Young Civilians Protest HSYK Appointments

Protesting in front of the İstanbul 13th High Criminal Court yesterday, the Young Civilians decried the Supreme Board of Prosecutors and Judges (HSYK) on Tuesday that three prosecutors had been appointed to İstanbul. It is thought that HSYK's appointments are an attempt to impede the Ergenekon investigation.

From a statement issued by the Young Civilians by way of TDZ:

“Forty prosecutors into the Ergenekon case will not suffice, let there be 367,” the statement read, poking fun at former Supreme Court of Appeals Chief Prosecutor Sabih Kanadoğlu, who previously stated that at least 40 prosecutors should be appointed to the case. Kanadoğlu nullified the election of Abdullah Gül as president in 2007, prompting the Constitutional Court to enforce a quorum of two-thirds -- 367 deputies of a total of 500 -- of Parliament for the first two rounds of voting.

“Kanadoğlu wanted 40 prosecutors in the Ergenekon case; and the number of Ergenekon prosecutors has started to increase. Uncle Sabih! Why don’t you just take your hand out of our lives and leave us alone? It is apparent that Kanadoğlu will not settle for 40 prosecutors, and even 367 prosecutors will not be enough for him. The latest trick of those who have come to realize that they will no longer be able to play down the Ergenekon case with the recent discovery of Ergenekon ammunition aims to water down its prosecutors now,” the statement continued.

The Young Civilians also stated that Turkish society was fully aware of what the appointment of new prosecutors into Ergenekon would mean. “We think there is one point they have disregarded. ... We are not the idiots that you suppose us to be. Having become bitter from our experiences in the past, we will not allow you to cover up the Ergenekon case. Beware!” they said.

More Than Tiliting At Windmills: A Look at Turkish Youth in Politics

PHOTO BY Johan Spanner/The New York Times
In response to the AKP closure case earlier this year, numerous democracy groups protested across the country against what many Turks viewed as another postmodern coup. This photograph captured a protest held this past June. The protest sign pictured reads: "We Were Small in the 80s. Now You Are."

From Hürriyet:

The number of young people active in politics is very low in Turkey, despite its high youth population, but a group of university students plan to voice their demands prior to local elections in March. Upon founding an association, the students have started to lobby municipalities firstly for cheaper transport fares.

For a country of young people the average age of politicians is very high and this is reflected in government priorities that ignore the needs of the youth, said a group of university students who have decided to take action.

A group of Istanbul students have formed a pressure group to lobby municipalities prior to local elections in March. The group wants their needs to be taken into account by municipalities and will start lobbying different candidates.

For this purpose, students have founded an association, "Youth Movement" (Gençlik Akımı), to voice their demands, which they believe have been neglected by mayors for too long. "We plan to prepare a petition that will include our specific demands, such as cheaper transport tickets for students," said Adnan Alkış, head of the association. Alkış believes if they can show candidates that university students represent a significant number of voters, they can improve conditions of life for students.

"We expect to get 100,000 signatures from students and this means 100,000 votes for the candidates. They must take our demands into account, too," said Alkış, a senior student from Sabancı University.

Coming from different ethnic, socioeconomic and even ideological backgrounds, eight students founded the association last April, an endeavor that sometimes required courage, dedication and enthusiasm considering the red tape involved in founding an association in Turkey.

"We all come from different backgrounds, but our common thread is our social sensitivity," said Bulut Çavaş, a student from Sabancı University. Although the students are offering to deal with all types of social problems, they have emphasized they are not part of any political party or movement.

Sociologists often talk of how the 1980 military coup led to apolitical generations as youngsters were discouraged from even being interested in politics, let alone taking an active part in it. Their fear about being labeled as part of an ideology is rooted in the highly tense period prior to the coup and the main reason Turkish youth have been largely apolitical for the past 30 years.

