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| Robert Olson |
History |
| Blood, Beliefs and Ballots: The Management of Kurdish Nationalism in Turkey , 2007-2009 |
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| This book analyzes and describes the instruments used by the Turkish state to manage Kurdish nationalism during 2007 to 2009 and the response of Kurds and the PKK and DTP to this state management which included the armed forces, conspiratorial organizations such as Ergenekon, a right-wing conglomeration of active and retired military officers, journalists, academics and organized crime types; the judiciary, media, Kurdish informants and the largesse of the state. Part of the state’s management of Kurdish nationalist movements within Turkey also impelled Ankara to better relations with Iran, Syria and Iraq. Improving relations with the Kurdistan Regional Government (KRG) in Iraq became especially important for Turkey in 2008 and 2009. This essay concludes with the 29 March 2009 elections and an analysis of how successful the instruments of Turkey’s management of Kurdish national movements were during the period under analysis and what this bodes for the future of relations between Kurds and Turks in Turkey, Turkey and Iraq, Turkey and the KRG, and the impact of these relations on the politics of the wider Middle East. The word “blood” in the title serves as a metaphor for the differences that grew between Kurds and Turks throughout the 20th century, especially after WWI. “Beliefs’ refers to the evolution of how differences between the two ethnic groups grew and developed into different nationalist movements and by 1984 into sustained armed conflict. Although the civil war between the Turkish state and the Kurdistan Workers Party, popularly known as the PKK, abated somewhat after the capture of PKK leader Abdullah Öcalan in February 1999, low intensity warfare has continued to the present. In the 1990s, with the creation of Kurdish ethnic political parties, the conflict between Kurds and Turks in Turkey also became one of a battle over ballot boxes. The coming to power of the Justice and Development Party (AKP) in November 2002 intensified the electoral competition. In the 22 July 2007 elections the struggle between the AKP and the main Kurdish contending political party, the Democratic Society Party (DTP), increased when the AKP was able to win 50 parliamentary seats in the heavily populated southeast and east of Turkey. The gain of the AKP was a stinging defeat for the DTP in spite of the largesse that the ruling AKP possessed to deliver goods to the impoverished people of the southeast. As a result of AKP gains, the competition between the AKP, now backed by the Turkish Armed Forces, the PKK and the DTP grew more intense during the period from the 22 July 2007general election and the local elections scheduled for 29 March 2009. |
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Acknowledgements
Note on Spelling and names
English Translations of Turkey’s Political Parties
Maps
Introduction
CHAPTER ONE
The Aftermath of the 22 July 2009 Election: Economic Development versus Language Rights
CHAPTER TWO
The Closure Cases against the AKP and DTP; Ergenekon and “mother tongue” Education
CHAPTHER THREE
Islamists versus Kurdish Nationalist Movements
CHAPTER FOUR
Renewed Intensified Armed Conflict
CHAPTER FIVE
Differences among Kurdish Nationalist Movements and
Heightened Campaign Rhetoric
CHAPTER SIX
The “War of Words” Takes Center Stage
CHAPTER SEVEN
Into 2009: Ergenekon Atrocities and the Election
CHAPTER EIGHT
The Davos Dèmarche and Its Aftermath
CHAPTER NINE
The Campaign Heats UP and Spreads to the
Spreads to the Kurdistan Regional Government
CHAPATER TEN
Into the Home Stretch
Conclusion
Bibliography
Index |
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 | Robert Olson
Robert Olson is Professor of Middle East and Islamic History at the University of Kentucky where he is University Research Professor. Professor Olson was selected as the Kirwan Memorial Prize Professor in 1999-2000 and Distinguished Professor of the College of Arts and Sciences in 2000-2001. He is the author of The Siege of Mosul and Ottoman-Persian Relations, 1718-1743: A Study of Rebellion in the Capital and War in the Provinces of the Ottoman Empire (1975); The Ba’th and Syria: From the French Mandate to the Era of Hafiz al-Asad (1982); The Emergence of Kurdish Nationalism and the Sheikh Said Rebellion: 1880-1925 (1989); Imperial Meanderings and Republican By-Ways: Essays on Eighteenth Century Ottoman and Twentieth Century History of Turkey (1986), The Kurdish Question and Turkish-Iranian Relations: From World War to 1998 (1998), and Turkey’s Relation with Iran, Syria, Israel, and Russia (2001). He is the editor of The Kurdish Nationalist Movement in the 1990s: Its Impact on Turkey and the Middle East(1996); coeditor of Islamic and Middle Eastern Societies: A Festschrift in Honor of Professor Wadie Jwaideh (1987); Orientalism, Islam and Islamists (1984); coeditor of Iran: A Revolution in the Making (1980). Several of Professor Olson’s books have been translated into Arabic, Persian and Turkish. |
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