Αντίβαρο - Dreaming in Turkish

Armenian News Network / Groong 25 March 2002

Dreaming in Turkish.

Author: Kinzer, Stephen.

Source: World Policy Journal v. 18 no3 (Fall 2001) p. 69-80

My favorite word in Turkish is istiklal. The dictionary says it means "independence," and it has special resonance in Turkey because Turkey is struggling to become independent of so much. It wants to break away from its autocratic heritage, from its position outside the world's political mainstream, and from the stereotype of the terrifying Turk and the ostracism which that stereotype encourages. Most of all, it is trying to free itself from its fears--fear of freedom, fear of the outside world, fear of itself.

But the real reason I love to hear the word istiklal is because it is the name of Turkey's most fascinating boulevard. Jammed with people all day and late into the night, lined with cafés, bookstores, cinemas and shops of every description, it is the pulsating heart not only of Istanbul but of the Turkish nation. I go there whenever I feel myself being overwhelmed by doubts about Turkey. Losing myself in Istiklal's parade of faces for a few minutes, overhearing snippets of conversation and absorbing the energy that crackles along its mile and a half, is always enough to renew my confidence in Turkey's future. Because Istanbul has attracted millions of migrants from other parts of the country--several hundred new ones still arrive every day--this street is the ultimate melting pot. Istiklal is perfectly named because its human panorama reflects Turkey's drive to break away from claustrophobic provincialism and allow its people to express their magnificent diversity.

That drive has been only partly successful. Something about the concept of diversity frightens Turkey's ruling elite. It triggers the deep insecurity that has gripped Turkish rulers ever since the Republic was founded in 1923, an insecurity that today prevents Turkey from taking its proper place in the modern world.

No nation was ever founded with greater revolutionary zeal than the Turkish Republic, nor has any undergone more sweeping change in such a short time. In a very few years after 1923, Mustafa Kemal Atatürk transformed a shattered and bewildered nation into one obsessed with progress. His was a one-man revolution, imposed and steered from above. Atatürk knew that Turks were not ready to break violently with their past, embrace modernity and turn decisively toward the West. He also knew, however, that doing so would be the only way for them to shape a new destiny for themselves and their nation. So he forced them, often over the howling protests of the old order.

The new nation that Atatürk built on the rubble of the Ottoman Empire never could have been built democratically. Probably not one of his sweeping reforms would have been approved in a plebiscite. The very idea of a plebiscite, of shaping a political system according to the people's will, would have struck most Turks of that era as not simply alien but ludicrous.

In the generations that have passed since then, Turkey has become an entirely different nation. It is as vigorous and as thirsty for democracy as any on earth. But its leaders, who fancy themselves Atatürk's heirs, fiercely resist change. They believe that Turks cannot yet be trusted with the fate of their nation, that an elite must continue to make all important decisions because the people are not mature enough to do so.

Atatürk's infant Turkish Republic in the 1920s was a very fragile creation. Sheiks and leaders of religious sects considered its commitment to secularism a direct assault on all they had held sacred. Tribal chieftans and local warlords realized that a strong centralized state would undermine their authority. Kurds who dominated eastern provinces sought to take advantage of the new state's weakness by staging military uprisings. European powers hoped it would collapse so that they could divide its territory among themselves. The new Soviet Union actively sought to subvert it and turn it into a vassal state.

In this hostile climate, Atatürk and his comrades came to think of themselves as righteous crusaders slashing their way through a world filled with enemies. They ruled by decree and with a rubber-stamp Parliament, equating criticism with treason. During their first years in power, arrest and execution were the fate of their real and imagined opponents.

Three-quarters of a century has passed since then, and in that time Turkey has changed beyond recognition. The nation that faced Atatürk when he took power was not only in ruins but truly primitive. Nearly everyone was illiterate. Life expectancy was pitifully short, epidemics were accepted as immutable facts of life and medical care was all but nonexistent. The basic skills of trade, artisanry and engineering were unknown, having vanished with the departed Greeks and Armenians. Almost every citizen was a subsistence farmer. There were only a few short stretches of paved road in a territory that extended more than a thousand miles from Iran to Greece. Most important of all, the Turkish people knew nothing but obedience. They had been taught since time immemorial that authority is something distant and irresistible, and that the role of the individual in society is submission and nothing more.