"After the coup in 1980, youth were punished for activism. Parents advised their children not to be a member of a party or a political movement. This discouraged young people and led to disorganization among them," said Mustafa Şen, a sociologist from the Middle East Technical University in Ankara.

Şen also said the main reason why young people do not participate in politics, despite their numbers in Turkey, relates to the laws on political parties. The non-institutional structure of political parties discourages youngsters, as does the education system and their families.

"In Europe, you can start to work in a political party from the bottom and reach the top at an earlier age than in Turkey. However, our parties do not have such an institutional structure," said Şen, who added the difference between the European Union’s and Turkey’s political structure will cause problems in Turkey’s candidacy period.

"The generations that preceded us left a very bad legacy. We face difficulties in finding more people who can work with us as everyone believes we are part of a political party," said Halil İbrahim Özcan, a senior student in Yıldız Technical University. Even with such reluctance from students, the association already has 33 members.

"According to a recent law on political parties and elections, youth branches of political parties are banned. No political party in Turkey has youth support and politicians do not care about it," said Şen.

The majority sometimes regards being part of an ideological and political group as dangerous. The founders of the Youth Movement feel the pressure of being labeled as a part of political group and hesitate to give political views in general or their own personal views about mayoral candidates.

"We do not want to be labeled as this or that. We want to work for the good of the people," said Özcan, 23.

For full article, click here.

One of the most salient points made in this article is these youth groups' democratic vision just a few decades after the crushing coup of 1980. In so many ways, Turkey's political dysfunctions can be attributed to the heavy-handed authoritarianism of the military rule that bore down on the country in these post-coup years. Indeed, an understanding of the 1980 coup plays prominently in the historical memory of many of these young reformers (see, for example, the Young Civilians). Although Turkey made a democratic recovery under the inspiring leadership of Turgut Özal, grassroots democracy is still very much incipient and political parties remain heavily top-down structures.

Politics in Turkey too often seems a spectator sport left to politicians who make it to the top of the country's party apparatus, and rather than hold politicians feet to the fire on policy positions citizens dislike, political participation too often manifests itself solely at the ballot box in the form of casting votes for parties that -- outside of elections -- are indifferent to calls from grassroots reformers and unresponsive to political demands from below. Some of the problem is indeed that political participation is embraced merely as a matter of elections, but political parties too bear a share of the blame. Turkey is in need of vibrant political leaders inside and outside of party leadership who are genuinely committed to civil society development and the construction of more responsive institutions. The importance of the youth movements highlighted in this article is that they move politics outside the realm of elite political gamesmanship and into a more vibrant and participatory public sphere. If Turkey's youth more actively engages the country's politics, the country's democracy is more likely to flourish in the future -- the coup of 1980 left behind in the annals of history as a painful memory of a time when politics was substituted for coercion.

For an earlier look at youth in politics by the European Stability Initiative, click here. The study is in collaboration with the ARI movement, a leading pro-democracy NGO concerned with youth politics, and pays particular attention to Turkish youth and the European Union.

Working for Soccer Diplomacy

LOGO OF THE YOUNG CIVILIANS: Under a pair of comfortable sneakers reads, "The Young Civilians Are Not Comfortable." The Young Civilians (Genç Siviller), a name the group gave themselves after they staged a protest against Turkey's annual Youth and Sports Day, an event in which schoolchildren in sports uniforms march diligently in school stadiums across the country. The group objected to what it considered to be the festivities' dreary Stalin-like order. The neo-nationalist daily Cumhuriyet reacted to the protest with a headline that read, "Young Officers Express Concern." The group retorted online with an aptly titled counter-statement: "The Young Civilians Are Uncomfortable."

