Doctor of Philosophy

dissertationUnder what conditions and why do the state elites change their policies toward nationhood? In this research, I intend to develop a nuanced analytical framework with an aspiration toward a theoretical proposition on the institutional change of state policies toward nationhood. The dissertation takes the cases of imperial citizenship reform in the Ottoman Empire in the mid-nineteenth century, the shift from Ottoman identity to Turkish identity in the first quarter of the twentieth century, and the state promotion of minority languages in Turkey after the 2000s. Methodologically, I carry out a comparative historical research through the analysis of official documents such as constitutions, parliamentary proceedings, and speeches by political leaders. I explore the patterns of change within my proposition of the four ideal-type nationhood structures that states can adopt: hierarchical, asymmetrical, hyphenated, and monolithic. While the dissertation emphasizes the notion of ontological security in terms of the logic of the state elites in revisiting state policies toward nationhood, it explains the conditions under which the policy changes occur by looking at the contingencies of the international context, domestic elite competition, and domestic nonstate actors

Book review: Turkey's July 15th coup: what happened and why edited by M. Hakan Yavuz and Bayram Balci

Two years after the event, the collection Turkey's July 15th Coup: What Happened and Why, edited by M. Hakan Yavuz and Bayram Balci, brings together contributors to unpack the historical, political, religious and ideological dimensions of the 2016 coup attempt in Turkey. The volume offers insightful historical insight into the deteriorating relationship between AKP leader and President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan and the Gülen movement and its ultimate impact on the events of 15 July 2016, writes Serhun Al

Federal versus Unitary States: Ethnic Accommodation of Tamils and Kurds

This article contributes to the debate on whether federalism leads to ethnic accommodation and is peace-preserving through comparing the methods of ethnic accommodation in federal and unitary states. Rather than focusing on a large dataset, this article offers an in-depth picture of the role the two systems play in ethnic accommodation, offering a more nuanced understanding. The Kurds (Iraq and Turkey) and Tamils (India and Sri Lanka) have been chosen as they form territorial minorities in both federal and unitary states. The article suggests that federalist states offer a degree of acceptance toward political, cultural and economic equality with ethnic minorities. However, federalism may not be the cause of ethnic accommodation; it may be on the one hand the expression of a state willing to concede cultural, political and economic equality to an ethnic minority, or on the other hand induce such behavior. Thus, federalism without recognition of such equality does not guarantee ethnic accommodation