Turkey: Security, State and Society in Troubled Times

Abstract

The end of the Cold War has allowed for a burgeoning of the security agendas to include a range of softer threats such as economic and social conditions and environmental damage alongside the more traditional military considerations. The Turkish national discourse, however, has largely diverged from these global trends with militaristic perspectives still dominating and guiding the Turkish security agendas, almost exclusively, throughout the 1990s. This article argues that the roots of such enduring centrality of security, as understood and interpreted along the traditional lines, lie in the variables of history and ideology and the way in which these variables are reflected in modern Turkish society and identity.Security in international relations is generally understood as the absence of, and freedom from, threats to core values for both individuals and groups. 1 Throughout the Cold War, security as the ultimate goal of state behaviour has occupied a key place in both scholarly and policy-making analyses. As a consequence, questions of national security have dominated the security field and the notion of national security in turn has often been defined as 'a state's ability to defend itself from enemies who, by external attack and/or internal subversion, would threaten the integrity of its borders or its very existence'. 2 Traditionally, the analysis of national security has concentrated on the hard security dimension and was primarily defined in military terms. Its focus was thus on the state's military ability to deter and defend against aggression and threats of violence.This perspective on the concept of security that is guided by exclusively military considerations has been criticised as limited in focus and 'too narrowly founded', 3 and a number of scholars and strategists have argued for an expanded notion of security to include a range of softer threats. 4 Indeed, the end of the Cold War has allowed for a burgeoning of the security agenda. As a result, issues such as economic and social conditions, environmental damage, ethnic and religious based communal conflict, terrorism, organized crime and

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“…The heavy conditions of the treaty led to the Turkish Independence War (1919–1923). It was annulled by the Lausanne Treaty in 1923, which secured the sovereignty and the current borders of the Turkish Republic (Drorian, ).…”

“…The heavy conditions of the treaty led to the Turkish Independence War (1919)(1920)(1921)(1922)(1923). It was annulled by the Lausanne Treaty in 1923, which secured the sovereignty and the current borders of the Turkish Republic (Drorian, 2005). The Sèvres Treaty is seen as the epitome of the external and internal existential threats to the Turkish state.…”

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“…The trauma was triggered by the treaty's heavy conditions – including the allocation of large proportions of the Ottoman territory to the Western countries and to the Kurdish and Armenian minorities in the Empire. The treaty was annulled after the Turkish War of Independence (1919–1923) by the Lausanne Treaty in 1923, which secured the current borders of the Turkish Republic (Drorian : 257). The Sèvres Treaty signalled the end of the Ottoman Empire and its struggle to stop its land loss to the Western powers and its minorities.…”