What Makes Turkish Islam Unique?

For many Westerners, Turkey is the beacon of the Muslim world. It is a secular democracy, a NATO member and an US ally. In all these ways, it defies the more radical interpretations of Islam, which promote a theocratic political system and an anti-Western standpoint. But why is Turkey exceptional? This chapter answers that question by analysing the dynamics that led to the rise of a democratic Muslim society in Turkey. The modernisation efforts of the Ottoman Empire date back to the eighteenth century and accelerated with the founding of the Turkish Republic. Moreover, Turkey has been a functioning democracy since 1950, or even, arguably, since 1876, the year of the proclamation of the Ottoman Constitution and the founding of the Ottoman Parliament. Consequently, while a total lack of democracy bred authoritarian Islamist movements in some other Muslim nations, Turkey’s devout Muslims have focused on the broadening of democracy, which, over time, has led to the appreciation of a secular (but not necessarily secularist) state, liberal values and, more recently, the political criteria of the European Union (EU). The ongoing integration of Turkey within the global economy, a process that has accelerated since the 1980s, has also deeply influenced Turkish society, including its religiously conservative segments.