{"id":8061,"date":"2008-12-11T21:27:44","date_gmt":"2008-12-11T18:27:44","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.turkishnews.com\/en\/content\/?p=8061"},"modified":"2023-04-06T13:24:46","modified_gmt":"2023-04-06T10:24:46","slug":"soul-searching-in-the-chp-baykals-chador-opening","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.turkishnews.com\/en\/content\/2008\/12\/11\/soul-searching-in-the-chp-baykals-chador-opening\/","title":{"rendered":"Soul-Searching in the CHP: Baykal\u2019s \u201cChador Opening\u201d"},"content":{"rendered":"

Soul-Searching in the CHP: Baykal\u2019s \u201cChador Opening\u201d<\/h2>\n
Publication: Eurasia Daily Monitor Volume: 5 Issue: 236<\/div>\n
December 11, 2008<\/div>\n
By: Saban Kardas<\/div>\n

Deniz Baykal, the leader of the main opposition Republican People\u2019s Party (CHP), kindled a controversial debate in Turkish politics when he introduced his new project to reach out to conservative circles. During a party meeting, Baykal pinned party rosettes on women wearing black chadors (carsaf<\/em>), welcoming them to the CHP (www.ntvmsnbc.com, November 17). Since then, Baykal\u2019s \u201cchador initiative\u201d has sparked a major debate within the CHP as well as between the CHP and other parties.<\/p>\n

The initiative was surprising to many, because the CHP, like Turkey\u2019s military and higher echelons of the judiciary, has presented itself as a major defender of Kemalist principles, in particular the narrow interpretation of secularism. After all, it was the CHP that brought the case before the Constitutional Court earlier this year, demanding the annulment of legislative changes that would have enabled girls with headscarves to attend universities. The court, sharing the same worldview as the CHP, annulled those changes in June (EDM<\/em>, June 5).<\/p>\n

Given the party\u2019s previous position on the headscarf issue, criticism was expressed across the political spectrum over Baykal\u2019s latest political move. Pundits in conservative and secularist camps slammed Baykal\u2019s move: for the former, it was insincere (Vakit<\/em>, November 23); and for the latter it was a regression from the gains of the Kemalist revolution and a step toward Shari\u2019a rule (Hurriyet<\/em>, November 20). Both camps believe that Baykal is seeking to make inroads into conservative circles but that the effort will be futile. Others also noted the women Baykal met were not representative of conservative women; they joined the party only because of their husbands\u2019 opportunistic hopes of gaining political positions (www.internethaber.com, November 20).<\/p>\n

Some of the CHP\u2019s political opponents found this initiative a tactical move to attract conservative voters in the forthcoming local elections. Ironically, Culture and Tourism Minister Ertugrul Gunay, who is a former secretary-general of the CHP and a member of the governing Justice and Development Party (AKP) since 2007, sharply criticized the move. \u201cThis is mere vote hunting. Far from being a [libertarian] opening, I see this as abuse,\u201d he said. Gunay, however, also fired a few shots at his own party\u2019s supporters, by referring to the chador as outmoded apparel for women (Sabah<\/em>, December 6). Gunay\u2019s position contrasted with Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan\u2019s sympathetic response to his archenemy Baykal. Erdogan congratulated Baykal for this courageous move and encouraged him to be vigilant against criticism (www.ntvmsnbc.com, November 25).<\/p>\n

In response to charges of pragmatism, CHP officials stressed that this development was sincere and was demanded by the party\u2019s grass-roots supporters. In defense of his position, Baykal said, \u201cTurkey is going through a healthy debate. This is not a [political] opening, but rather completely humanitarian and ethical behavior.\u201d Noting that 70 percent of Turkish women cover their hair, Baykal added that chador was a traditional outfit in Turkey, not a political symbol. Arguing that the CHP valued people for their opinion, not their appearance, he added that his party was open to those who did not have problems with secularism and the state. (ANKA, November 26).<\/p>\n

When criticism from within the secularist camp continued unabated, Baykal took further radical steps and argued that the CHP should engage in self-criticism and come to terms with the mistakes in its past, acknowledging that there might have been undue interference in people\u2019s private lives. Viewing people\u2019s clothing as a challenge to the state \u201cis a mentality of a one-party regime. Everybody has to abandon that obsession.\u201d Noting that Turkey was already socially fragmented, Baykal confronted his critics and maintained that the CHP could not afford the luxury of dividing the country further by judging people based on their appearance (Yeni Safak<\/em>, December 3).<\/p>\n