If Atatürk could return to see what has become of his nation, he undoubtedly would be astonished at how far it has come. Muddy villages have become bustling cities and cow paths have become superhighways. Universities and public hospitals are to be found in even the most remote regions. The economy is unsteady but shows bursts of vitality. Turkish corporations and business conglomerates are making huge amounts of money and competing successfully in every corner of the globe. Hundreds of young men and women return home every year from periods of study abroad. People are educated, self-confident and eager to build a nation that embodies the ideals of democracy and human rights.

The ruling elite, however, refuses to embrace this new nation or even admit that it exists. Military commanders, prosecutors, security officers, narrow-minded bureaucrats, lapdog newspaper editors, rigidly conservative politicians and other members of this sclerotic cadre remain psychologically trapped in the 1920s. They see threats from across every one of Turkey's eight borders and, most dangerously, from within the country itself. In their minds Turkey is still a nation under siege. To protect it from mortal danger, they feel obliged to run it themselves. They not only ignore but actively resist intensifying pressure from educated, worldly Turks who want their country to break free of its shackles and complete its march toward the democracy that was Atatürk's dream.

This dissonance, this clash between what the entrenched elite wants and what more and more Turks want, is the central fact of life in modern Turkey. It frames the country's great national dilemma. Until this dilemma is somehow resolved, Turkey will live in eternal limbo, a half-democracy taking half-steps toward freedom and fulfilling only half its destiny.

The most extraordinary aspect of this confrontation is that both sides are seeking, or claim to be seeking, the same thing: a truly modern Turkey. Military commanders and their civilian allies, especially the appointed prosecutors, judges and governors who set the limits of freedom in every town and province, consider themselves modernity's great and indispensable defenders. They fear democracy not on principle, but because they are convinced it will unleash forces that will drag Turkey back toward ignorance and obscurantism. Allowing Turks to speak, debate and choose freely, they believe, would lead the nation to certain catastrophe. To prevent that catastrophe, they insist on holding ultimate political power themselves and crushing challenges wherever they appear.

Yet what this means in practice is that state power is directed relentlessly against the very forces in society that represent true modernity. Writers, journalists and politicians who criticize the status quo are packed off to prison for what they say and write. Calls for religious freedom are considered subversive attacks on the secular order. Expressions of ethnic or cultural identity are banned for fear that they will trigger separatist movements and ultimately rip the country apart. When foreign leaders remind Turkey that it can never become a full member of the world community as long as its government behaves this way, they are denounced for harboring secret agendas whose ultimate goal is to wipe Turks off the face of history.

These attitudes have turned Turkey's ruling elite into the enemy of the ideal that gave it life. Originally dedicated to freeing a nation from dogma, this elite now defends dogma. Once committed to liberating the mind, today it lashes out against those whose minds lead them to forbidden places. It has become the "sovereign" against which its spiritual ancestors, the Young Turks, began rebelling in the nineteenth century.

"Our sovereign and our government do not want the light to enter our country," the Young Turk theorist Abdullah Cevdet wrote in 1897. "They want all people to remain in ignorance, on the dunghill of misery and wretchedness; no touch of awakening may blaze in the hearts of our compatriots. What the government wants is for the people to remain like beasts, submissive as sheep, fawning and servile as dogs. Let them hear no word of any honest lofty idea. Instead, let them languish under the whips of ignorant gendarmes, under the aggression of shameless, boorish, oppressive officials.".

The Young Turks were members of insurgent groups that defied the absolutism of Ottoman rule during the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. These groups built a rich tradition of dissent that shaped the intellectual and political life of the late Ottoman period and laid the foundation for Atatürk's revolution. Their principles were admirable, but most of their leaders believed instinctively that the state, not popular will, was the instrument by which social and political change would be achieved. They bequeathed to Atatürk the conviction that Turkish reformers should seize state power and then use it ruthlessly for their own ends, not try to democratize society in ways that would weaken the centralized state.

