Faith Simmers Beneath the Surface of Turkish Society

Last Tuesday, I cast my very first vote in a presidential election from the most unexpected of locations -- a hectic post office in Alanya, Turkey, thousands of miles from DC. Covered with various stamps and a vaguely official label, the envelope containing my ballot should reach my Alabama election office by November 6 (inshallah, at least). With the instant--and borderless--availability of sound bites, attack ads, and trending topics, it's sometimes hard to believe that an entire ocean lies between us and the presidential race.

As I've watched from Turkey this election season, I've noticed the prominence of the religious beliefs of the candidates--both Obama and Romney, Biden and Ryan--in shaping their perspectives and their policies and, in particular, their honesty about it in the midst of the campaign. No matter the outcome of the election, the man standing on the Capitol steps in January will take his oath with his hand on the Bible, his chosen religious text. This could never happen in Turkey.

Nearly ninety-nine percent of the Turkish population identifies as Muslim, but since 1928, the state has remained nominally and functionally secular at all levels--a product of the sweeping reforms for modernization executed by Kemal Atatürk, father of the republic. A focus on hyper-secularity permeates Turkish politics at all levels, shaping official state dialogue and party positions: just since the 1980s, two groups, the Welfare Party and the Virtue Party, have been disbanded for their religious agendas. This emphasis on laïcité--the "active neutrality" of the state, built on decades of practice--has created a distinct separation between public and private and banished any free discussion of faith from Turkey's political sphere.

But Turkey is a nation brimming with paradox, and as one New York Times writer has suggested, just because Islam does not shape Turkish politics doesn't mean that the state can't wield a certain influence over Islam. The government still plays a role in the Sunni Hanafi school nationwide. State-issued identity cards ascribe a religion to citizens at birth, institutionalizing it as a means of social organization. The AKP, the ruling party since 2003, has faced accusations of Islamist leanings for supporting policies like the elimination of headscarf regulations in public schools and government offices while simultaneously pushing for the rise of Turkey's liberal economy and demanding a position in the EU.

This interplay between modernism and tradition seems strange when viewed through an American lens, but here it represents the essence of political reality. A visit to the Ministry of Religious Affairs in Ankara by our program in September shed light on the official interaction between politics and religion. Under the ever-present, blue-eyed gaze of Atatürk--in portrait form, of course--our speaker's sterile discussion of Islam made clear the state's viewpoint: religion is but an entity to be managed, not a social actor nor a part of political dialogue.

In denying Islam's fluid character on the political stage, the state pushes it further into society itself; there it splits and scatters bits of its influence everywhere, confusing the already complex question of Turkish identity in the process. In Istanbul, dozens of mosques attract tourists from around the world while also serving as a vibrant social centers that unite the local community. Each night in my apartment in Alanya, I listen as the American pop music blasting from the clubs mingles with the call to prayer, creating an auditory identity crisis at once totally strange and vaguely beautiful. At the elementary school where I work as a teacher's aide once a month, one student comes to class with her hands covered in henna as her grandmother prepares for the hajj, but no teacher can wear a headscarf nor grow a beard. My host family asks about my religious and political beliefs, curious to make a link between the two in my life as the struggle to find one in their own state. These vignettes offer little clarity, but they do characterize the wonderful duality with Turkish society--the lively tensions simmering just beneath the surface of stale political dialogue.

As my US-bound envelope makes its way across the Atlantic, I look forward to the election and to my first Inauguration Day in DC. But for now I am in Turkey, and I remain transfixed by the relationship between religion, society, and politics here, wondering when--if ever--the day will arrive when rich and productive discussion about faith spreads from within society and joins the political sphere.