Doing what they do best, the Young Civilians are in the middle of an innovative campaign to encourage President Gül to accept the invitation of Armenian President Serge Sarkisian to attend the first international football match to be played between the two countries—a match to be played Sept. 6 that will qualify one team or the other for the FIFA World Cup. Armenia has said that it will open up its borders from Sept. 1 to Sept. 6 to allow Turkish citizens to travel to Yerevan, the capital of Armenia where the game will be played (see Aug. 16 post). For their part, and in addition to raising pressure on Gül to accept Sakisian's invitation, the Young Civilians are encouraging Turkish citizens to take advantage of the historic opportunity and travel to Yerevan. The border has been closed since 1994 following Armenian support an armed insurrection by ethnic Armenians in the Karabakh region of Azerbaijan, a close Turkish ally. Gül has still not decided whether he will attend the match.

On my last day in İstanbul, I had the opportunity to talk with Pınar Akpınar, the Young Civilian leading up this latest campaign of the Civilians. Akpinar's resolve to make a difference in the foreign relations between both countries was not only inspiring in its own right, but more so in that it fits within the Civilians' larger agenda of sparking political dialogue. According to Akpinar, for the Civilians, no progress can me made without first having people talk to one another in spite of their differences. This not only includes progress toward ending the current standoff between Turkey and Armenia, but most especially in Turkey's larger struggle for democracy. Long intrigued by the Civilians who claim "politics as existential," what most struck me about the stated objective of the organization was the non-ideological nature of its end-goal. Rather than a capitalist, socialist, secularist, or Islamist society, the Civilians are first and foremost concerned with "democracy," and democracy for the group means better democratic practice. More than free elections, democracy means freedoms of expression and assembly, in addition to freedoms to a broad education centered on the development of the individual and multiple opportunities to meaningfully participate in the process. To drive home their message of democracy being a process versus an end, the Civilians are open about not knowing exactly sure where Turkey's democratic project will end up—rather, like relations between Turkey and Armenia, what is important is that it gets a good start.

For more on the Young Civilians, see April 9 post.

"Make Noise Against Coups"

PHOTO BY Johan Spanner/The New York Times
The sign pictured reads: "We Were Small in the 80s. Now You Are."

Mary Ann and Richard brought me my very own sign from the large demonstration leading up to Taksim Square on Saturday. Thousands of people attended the unsanctioned protest (there was no permit), but police did nothing to intervene save block access to Taksim. The signs being waved read, "Make Noise Against Coups," and the protests were indeed loud enough to warrant a story in Sunday's New York Times. The NYT article focuses on the class dimension of the current political struggle and the heightened anxiety of the "secular establishment."

From BIA-Net:

On Saturday (June 21) the “Stop the Coups” meeting was held in Istanbul, which was organized by the organization Say Stop To Racism And Nationalism”. Among the supporters were the Global Action Group (KEG), Young Civilians, Organization of Human Rights and Solidarity for Oppressed People (MAZLUM-DER), Say Stop To Racism And Nationalism, the Democratic Society Party (DTP), the Revolutionary Socialist Workers Party (DSİP), the Foundation of Volunteer Organizations of Turkey (TGTV), the Socialist Democracy Party (SDP), the Socialist Party Initiative, The Peace Congress Activists, Lambdaİstanbul LGBTT Solidarity Association and the Political Horizon Movement.

“We can stop the coups”
Gathering in Istanbul’s historic Tünel neighborhood, the crowd of thousands of people, among whom were intellectuals like Adalet Ağaoğlu, Nazlı Ilıcak, Abdurrahman Dilipak, Lale Mansur, carried the banner that said “70 Million Steps Against The Coup”.

The meeting crowd, which chanted slogans such as “Say Stop, Say Stop, Say Stop To Coups”, “Free, Free, Freedom” and “We can stop the coups”, was interesting in showing that individuals from different backgrounds could get together for a common cause. Kurds, covered women, gays, socialists and many others walked together, making the same demand.

White glove, Turkish flag and police barricade
Among people who were wearing white gloves and blowing whistles against coups, there were those who were carrying Turkish flags as well.

Although the meeting crowd was planned to go all the way to Taksim square originally, it had to end with a press release in front of Galatasaray High School, midway between Tünel and Taksim square, once the crowd encountered the police barricade set for them.