Turkey's effort to rid itself of this authoritarian mind-set has been difficult and scarred by trauma. Not until 1950 did military commanders, the vanguard of Atatürk's new class, allow free multiparty elections for Parliament. To this day they watch politicians closely. Three times they have staged coups to depose elected governments. After the last one, in 1980, they ruled the country for three years, and before returning to their barracks they wrote a new constitution and called a national referendum to ratify it. Criticizing the document or campaigning for a "no" vote was illegal, and in the end ninety-one percent of voters approved. This constitution, which remains in force, was written to embody the needs of Turkey's military-dominated elite. The article guaranteeing freedom of speech and the press stipulates that "the exercise of these freedoms may be restricted for the purposes of preventing crime." Another article bans "any news or articles that threaten the internal or external security of the state." A third asserts: "Fundamental rights and freedoms may be restricted by law, in conformity with the letter and spirit of the Constitution, with the aim of safeguarding the indivisible integrity of the state with its territory and nation, national sovereignty, the Republic, national security, public order, general peace, the public interest, public morals and public health.".

These articles and a series of laws passed to bolster them have been used very effectively to prevent the flowering of Turkish democracy. In the 1990s, however, it became clear that the true core of the constitution was Article 118, which established a body called the National Security Council, composed of five elected officials (the president, prime minister and ministers of defense, interior and foreign affairs) and five generals (the chief of staff and the commanders of the army, navy, air force and gendarmerie). Article 118 stipulates that the government must give "priority consideration" to its decisions.

For most of the 1980s Turkey was dominated by Turgut Özal, an energetic visionary whose rise to power the departing generals had tried to prevent. He managed to impose a measure of civilian control over the armed forces, and during his years as prime minister and then president, the National Security Council remained in the background. But after Özal's death in 1993, Turkey entered a period of political upheaval in which small-minded politicians bickered while the country drifted toward social and political fragmentation and a new Kurdish revolt in the eastern provinces reached an alarming peak. The politicians' failure to confront these challenges created a vacuum, and to the relief of many Turks, military officers stepped in to fill it. They became Turkey's true rulers, assuming the power to veto every government policy of which they disapproved. The vehicle they used to exercise this power, and use to this day, is the National Security Council. It is not a forum for debate or discussion but a place where generals come to tell the country's elected leaders what to do.

The council usually meets once a month, and although its deliberations are private, television reporters are admitted for a few minutes to film the members as they arrive and settle into their seats. The pictures they take perfectly convey the balance of power within the council. Elected government leaders sit on one side of a long table, shifting uncomfortably like guilty schoolboys. The military commanders, ribbon-bedecked and unsmiling, sit opposite, glowering at their charges as they pull folders from their briefcases and prepare to deliver their decrees. Always they speak with a single voice, and always it is understood that their will must be done.

In 1997 I visited the Islamic Republic of Iran to write about the election that brought Mohammed Khatami to that country's presidency. On the plane trip back to Turkey, I reflected on the curious system by which Iran is ruled. There is a fully functioning government headed by an elected president and including a parliament and various local authorities. But there is also a second center of power, the Council of Guardians, composed of religious figures and headed by a mullah they choose for a life term. The government is elected by the people, who are human and therefore fallible, but the Council of Guardians is guided by God, who is infallible. Whenever there is a conflict between the two branches, therefore, the Council of Guardians must be right. What it decides must be done, regardless of what the people or their elected representatives want.

As my plane entered Turkish air space, my thoughts slowly drifted from the country I was leaving to the one to which I was returning. Comparing Iran's political system to that of Turkey, I saw a remarkable similarity. Turkey has a diverse and often feisty Parliament that chooses a prime minister according to the outcome of free elections, as well as a cabinet and all the trappings of a bureaucratic state. Ultimate power, however, rests with the National Security Council, dominated by military commanders accountable only to each other. The commanders draw their authority from Atatürk, who though long dead remains Turkey's secular god. Because they defend Atatürk's principles and believe they know instinctively what he would do in any situation, their decisions must take precedence over those of fallible politicians. To allow civilians to overrule them, they believe, would be an unforgivable betrayal of both duty and the nation's sacred guiding spirit.

There is one glaring difference, of course, between the roles of Iranian mullahs and Turkish generals. The mullahs use their power to enforce a reactionary theocratic order based on hatred of the modern world. Turkish officers detest that order, and wield their power in an unrelenting battle to assure that it can never take hold in their country. They want what most Turks want: a society that is free, democratic and secular. The great question they now face is whether the tactics they have used to promote those ideals for four generations are still appropriate or whether it is time for them to relax their grip and let civil society bloom.

