The Founding of the Turkish Republic

The Turkish Republic was founded in 1923 by Mustafa Kemal, called “Ataturk” (Father Turk), who evicted the victorious Allies that occupied Turkey after World War I. After a distinguished military career, he wanted to establish a secular state capable of holding its own against European nation-states. To do this, it was necessary to disband the traditional religious elite. Accordingly, the ulamas’ extensive land holdings (evkaf) were appropriated, destroying their institutional source of economic power. This enabled the state to extend control over all aspects of religious institutions and practices, and personnel recruitment and advancement.

During his fifteen-year presidency, Ataturk introduced a series of legislative reforms that adopted European legal systems and civil codes, replacing both Shari’a and the kanun, or Islamic jurisprudence. Friday, the Muslim day of worship and a public holiday, was decreed a regular work day. The most significant act, however, was the abolishment of the caliphate itself. While Ataturk was trying to effect change only in Turkey, the decision reverberated throughout the Islamic world. It deprived the Muslim world of its central office and a leader who had a standing equivalent of that of the Pope for Catholics.

Ataturk is credited with creating a breach with Turkey’s Islamic past. He succeeded in establishing a nation-state which drew its legitimacy solely from Turkish ethnic nationalism. In doing this, he fashioned a new national historical narrative which suggested that Turkish history began not with the introduction of Islam, but long before. Even the language was reworked; words of Arabic or Persian origin were purged and replaced by new words that had demonstrably Turkish roots. The Arabic alphabet was replaced with Latin script. Within a generation, this had the effect of reorienting Turkish society to Western traditions as opposed to Ottoman and Muslim traditions practiced in the past.