“Today is the day to show the first reaction against the attempt to place democracy under the guardianship of military”
Zeynep Tanbay, who read the press release on behalf of the crowd, said, “Today is the day to raise our voice against coups, coup attempts of all sorts, the day to show the first reaction against the attempt to place democracy under the guardianship of military.”

“Are we experiencing a military coup? At first sight, it seems not possible to talk about such a coup. But, especially the developments after the April 27 manifesto by the military show that we are in a slow-motion coup process, that democracy is subjected to a sort of intervention.”

The concepts of freedom, justice and equality are thrown into the background
Reminding that there were closure cases against the political parties DTP and AKP and that the amendment that permitted the use of headscarf in the universities was annulled, Tanbay told the crowd that “We are facing a new stage in the intervention process that has been taking place for a while in Turkey. The demand by the forces on the side of democracy for a democratic constitution has been dropped from the agenda during this process and The concepts of freedom, justice and equality are thrown into the background.”

We will continue taking steps until we arrive at real democracy
Indicating that they want to disperse organizations such as Ergenekon, the Republican Work Groups and spoil the plans made behind the closed doors, Tanbay continued, “We will raise our voice against coups regardless if it is a summer day, an autumn night or a winter morning. Against coups, we will be on every street in Turkey .We will continue taking steps until we arrive at real democracy. (BÇ/EZÖ/TB)

Let's Be Kurdish

The Young Civilians (see April 9 post) are at it again. . .

From Today's Zaman:

A group of youth spent their May 19, Youth and Sports Day, in southeastern Turkey, highlighting the unity of the Turkish and Kurdish communities.

"We had a forum in Diyarbakır with university students on the Kurdish issue and are now on our way to Midyat," said Yasemin Demir from Mardin in a phone interview with Today's Zaman.
The group's members spent a few nights in the homes of poor families to learn about Kurdish culture and traditions, said Demir, a 25-year-old woman who works in a bank in İstanbul and is an active participant with the Young Civilians (Genç Siviller), a Turkish nongovernmental group noted for its use of sarcasm in protests.

The Young Civilians organized a series of workshops, called "Let's be Kurdish," that deal with Kurdish cuisine, language and songs and in the process memorized Kurdish songs and cooked Kurdish dinners. The group says Turks don't know as much about the Kurdish culture as they do about, for example, the Japanese culture -- even though Kurds are much closer to Turks in that respect.

"We are finishing the workshops today and having an alternate May 19," said Erkan Şen, 23, a student at İstanbul University's department of law.

Rejecting wearing the "uniforms of anyone," Young Civilians started as a group of students and held one of their earliest protests in the early 2000s. Instead of stadium shows, the traditional May 19 celebration, the group has been organizing alternative festivities in Turkey's various provinces.

"We have a desire to free the youth festivities from the way they were celebrated in stadiums -- where young people are not treated as individuals. I participated in a few of these stadium shows when I was in high school and I know the psychology of the students, ready to take commands and do what they are told," said Rasim Ozan Kütahyalı, a 27-year-old screenplay writer from İzmir.

He said Young Civilians seek to have May 19 festivities be a tool for all youth, whether Turkish, Kurdish, Armenian, observant Muslims or not, to take control of their own future. "To the contrary," he added "young people face an increasingly polarized society in Turkey."

Who Are These Young Civilians?

A campaign poster for Aliye Öztürk's presidential bid, an imaginary candidate the Young Civilians created to comment about the secular guard's opposition to Gül. Öztürk is the military's worst nightmare: a devoutly religious female university professor who is Kurdish, Armenian, and Allewite, and whose türban fashion spells "political troublemaker." The imaginary candidate's bid for the presidency is just one of the sassy campaigns the group has devised.