To portray Turkey's political system as a form of military dictatorship would be unfair. Certainly military commanders, like many powerful civilians, harbor a deep mistrust of the people and an abiding fear that if given the chance to do so, the people would make disastrous mistakes and bring Atatürk's magnificent edifice crashing to the ground. But these commanders and the system by which they exercise power also provide a measure of stability that Turkish politicians have been unable to offer. In the absence of a strong constitutional tradition or a long-established social consensus, they are a bulwark against Islamic fundamentalism and other threats to Atatürk's modern state. Turks are acutely aware of this uncomfortable reality, and many sleep soundly at night because they know the generals will not allow anything to go too badly wrong.

For years, Turkish officers took great pride in public-opinion surveys that showed the armed forces to be the country's most trusted institution. This was not so great a compliment as it seems. It is illegal to criticize the armed forces, so no newspaper may publish stories about waste, corruption, brutality, abuses of power or other negative aspects of military life. Being thus protected, military institutions naturally seem to exist on a higher moral plane than others. Yet in their hearts, many Turks feel a sincere respect, admiration and even affection for their men in uniform.

Part of the reason for this is historical. It was, after all, the army that established the Turkish Republic against the will of European powers, rallying behind Atatürk to rescue the nation from impending doom. The Republic's first leaders rose from military ranks, and it was their collective act of will that ripped Turks away from their old ways, reversed their long decline as a people and set them on the road toward freedom and prosperity. It is frightening to imagine what Turkey would look like today without the influence of its army. Quite possibly it would be somnolent and isolated, like Syria, Iraq and other Middle Eastern countries where democracy and individual rights are concepts about which citizens dare not even dream.

All young Turkish men must serve in the army, which means that virtually every adult male is a veteran and that most families have had the experience of seeing sons in uniform. Turks do not fear their army or consider it oppressive, the way terrified Africans and Latin Americans did when cruel military dictatorships dominated their societies. Most see it as a benevolent force that has successfully defended Turkey against foreign and domestic enemies, and that truly has the national interest at heart.

Some things the army has done are widely viewed as tragic errors--such as its decision after the first military coup in 1960 to convene a tribunal that convicted Prime Minister Adnan Menderes and two of his cabinet ministers of treason and then sent them to the gallows. Other stains on its record, like the imprisonment and torture of thousands of political activists following the 1980 coup or the brutish tactics used to suppress Kurdish rebels in the 1990s, are not much discussed outside intellectual circles. People understand that these excesses occurred, but choose either not to dwell on them or to believe they were necessary to preserve the nation. In much of Turkish society there is a desire to believe the best about the armed forces and their commanders.

Turks have a vivid collective memory of the chaos out of which their nation was forged. Over the years they have also watched several nearby countries--Yugoslavia, the Soviet Union, Lebanon, Iraq, Afghanistan--dissolve into fratricidal conflict. These experiences have convinced them of the supreme value of stability. In Turkey it is not hard to find thoughtful, worldly people who believe their country is not ready for full democracy. They know that once Turks are allowed to speak and write freely, to form political parties that advocate unorthodox ideas and to challenge long-held principles in the court of public opinion, Turkey will become more turbulent. That is something they deeply fear. They doubt their society can withstand the clash of ideas that is the essence of democratic life.

"You in the West also had long periods of backwardness and intolerance," a Turkish diplomat once told me as we walked along a quiet corridor in the foreign ministry in Ankara. "You had dictatorships, civil wars, religious fanaticism, the Inquisition, all kinds of horror. Then, over a period of centuries, you climbed out of that hole. You had the Enlightenment. You had philosophers who wrote books about democracy. Very slowly, people started to understand and accept these new ideas. You began to have governments based on democratic principles. Now, because you went through all that, you can give your people complete freedom. Your societies are stable enough to handle it. But it's not the same here. Our Enlightenment began only seventy-five years ago. It's too soon to lift every restriction. The risk is too great. We could lose everything.".

