their socio-political agenda from Islam. Hence, this paper will ask, how do Islamic parties utilize Islam? To answer this question, this paper will use a single case-study approach to test and to rethink Islamic political parties and what is “Islamic” about them in the Turkish case. This paper will study the Turkish case because the country’s incumbent party, the Justice and Development Party (JDP), has been governing Turkey since 2002, making the Party the longest ruling Islamic party still in power. Based on the literature on populism, this paper will argue that the way the JDP utilized Islam can be characterized as populism flavored by religion that is based on (i) a thin theological foundation, (ii) a majoritarian rather than a multivocal interpretation of Islam, and (iii) a Muslim unity rhetoric.

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Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 92%

Islamic Populism in Turkey

Kirdiş

2021

Religions

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“…Conservative elites counter that it is the deviations from a moral family life that cause social problems, and that the family, if "strengthened" by public resources and interventions, can serve as a venue through which many of these problems might be resolved (Yilmaz 2015). Treating the family unit as a rights-bearing actor, however, stands at odds with internationally recognized children's and women's rights.…”

Section: The Turkish Foster Family Systemmentioning

confidence: 99%

Norm Localization and Contestation: The Politics of Foster Children in Turkey

Ellis

2021

Genealogy

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International norms do not diffuse linearly; they are localized, adapted and contested at every turn. Foster care systems have been enthusiastically promoted by international organizations to serve the best interests of children. This study explores the recent adaptation of foster care (Koruyucu Aile) in Turkey. This elite-driven norm change was institutionalized through comprehensive legislation, economic incentives and national campaigns, situated in the “politics of responsibility” arising from moral duty and national and religious ethics. These efforts faced early resistance, leading to slow cultivation of foster families, while over time, the foster system found unlikely allies among urban middle-class women. Using Zimmermann’s typologies of reinterpretation of norms through an analysis of narratives about foster parenting in 50 local and national TV productions, this article shows how the foster family system has evolved as a panacea for women’s empowerment in contemporary Turkish society. In parallel, Turkey has embarked on an intense criticism of the care of ethnic Turkish children in European foster care systems. However, this creative utilization of the foster system has come at the cost of the rights of biological parents and a permanency that has decoupled the Turkish foster care system from its counterparts around the world.

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“…They want to revive the “traditional” multigenerational extended family, in which elders live with their children and grandchildren in the same household, not merely because they regard grandparents as the transmitters of religious and moral values to future generations, but also because they consider the family, rather than the state, to be responsible for the care of dependent populations such as children, the elderly, and the disabled (Yazıcı ). While aligning with the government's neoliberal policies, the kinship norms promoted by the AKP consolidate a patriarchal social structure in which women are confined to their homes to fulfill their reproductive, nurturing, and caregiving roles rather than participating in the public sphere as economically independent and self‐reliant individuals (Coşar and Yeğenoğlu ; Yılmaz ).…”

Section: Inculcating Kinship Norms Through Religionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Regulating the family through religion

Kocamaner

2019

American Ethnologist

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Under Turkey's neoconservative government, the Directorate of Religious Affairs deploys state‐employed religious functionaries to provide Sunni Muslim citizens with advice and guidance on family life. By inculcating government‐sanctioned sensibilities and dispositions related to kinship, these Islamic authorities have become instrumental to extending state power into the domestic lives of the religious majority. This particular entwinement of religion with state power is no aberration. Indeed, the Turkish case reveals a contradiction that lies at the heart of secular governance: the continuing involvement of religion in the politics of the family despite the assumed separation of religion and politics. Secular states may appropriate religious discourses and authority in regulating intimacy and the family while aligning these with biopolitical rationalities, as well as with secular laws and expertise. [secularism, kinship, family, intimacy, governmentality, the state, expertise, Islam, Turkey]

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“Strengthening the Family” Policies in Turkey: Managing the Social Question and Armoring Conservative–Neoliberal Populism

Cited by 55 publications

References 19 publications

Islamic Populism in Turkey

Islamic Populism in Turkey

Norm Localization and Contestation: The Politics of Foster Children in Turkey

Regulating the family through religion

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