In making his case against Erdoğan, Rubin spared no punches. Even though Erdoğan had endorsed Turkey’s entry into the European Union, he was really using those reforms to dilute “the checks and balances of military constitutional enforcement” (the paradox in that phrase is too hard to miss). Following the European Court of Human Rights decision to uphold a ban on headscarves in universities earlier this year, Erdoğan criticized the court’s decision because they had not “consulted Islamic scholars.” Later in May, the chief-negotiator for the accession talks with the EU, Ali Babacan, removed reference to the secular dimension of Turkey’s educational system from one of the working papers.

Rubin further emphasized this point on how the Erdoğan government has been systematically attacking Turkey’s secular education system. The promotion of graduates of religious high schools (İmam Hatips) to enter regular universities and attempts to debilitate the influence of the secular-oriented Higher Education Council (Yükseköğretim Kurulu-YÖK) by founding 15 new universities indicated that.

Rubin’s harangue touched on other well-known objections to Erdoğan: appointing “like-minded” bureaucrats to various positions in the government, particularly the Central Bank; the failed attempt to ban the sale of alcohol from residential neighborhoods; endorsement of the Saudi businessman Yasin al-Qadi, who has been identified by the UN and the U.S. Treasury Department as an al-Qaeda financier; and Erdoğan’s background in Necmettin Erbakan’s Islamist movement in the 1980s and 1990s when he likened democracy to a streetcar that could be ridden until one arrived at the desired destination and then “hopped off.”

The article finally criticized the U.S. government for causing “more harm than good” by throwing “[politically correct] PC platitudes” at the Erdoğan government and for supporting a political party in “an established democracy” that was entering an election season. “It is not good relations with Ankara that should be the U.S. goal, but rather the triumph of the democratic and liberal ideas for which Turkey traditionally stands,” concluded Rubin.

Before talking about the things that I thought after reading Mr. Rubin’s piece, let me say that I am not a supporter of either Prime Minister Erdoğan or his party. I do not think that his government is doing a good job with running the country (although they have been much more successful than the chronically inept coalition governments of the 1990s and early 2000s). Following his catastrophic “the army is no place for slacking” remark, I do not champion Erdoğan’s presidential aspirations for the simple reason that I do not believe that he will be an effective commander-in-chief. He does not possess the intellect, the statesmanship, the wisdom, and the prudence to be the president of a country that sits at the most critical junction on the planet. For all intents and purposes, his Foreign Minister Abdullah Gül is a better candidate.

The Erdoğan’s governments education policy is also a wreck. Whereas his government should be aiming to elevate the intellectual quality of Turkey’s imams (prayer leaders) by promoting college-level education, his insistence to promote the İmam-Hatip high schools is not so much politically unwise but practically meaningless (Erdoğan himself is a graduate of an İmam-Hatip). Not many graduates of İmam-Hatips prefer to be imams and those who do are not trained well enough to  meet the needs of their communities. As for Erdoğan’s confrontation with YÖK, it is equally futile. Instead of encouraging the council to improve academic standards across Turkish universities, which are quite below those of their Western counterparts, Erdoğan has been engaging in endless turf wars with YÖK which do not translate into better libraries, better facilities, and better faculty.

That I do not support Mr. Erdoğan, however, does not mean that I am furious about his rule. For one thing, as Mr. Rubin correctly asserts, Turkey is a consolidated democracy. The political problems that Turkey faces today are not the same ones that it faced thirty, twenty, or even ten years ago. Radical Islam has failed to offer itself as a viable political project; ethnic nationalism, despite extracting a severe toll on civilian lives, has failed to accomplish its ultimate goal to escalate terrorism into civil war. In bringing about economic development and increased political democracy, the past four years under Erdoğan have not been that bad.

One should also be honest, nonetheless. Turkey still needs a genuinely liberal political party that neither has a problem with the way that Turkish people live Islam nor with the way that the secular state operates. None of the political parties know (or even worse, care) how to raise the people’s standard of living. One of the things that they all have in common is that they do not have a vision to elevate the country to what its Founding Father Mustafa Kemal Atatürk called the level of “modern” countries.

It is worth noting that there is an even greater challenge to liberal democracy here in the United States. Many of my Democrat friends have been cheering about their party’s success in the midterm elections. I, on the other hand, am utterly disappointed. What I am disenchanted about is the electoral success of the incumbent senator from my state, George Allen. Even though he made an expressly racist remark last summer (calling an Indian-American student working for his opponent’s campaign a “macaca”), Allen still managed to get nearly half the votes from the electorate. His contestant James Webb beat him only by a 7,000-vote margin in what should have been a decisive victory. I can only read the results as an expression of endorsement for Allen’s ill-concealed racism.

There is a deep animosity between individuals from different “racial” groups in this country. African-Americans still feel discriminated and have developed a counter-culture to what they perceive as “white” America. On the other hand, many “white” Americans, especially in the South, who are not honest enough to admit that they are racist, champion “Confederate” symbols as a part of their “heritage” (imagine Germans coming up with a similar argument for their Nazi past).

One should be even more concerned for the future of a secular United States, for reasons similar to those that Mr. Rubin has about Turkey, though I believe that my worries are more justified. Last week, I went to see the British comedian Sacha Baron Cohen’s mockumentary Borat the Movie. What was absolutely disturbing in the film was the part when Cohen’s character went to a Pentecostal church, where the Chief Justice of the Mississippi Supreme Court James W. Smith argued how America was once a “Christian nation” and that it will once again become “Christian” in the near future.

It can be argued that Justice Smith is from one of the most backward states in the Union and what he says would not matter that much. But what about the case of Rep. Lynn Westmoreland (R-GA), who sponsored a bill last summer to put the Ten Commandments in the chambers of the House of Representatives and the Senate? For sure, the bill was killed almost instantly (probably owing to the fact that Westmoreland was not able to name all Ten Commandments in an interview with the comedian Stephen Colbert). But when one thinks about the part of the First Amendment to the U.S. Constitution that “Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof,” and the brazenness of a U.S. Representative to expressly defy that, it is time to feel uneasy. In Turkey, no politicians can expect to get away with suggesting to install religious symbols to any public building, let alone the Grand National Assembly.

Let us be honest with each other: the assault on secularism in the United States is not confined to a few legislators or judges; it is systematic and quite widespread. There is every effort to tear down the barriers between religion and state. The assault on abortion, sex education in schools, banning the study of the theory of evolution and trying to replace it with creationism are all done in the name of God. Furthermore, many politicians in this country believe that they are on a mission by God and are therefore infallible. It is completely lost to them that God really does not need human agency; especially one that is expressed in the form of self-righteousness.

Politicians’ use to of religious symbols is a lot more prevalent in the United States than it is in Turkey. Looking at this picture, I do believe that everyone should be more concerned about the future of secularism in America, the country that actually invented it. If secularism is gone, the United States will cease to exist as a democracy. Without a democratic United States, the world will be an even more unpleasant place to live.

It must be borne in mind that there is no such thing as a flawless democracy – the idea is perfect, but its application never is. In criticizing other countries for a lack of democracy, American intellectuals should question the possibility as to whether the same arguments can be made against them. “Stick the needle onto yourself, the awl onto others,” warns an old Turkish proverb. Reflecting one’s own position should precede passing judgments on others. Only by appreciating the short-comings in their arguments can intellectuals truly maintain the respect that they muster through hard-work.

+++

Barın Kayaoğlu is a Ph.D. student in history at the University of Virginia in Charlottesville, Virginia and a regular contributor to the Journal of Turkish Weekly.

E-mail: kayaoglu@virginia.edu

12 November 2006