This rationale for limiting democracy is repeated constantly in Turkey. After a while it begins to sound like what an overprotective mother might say about her child. No mother would allow her four-year-old to cross the street alone or handle knives or play with matches, but there must come a time when, however reluctantly, she accepts that her child has grown up and is able to handle the responsibilities of adulthood. The fear of popular will that underpins Turkey's political system is like that of a mother whose child turns fifteen and then eighteen and then twenty-five and older, but is still not trusted to leave home alone.

When I asked my diplomat friend how long he thought it would take before Turks grow wise enough to assume the responsibilities of freedom, he stopped in his tracks and turned to me, a very serious expression on his face. Obviously he had pondered this question before. "It's been three-quarters of a century since this process started," he said. "Maybe after a century has passed we'll be far enough along." Then, after another pause, he repeated the key word with emphasis: "Maybe.".

Many Turks, especially the impatient young, feel profoundly insulted by this contempt for their intelligence. Why, then, do they not rebel against the army's insistence on guiding the political system? One reason, at least during the 1990s, was the widely held belief that without a strong military hand, Kurdish rebels and religious fanatics would plunge the country into crisis. But with the rebellion over and fundamentalists in retreat, another unpleasant reality still hangs over the body politic. No matter how committed one may be to the principles of democracy, the inescapable reality in Turkey is that the political class deserves its poor reputation. Military schools are far superior to those most civilians attend, and as a result the average officer is considerably more likely than the average politician to understand history, speak foreign languages and grasp the principles of effective government. It is no wonder, then, that many Turks like the idea of a military hand on the tiller of state.

Most developed countries are overflowing with people qualified to serve as legislators or public administrators, and as a result they are run relatively well. At the other end of the spectrum are countries that are a mess partly because their educational and social systems have, for one reason or another, failed to produce a capable political class. Turkey is caught uniquely between these two extremes. Its writers, thinkers, university professors and business executives are as talented, highly trained and broadly experienced as any in the world. But its political system has been very effectively designed to exclude these people from positions of power, and as a result Turkish democracy remains stunted. In no country is the gap between the quality of the educated elite and the quality of the political class as great as it is in Turkey.

For decades, each of Turkey's important political parties has been run by a single individual, sometimes with a tiny coterie of co-conspirators. These few figures choose candidates for public office by using a single criterion: blind obedience. Only sycophants need apply, and independent thinkers are avoided as if they carry the virus of a deadly plague. The political system has become ossified, dominated by a handful of phlegmatic reactionaries whose only true allegiance is to the status quo.

In Turkey, as in any democracy, the defense minister is supposed to be responsible to civilian leaders. Interviewing one, however, is a revealing experience. During my years in Turkey I did so only once, and the folly of it quickly became clear. The minister's office is located inside the walled complex in Ankara where the general staff has its headquarters, vividly symbolizing his position as a prisoner of his generals. It is the generals who make military policy, usually without even consulting the civilians who are their titular superiors. The defense minister I interviewed was almost blissfully ignorant and took great pains to avoid saying anything that might offend his uniformed masters. A colonel sat beside him, serving not simply as chaperone and note-taker but also as keeper of correct answers. Every time I asked a substantive question, the minister leaned his head toward the colonel and listened to whispered advice. Then he straightened up and repeated what he had been told.

Commanders of the Turkish army, navy, air force and gendarmerie are appointed as a group along with the chief of the general staff, normally serving in top command posts for three years and then, always in August, turning power over to the next group. They choose their own successors, with the principal qualification being absolute loyalty to the established order. Each group has its own attitude toward the press, so there are periods when they welcome journalists and other periods, often years along, when they view us as lepers or worse. During one interlude of openness, I was able to meet them regularly. Once I sat transfixed as a top commander launched into an astonishingly frank monologue full of contempt for politicians and their system.

"Idiots!" he began, shaking his head slowly and sounding almost as sad as he was outraged. "Those people in the Parliament are idiots! They don't know anything about government or Turkey or the world. The only thing they want is to steal money in their own little ways, to build their own little empires. Public good? Forget it. Planning for the future? Never think about it. Duty or integrity? Unknown. You should see the defense ministers they send us! They hardly know a tank from a plane. And those are the ministers! The rest are even worse. Their intellectual level is incredibly low. How can anyone expect us to take orders from people like that? Turkey would never forgive us if we did.".