I have been lamenting as of late that there seem to be so very few Turkish young people involved in progressive politics. However, an interview I read in Today's Zaman led me to research a civil society group composed of diverse characters—students, devout Muslims, agnostics, Kurds, young professionals, Alevis, etc.—united by a common belief in the virtues of pluralist democracy. Indeed, I think I am in a better mood than I have been for a week.

So, who are these young people whose very presence so excites me? They call themselves the Young Civilians (Genç Siviller), a name the group gave themselves after they staged a protest against Turkey's annual Youth and Sports Day, an event in which schoolchildren in sports uniforms march diligently in school stadiums across the country. The group objected to what it considered to be the festivities' dreary Stalin-like order. The neo-nationalist daily Cumhuriyet reacted to the protest with a headline that read, "Young Officers Express Concern." The group retorted with online with an aptly titled statement, "The Young Civilians Are Uncomfortable."

Another American told me a month ago that Turks don't understand sarcasm. The Young Civilians prove this a total fallacy. Since the first protest, the Young Civilians have staged a number of creative and bitterly sarcastic protests that exude the dark comedy one might find in a Wes Anderson film. Truly innovative in their approach to politics, the group does not stake out a rigid ideological position for itself, but instead celebrates the promises of pluralism.

In an article from last year by the New York Times' Sabrina Tavernise, Young Civilian İlhan Doğus is quoted as saying,“People are trying to rethink their identity. . . .The one the state gave us is being deconstructed.” I do not know how true this is for the majority of Turks, but it certainly seems to be true for Doğus and his cohorts. State education and ideas ingratiated from birth as to what a Türk should be often promote a de-humanizing singularity, what the group considers a state-given identity that is inconsistent with the reality of the country's diversity, anathema to human dignity and personal development, and an impediment to pluralist politics.

Some of the young people with whom I have talked complain about the rigidity of the public education system and the lack of excitement for genuine learning or critical thinking. From their descriptions of school (which includes university), Turkish education is about passing tests, not learning. I imagine there is also a good bit of state indoctrination involved. One person confided in me that he thought education paralleled Turkey's larger political culture and the "beliefs given to children in the first day of school." I cannot comment as to how common is his experience, but such dogmas most certainly bleed into politics and are worth exploring.

Below is the interview from Today's Zaman as well as other links related to the group.

Turkey Moving From Oligarchy to Absolute Monarchy, Says Oğur

Turgay Oğur, a representative from the Young Civilians -- a Turkish NGO noted for its use of sarcasm in protests -- says recent developments, including the ongoing closure case against the ruling party and last year's "367 criterion," introduced to the presidential election process with the result that the ballot in Parliament was made unusually difficult, show that Turkey currently has an oligarchic power structure.

"The Constitutional Court, as we have found out, has turned out to be a supervisory body over the Parliament," Oğur says in an interview for Monday Talk. "If the court overturns the legislation on the freedom to wear the headscarf at universities and if it decides to close down the Justice and Development Party (AK Party), it will be proven that this is an absolute monarchy," he says.

The Young Civilians, a group of "private citizens" from diverse backgrounds, states that it was established to demand change for more democracy. Rejecting the wearing of the "uniforms of anyone," they started as a group of students and began holding protests in the early years of the new century.

For Monday Talk, Oğur explains how the Young Civilians got their name and why they are “uncomfortable” with the way things are in Turkey.

Your organization came into the limelight with its criticism of the May 19 Youth and Sports Day celebrations. How did this happen?

We had a gathering at Parliament on May 19 in 2003. We have long desired to free the youth festivities from the way they are celebrated in stadiums where young people have not been treated as individuals, but as part of a planned organization. They have been seen as objects, not subjects. As we have been trying to give this message, newspapers wrote several stories about us. We did not even have a name at the time.

Then came a story in the Cumhuriyet daily about ‘young officers,’ right?

Yes, the newspaper wrote that the young officers were uncomfortable with a few things in the country, including our May 19 campaign. Later, in 2006, we wrote an unprecedented text about the Kurdish issue. We titled it “The Young Civilians are Uncomfortable” and it was highly debated, so whenever we were referred to later on, we were described as the group that wrote the text of “The Young Civilians are Uncomfortable.”