Nonetheless, the \u201cchador initiative\u201d has provoked enmity within the CHP. Baykal\u2019s call for a critical reflection on the party\u2019s past angered more radical voices. Necla Arat, a parliamentary deputy from Istanbul and one of the fervent advocates of the headscarf ban, disparaged Baykal. She said that \u201ccriticizing practices during the era of Ataturk and Ismet Inonu [the second president of Turkey] because of \u2018one-party-rule\u2019 is unfortunate. My friends and I have started wondering whether the party is betraying its heritage [reddi miras<\/em>].\u201d Scores of other CHP deputies reportedly share Arat\u2019s opinion (Hurriyet<\/em>, December 4).<\/p>\n

A rather surprising attack on Baykal came from the leader of the Nationalist Action Party (MHP), Devlet Bahceli, who said that this issue was, in fact, a non-issue and did not correspond to the real problems of the people. He said, \u201cAs part of the Greater Middle East Project, there is an attempt to shape Turkish politics through moderate Islam\u2026 The Right pillar of moderate Islam is the AKP\u2026Is there an attempt to erect a Left pillar of moderate Islam through this opening?\u201d (Anadolu Ajansi, December 9).<\/p>\n

Baykal issued a written response to Bahceli, in which he drew a distinction between a legitimate right to certain religious freedoms and moderate Islam as a political project. Baykal attacked Bahceli by saying, \u201conly those who either abuse religion or come from a tradition of setting political traps [referring to the MHP\u2019s controversial role in urging the AKP to pass the constitutional amendments on headscarves] will dislike this [the CHP\u2019s defense of religious freedom]\u201d (ANKA, December 10).<\/p>\n

Baykal indeed took a bold step by opening one-party rule to debate and indicating that the CHP would defend religious freedom, but there are grounds for being skeptical about the prospects of the \u201cchador initiative.\u201d As political scientist Bekir Berat Ozipek says, having ruled the country singlehandedly during the one-party-era (1923-1950), the CHP has not been able to adapt itself to competitive electoral politics since Turkey moved to multi-party rule in the 1950s (Today\u2019s Zaman<\/em>, December 8). Indeed, the CHP\u2019s critical distance from the masses and their lifestyles and its modernization project of transforming Turkish society have shaped the identity of the party\u2019s core grassroots. Therefore, even if Baykal\u2019s intentions were sincere, many analysts like Ozipek are skeptical about the CHP\u2019s ability to transform itself from a statist party to a liberal party embracing human rights and religious fr
\needom.<\/p>\n

Skeptics also refer to Baykal\u2019s track record. He promised in the 1990s to develop a new platform that would be called the Liberal Left or the Anatolian Left and would represent the conservative people. For some, this project failed because of Baykal\u2019s low credibility and unprincipled pragmatism (www.internethaber.com, November 20). Ozipek believes that those steps were never taken, because such a move would contradict the identity and the ideology of the CHP’s core secularist constituency. Ozipek put it sarcastically: \u201ca party leader could experience such enlightenment all of a sudden, but expecting a change in party politics in such a brief period of time would be na\u00efve.\u201d<\/p>\n

https:\/\/jamestown.org\/program\/soul-searching-in-the-chp-baykals-chador-opening\/<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Soul-Searching in the CHP: Baykal\u2019s \u201cChador Opening\u201d Publication: Eurasia Daily Monitor Volume: 5 Issue: 236 December 11, 2008 By: Saban Kardas Deniz Baykal, the leader of the main opposition Republican People\u2019s Party (CHP), kindled a controversial debate in Turkish politics when he introduced his new project to reach out to conservative circles. During a party […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":83,"featured_media":782331,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[727,89],"tags":[721],"class_list":["post-8061","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-saban-kardas","category-turkey","tag-women-issues"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.turkishnews.com\/en\/content\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8061","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.turkishnews.com\/en\/content\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.turkishnews.com\/en\/content\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.turkishnews.com\/en\/content\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/83"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.turkishnews.com\/en\/content\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=8061"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.turkishnews.com\/en\/content\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8061\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.turkishnews.com\/en\/content\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/782331"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.turkishnews.com\/en\/content\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=8061"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.turkishnews.com\/en\/content\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=8061"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.turkishnews.com\/en\/content\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=8061"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}