My first reaction to this tirade was horror, coupled with a sinking feeling that this country was doomed to live a very long time under military dominance. But my indignation and outrage were soon overwhelmed by unwelcome thoughts. Against my will, I had to admit that much of what this general was telling me was true. Of course the Turkish Parliament and other elected bodies include men and women of intelligence and character, but not nearly enough of them.

Although the generals are justified in lamenting this unfortunate situation, their outrage is a bit disingenuous. They themselves are the ones who dictate the outlines of the political system, and they have shaped it so that parties reflect military ideas of order and discipline. Conditioned by their training, they like dealing with a handful of autocrats and are repelled by the brawling untidiness of open politics. Laws that govern Turkish political parties, including those that make it all but impossible to challenge or depose party leaders, were inspired by the generals themselves. So was Article 68 of the constitution, which allows the banning of any party whose program is found to conflict with "the democratic and secular order." And beyond these laws is the memory of three coups staged by the military, the execution of a prime minister and the jailing and humiliation of hundreds of politicians, along with the knowledge that dissidents have little legal protection from the vengeance of the ruling elite. With its array of spoken and unspoken laws, this system allows generals to control politicians and, ultimately, the course of the nation.

To ensure that the public does not stray too far from the ruling ideology, not only the political system but also the press must be brought to heel. In Turkey this is done with marvelous efficiency. The most potent weapon in the state's hand is a set of laws that allow reporters and editors to be imprisoned, newspapers to be closed and radio or television stations to be silenced if they challenge any aspect of the ruling dogma. Beyond those laws is the structure of the press itself, which functions not as an independent watchdog or critic but as a conscious part of the ruling system. Publishers readily accept guidance from the state about what should and should not be published, even to the point of suspending or firing columnists about whom the generals complain.

Eighty percent of the total circulation of Turkish newspapers and many of the country's most powerful broadcast outlets have traditionally been controlled by two industrial groups that together function very much like a cartel. Under a gentlemen's agreement between these groups, no reporter or columnist fired by one may be hired by the other. Their collaboration with each other and with the ruling elite is dictated not simply by misguided patriotism but also by crude economic interests. The cartel that runs the news business is also involved in a host of other enterprises, from real estate to power generation, that succeed or fail according to Ankara's whim. Thus do press barons join generals and leaders of political parties as key figures in the maintenance of the status quo.

Turks do not torment themselves by asking endlessly how they can push the army and its allies away from politics. They know the answer. All they need to do is elect a capable and united government that could assert civilian power. Such a government would be able to act without much resistance. Certainly the army is not willing to surrender its power to make key decisions, and someday that may lead to a confrontation. But today military commanders would give up much of their political power without a fight. Unlike commanders in countries under military dictatorship, they are not grasping to dominate every aspect of society. They seem genuinely to regret that they must intervene so often, and would welcome a strong civilian regime that would allow them to concentrate on military matters. Such a regime, however, is only beginning to take shape.

The larger reason for this state of affairs, beyond the structural weakness of Turkey's political system, lies in the nation's deep uncertainty about its identity and future. Should it look east or west, turn toward its Asian or its European heritage, take the risks of democracy or remain wrapped in comfortable paternalism? Many of today's Turkish leaders believe the Ottoman Empire was brought down by treacherous citizens who joined with foreign powers to extract special privileges from the state or to break away from it entirely. They fear that if they yield to the rising demand for recognition of Turkey's political, social, religious and ethnic diversity, the Republic will ultimately be dismembered and collapse just as the empire did.

One day, especially if Turkey moves closer to joining the European Union, the ruling elite will have to embrace democracy fully and without reservation. That will mean abandoning the system under which the Republic has been governed since its foundation. Most important, it will require that military commanders surrender all their influence over politics and, by extension, abandon their belief that they know what is best for Turkey. Before that can happen, Turks must finally succeed in building the civic consensus that has eluded them for so long. If they are able to do so, they will have the political and moral authority to demand that they finally be set free to shape their own destiny.

