He began with the Ottoman era from 1299 to 1923. He noted that the Ottoman era was one of tolerance, with a multiethnic, multireligious empire. The Sultan in 1492 took in the Sephardic Jews from Spain when King Ferdinand ousted them, and offered his protection. He said the empire was symbolic of "political and cultural inclusiveness".
The French Revolution had a negative impact on the Ottoman Empire to the extent that it brought ideas of national self determination to the peoples of the region. The Greeks and Serbs sought independence first and the empire began to decay. In 1916 there was an Arab revolt from the southern parts of the empire.
In the 1850s the empire began to deliberately reform, holding the first elections in 1876 to establish a constitutional monarchy.
In WWI, the empire fought on 9 different fronts and was allied with Germany. It lost and the Turkish army collapsed. The Greeks invaded western Turkey.
1923-1950 there was a single party Republic formed. Efforts were made to transform a heterogeneous empire into a homogenous country > radical secularization. Elites did not think the masses were ready for full democracy at this time. In 1950 a second party was created and the country has sense become a multiparty system.
Our host explained that there were coups in 1962, 1974, 1980 and 1996. Failled efforts in 2004 and 2009. The democracy is well consolidated and a successful coup is very unlikely because 1) there is a large private sector that wants less state intervention 2) there is a growing civil society 3) there is a diversified media that will not say only what the govn't or military wants. He also noted that Turkey is not radicalized and anti-Western like some countries in the Middle East are because it never fell under western colonization like the rest of the Middle East (after WWI).
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