DEMOCRACY, ISLAM, AND SECULARISM:
TURKEY IN COMPARATIVE PERSPECTIVE
Columbia University
Friday-Saturday, March 6-7, 2009
International Affairs Building 1501
420 West 118th Street
Turkey is the only member of NATO and candidate member of the European Union that is a Muslim-majority country. This conference aims to present an integrated picture of Turkey by bringing together comparative perspectives on its past, present, and future, and delving into such issues as the legacy of the Ottoman Empire, secularism, religion, democracy, civil-military relations, and the European Union membership.
Co-sponsored by Center for the Study of Democracy, Toleration, and Religion; Institute for Religion, Culture, and Public Life; and
Middle East Institute; and Institute for Turkish Studies.
News Coverage
“Civil Military Relations in Turkiye”
Watch video in English on Ebru TV
“Academics Debate Turkish Constitution“
Ebru News | March 10, 2009
Sustainable Development Media Think Tank
Newspapers in Turkish:
• Zaman Online
• Hurriyet USA
Ergun Ozbudun on Turkey and Democracy: Watch video on Turk.net
“Turkish Law Professor Speaks on Democracy“
Columbia Daily Spectator | March 3, 2009
“Ergenekon’da iddialar?n yüzde 10’unun do?ru olmas? bile yeter“
Zaman USA | March 4, 2009
FRIDAY, MARCH 6
9.30 – 9.45: Opening Remarks
Alfred Stepan, Wallace Sayre Professor of Government, Columbia University
9.45 – 12.45: From the Ottoman Empire to the Turkish Republic
Chair: Rashid Khalidi
Discussant: Richard Bulliet
- Karen Barkey, “Empire and Religious Diversity: The Ottoman Model in Contemporary Perspective”
- ?ükrü Hanio?lu, “The Historical Roots of Kemalism”
- Nur Yalman, “‘The Three Ways of Politics’ Revisited: Whither the People of the ‘Sublime State’?”
12.45 – 2.30: Lunch
2.30 – 5.30: Religion, Religious Parties, and Democracy
Chair: David Cuthell
Discussant: Mirjam Künkler
- Alfred Stepan, “Variations of Laïcité: Comparing Turkey, France, and Senegal”
- Stathis Kalyvas, “Does Christian Democratic Experience Travel in the non-Christian World?”
SATURDAY, MARCH 7
9.30 – 12.30: The AKP Government and the Military
Chair and discussant: Alfred Stepan
- Ümit Cizre, “Society as the Battleground for Hegemony: Secular Military and the AKP”
- Ahmet Kuru, “Politicized Military and the Consolidation of Democracy in Turkey”
12.30 – 2.30: Lunch
2.30 – 5.30: Politics of the Future: European Union, Constitution, and Democratization
Chair and discussant: Joan Scott
- Joost Lagendijk, “Turkey’s Membership to the European Union: Perceptions and Processes”
- Andrew Arato, “Legality and Legitimacy in the Making of a New Turkish Constitution”
- Ergun Ozbudun, “Turkish Democracy in Constitutional Crisis”
SHORT BIOS
Andrew Arato is the Dorothy Hirshon Professor of Political and Social Theory at the New School for Social Research. He is the author of Constitution Making under Occupation: The Politics of Imposed Revolution in Iraq and Civil Society, Constitution, and Legitimacy, and co-author of Civil Society and Political Theory.
Karen Barkey is Professor of Sociology at Columbia University. She is the author of Empire of Difference: The Ottomans in Comparative Perspective and co-editor of After Empire: Multiethnic Societies and Nation-Building, the Soviet Union and the Russian, Ottoman, and Habsburg Empires.
Richard Bulliet is Professor of History at Columbia University. He is the author of The Case for Islamo-Christian Civilization, the editor The Columbia History of the Twentieth Century, and the co-editor of The Encyclopedia of the Modern Middle East.
Ümit Cizre is Professor of Political Science at Bilkent University, Turkey. She is the author of The Politics of the Powerful (in Turkish) and the editor of Secular and Islamic Politics in Turkey: The Making of the Justice and Development Party and Almanac Turkey 2005: Security Sector and Democratic Oversight.
David Cuthell is the Executive Director of the Institute of Turkish Studies in Washington D.C. He also teaches Turkish politics as Visiting Adjunct Professor at Columbia University and Georgetown University.
?ükrü Hanio?lu is Professor and the Chair of Near Eastern Studies at Princeton University. He is the author of Brief History of the Late Ottoman Empire, Preparation for a Revolution: The Young Turks, 1902-1908, and Young Turks in Opposition.
Stathis Kalyvas is the Arnold Wolfers Professor of Political Science and Director of the Program on Order, Conflict, and Violence at Yale University. He is the author of The Logic of Violence in Civil War and The Rise of Christian Democracy in Europe.
Rashid Khalidi is the Edward Said Professor of Arab Studies at Columbia University. He is the author of The Iron Cage: The Story of the Palestinian Struggle for Statehood and Resurrecting Empire: Western Footprints and America’s Perilous Path in the Middle East.
Mirjam Künkler is Assistant Professor of Near Eastern Studies at Princeton University. She is the co-editor of The Role of Religious Institutions in Democratic Transition and Consolidation Processes (in German).
Ahmet Kuru is Postdoctoral Fellow and Assistant Director of the Center for the Study of Democracy, Toleration, and Religion at Columbia University. He is the author of Secularism and State Policies toward Religion: The United States, France, and Turkey.
Joost Lagendijk is Dutch politician from Green Left. He is a Member of the European Parliament and its Committee on Foreign Affairs. He is also the Chairman of the Delegation to the European Union – Turkey Joint Parliamentary Committee.
Ergun Özbudun is Professor of Law at Bilkent University, Turkey. He is the author of Contemporary Turkish Politics: Challenges to Democratic Consolidation and the co-editor of Atatürk: Founder of a Modern State. He recently chaired the academic committee to draft a new constitution for Turkey.
Joan Scott is the Harold F. Linder Professor at the School of Social Science in the Institute for Advanced Study. She is the author of Only Paradoxes to Offer: French Feminists and the Rights of Man, Parité: Sexual Equality and the Crisis of French Universalism, and The Politics of the Veil.
Alfred Stepan is the Wallace Sayre Professor of Government, director of the Center for the Study of Democracy, Toleration, and Religion, and co-director of the Institute for Religion, Culture, and Public Life at Columbia University. He is the author of Arguing Comparative Politics and the co-author of Problems of Democratic Transition and Consolidation.
Nur Yalman is Professor of Anthropology at Harvard University. He is the author of Under the Bo Tree: Studies in Caste, Kinship, and Marriage in the Interior of Ceylon and co-author of A Passage to Peace Global Solutions from East and West.
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image credit: Sue Kellerman
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