This would be a grand challenge for any country, but it is especially important that Turkey succeed because that success would have such profound effects in Europe, the Middle East and beyond. Though Turkey has looked inward for most of its short life, it has begun to share its cultural riches and make a serious mark on geopolitics and the world economy. A truly modern Turkey governed by the rule of law would raise the Turkish people to levels of prosperity and self-confidence they have never known before. Despite this country's political and psychological underdevelopment, it has the resources to become a towering power. If it can liberate itself from its paralyzing fears and embrace true democracy, it will also serve as a magnetic example of how the ideals of liberty can triumph over enormous obstacles. By adding moral strength to its military strength, Turkey could become a dominant force in the Middle East, encouraging peace and pulling Arab countries away from the social backwardness and feudal dictatorship under which most of them now suffer. It could exert a mighty and stabilizing influence westward to the Balkans and eastward to the Caucasus and Central Asia, becoming the key power in a region that is strategically vital, overwhelmingly rich in oil and other resources and now ruled mostly by tyrants who are dragging it toward chaos.

As a result of geography and because of their Ottoman past, Turks occupy a singular position in the Islamic consciousness. If any country is going to prove that Islam can coexist with modernity and democracy, it will almost certainly be Turkey. That achievement would make Turkey an invaluable countervailing force against religious fundamentalism everywhere. As a real democracy, Turkey would be a shining beacon not only for Muslims in nearby countries but for the entire Islamic world. Its example would be immensely important to the more than one billion people who live in the fifty-six predominantly Muslim countries stretching from Morocco to Indonesia. If Turkey can entice those countries toward democracy, it will reshape the entire world.

By embracing democratic principles Turkey would also qualify for membership in the European Union, which would be a historic breakthrough for Turkey itself and also bring Europe a badly needed injection of youthful energy. By embracing rather than denying its ethnic diversity, it would show the world, as the United States has done, what great benefits accrue to richly diverse societies. Once again, as during the Ottoman centuries, it would stand like a colossus at the point where two continents come together, drawing riches from both and offering itself as a meeting point for civilizations that might otherwise drift toward calamitous confrontation.

Whenever I sit in a café beside the Bosphorus I sense the power of Turkey's geography. Behind me lie Paris, Berlin and London. Across the narrow waterway is Asia, an unbroken land mass stretching from the streets of Istanbul to Baghdad, Delhi and Beijing. The Black Sea, gateway to Russia and the Slavic world, is a few miles to the north. To the south lies the wine-dark Mediterranean, most storied of seas, which washes the shores of Europe and Africa. Turkey's own heartland, Anatolia, is a paradise of dreamy coasts and coves, vast fruited plains, thick forests, deep lakes, raging rivers and soaring mountain ranges. This country is the great bridge between East and West, North and South. Seen another way, it is a barrier protecting Europe from the tides of political upheaval and religious extremism.

Turkey is an easy country to appreciate, but not such an easy country to help. Its leaders are proud, sensitive and quick to take offense. They don't make things easy for their friends. So the great question facing Americans and others who sympathize with Turkey is: What can we do to encourage Turkey to become the kind of country we can help without reservation?

Outside pressure on Turkey has proven effective. The United States has applied it discreetly, maintaining a strong military relationship while seeking gently to promote the values of tolerance and free choice. European leaders have taken a more direct approach, denouncing Turkey's human-rights abuses and publicly lamenting its failure to meet modern democratic standards. For many years this approach seemed unproductive, but now that Turkey has been officially designated as a candidate for membership in the European Union, there is a very concrete reason for its leaders to listen. If they can meet Europe's high standards, they will be rewarded with a huge prize that will guarantee them generations of freedom and fulfillment.

Turkey's success in creating a genuinely democratic space in a part of the world where there has traditionally been very little democracy is a historic achievement. It is, however, still incomplete. To fulfill its destiny, Turkey must create a democracy that shines not just by regional standards but by world standards.

This transformation will require more than mere political reform. It will require Turks to change the way they view themselves and their relationship to society. In Turkey the individual is considered less important than the collective, but the collective is the family or village or clan rather than the nation. There is little civic or environmental consciousness. Few people feel that they have a stake in society or care much about contributing to it.

Time and again I have stepped off an ugly or dirty Turkish street, passed through a portal and entered an immaculate and lovingly kept home. The contrast is striking, often amazing. Whether because of their nomadic past in Central Asia or as a response to their centuries of life under autocratic rule, many Turks still believe that life is to be lived within the family or clan. They feel no true allegiance to national goals and aspirations.

A classic Turkish village has no central plaza or square. In other parts of the world such public spaces encourage people to come together to crystallize their ideas and realize their collective power, to speak out, argue and protest. But in Turkey, allowing people to do that has always seemed vaguely dangerous. Turks gather to eat, drink and smoke, and sometimes to chat in front of the local mosque, but most of them do not enjoy the public space that has been the incubator of popular movements in other parts of the world.

Turkish leaders have sought to bind their people together by creating a concept called devlet. Over the years this has become my least favorite Turkish word. The dictionary says it means "state," but it also means something much uglier. Devlet is an omnipotent entity that stands above every citizen and every institution. Loyalty to it is held to be every Turk's most fundamental obligation, and questioning it is considered treasonous. No one ever defines what devlet means; everyone is supposed to know. Its guardians are a self-perpetuating elite--the generals, police chiefs, prosecutors, judges, political bosses and press barons who decide what devlet demands of the citizenry. This elite has written many laws to help it do what it perceives as its duty, and when necessary it acts outside the law. In its collective mind, serving devlet is a responsibility so transcendent and sublime that not even law may be allowed to obstruct it.

The reason that freethinkers must be imprisoned in Turkey is not simply because they speak against hallowed principles but because they threaten devlet. This devlet is much more than an abstract concept, much more than a focal point for national unity. It is Turkey's apocalyptic swordsman, the repressive mentality that overwhelms, constricts and suffocates the citizenry.

Many Turks who serve devlet are truly selfless. They consider themselves Atatürk's heirs and servants and are utterly convinced that their ceaseless vigilance is all that stands between Turkey and disaster. One of them, Vural Savas, who for much of the 1990s was the country's most zealous prosecutor, was once asked why he worked so tirelessly to close political parties and imprison politicians and journalists. He replied, "One simply has to know how to say no." That was a wonderfully precise answer, because saying no is the main duty of devlet. Saying yes to devlet means saying no to dissent, no to iconoclasm, no to new ideas, no to the kind of boldness and daring that propelled Atatürk to greatness. In the end, it means saying no to the possibility of Turkey rising to fulfill what could be a glorious historic mission.

Another fervent member of this secular priesthood, General Dogu Silahcioglu, once met with elected officials in Samsun, a provincial capital on the Black Sea coast, as they were making plans for a patriotic celebration. One city councillor ventured the opinion that since Samsun is home to people from various ethnic groups and Muslims of various persuasions, the celebration should emphasize the value of tolerance. That suggestion touched the general's rawest nerve.

"Tolerance!" he shouted. "Tolerance is the password of those people with a certain ideology. You cannot use this word here!".

That too was a perfectly concise expression of devlet. Its defenders detest the notion of tolerance because they believe tolerance will allow the spread of ideas that will ultimately kill Turkey. They consider themselves the truest defenders of Turkish democracy because they work day and night to suppress ideas and forces and people who want to destroy that democracy. More than a few Turks, conditioned as they are to obey and not protest, agree that although devlet is an arbitrary and often unfair institution, it is also indispensable.

In today's Turkey, no two words are as fundamentally contradictory as istiklal and devlet. The first stands not just for national independence but for the freedom and progress that independent thought brings to any society that encourages it. The second is a dark force that represents fear, mistrust and arrogance. It keeps Turkey in chains. For Turkey to live, devlet must die.

Without surrendering its unique identity, Turkey must find a way to break out of its political immobility. The world has changed radically since the fall of the Berlin Wall, and in many ways so has Turkey. It is an incomparably freer and more open society than it was a generation ago. But still it lags behind the countries that are its natural friends and allies. More and more of its citizens chafe under the restrictive order that so relentlessly limits their progress as a nation. If they can find a way to break free, Turkey will astonish the world by becoming the most audaciously successful nation of the twenty-first century.

Added material.

Stephen Kinzer was Istanbul bureau chief for the New York Times and is now that paper's national cultural correspondent. He is the author of Blood of Brothers and co-author of Bitter Fruit: The Untold Story of the American Coup in Guatemala.

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