And you have a pair of sneakers in the logo, as opposed to the military boots of the young officers…

Yes, we found this symbol on an ad hoc basis. In the Cumhuriyet article I mentioned, they had military boots displayed next to the story. We thought of an object contrary to the military boots and close to the hearts of young civilians and found a pair of sneakers most appropriate as a symbol.

Your messages have been perceived as very political, yet also quite democratic. How do you get rid of your prejudice?

We listen to our consciences. Each of us has a background that shapes us to a degree, but we also have our consciences, which guide us. That brings us together.

Do you receive any negative reactions at the university -- or outside -- because of what you do and how you do it?
We have people coming from different backgrounds and we have a mixed profile. We have ordinary-looking people doing extraordinary or somewhat unexpected things. This is unusual for many people and they have difficulty labeling us.

For example?

When it comes to the headscarf issue, our most fervent supporter of headscarf freedom is a woman who describes herself as an agnostic. She surprised all of her instructors and students at the Middle East Technical University (ODTÜ). So, because of this fact, people have a delayed reaction and we have many times proven that preliminary opinions were wrong.

Why would an agnostic defend headscarf freedom?

Actually, there is no need to do this, but it is a requirement of taking a democratic stand in Turkey. The headscarf is an issue of basic freedoms. I cannot say, “You’re going to be against me if I don’t look like you tomorrow, so I should oppose your headscarf today.” I should not say that because, if you do such a thing tomorrow, I can deal with it then. I cannot side with those who want to restrict the freedom to wear a headscarf because I think it would not be ethical. This would be like a father who beats up his daughter “pre-emptively” so that she will not do anything “wrong” or anything he doesn’t approve of. This is a pathological approach.

You are a relatively small group, but your activities make it to the media easily. How do you manage to get organized so easily and project your messages?

We mainly communicate through e-mail. We use lots of humor. We follow daily developments in the country. When the talk in the country was about higher education entrance exams (the Student Selection Exam, ÖSS) one week, there was no use in going to the seaside to protest pollution. At the time, we prepared ironic test questions to help the distressed students get through trying to pass the exam.

Do you have ambitions to become a bigger organization or do you plan to be involved in politics in a party format in the future?

We don’t think spreading out with lots of branches is a good use of our time. We focus on production and on our activism. We have events organized by different members of the group. We have an anarchist makeup. One of our members has organized a visit to İstanbul by Italian Prosecutor Felice Casson [who discovered the existence of Operation Gladio, a NATO stay-behind paramilitary force left over from the Cold War] and another member organized a workshop about Kurdish culture called “Let’s be Kurdish.”

When is Felice Casson coming?

He will be speaking at [İstanbul] Bilgi University on April 26.

And could you be Kurdish?

We have realized that we don’t know as much about Kurdish culture as we know about, say, Japanese culture, even though Kurds have been quite Turkish in that sense. We wanted to learn about their cooking, their language and their songs. We memorized Kurdish songs and we cooked Kurdish dinners. Basically, we wanted to end our ignorance about Kurdish ways. At the end of the workshop, we will go to Diyarbakır on May 3 and try to address people in the Kurdish language. Unfortunately, lots of bridges have been burnt between Kurds and Turks in Turkey. Ours is an effort to walk on a small wooden passage. But, small or big, much needs to be done in that regard.

How have you reacted to the closure case against the pro-Kurdish Democratic Society Party (DTP)?

Very strongly. We applied for permission to read our message to the DTP group in Parliament, but at the time visitors were not being accepted to Parliament.

A recent event at Akdeniz University has been making headlines. Do you think the man who was allegedly involved in a shooting spree at the campus was an agent provocateur?

These types of provocations have been tried several times before. Universities are appropriate for these activities because young people can get energized and get organized pretty quickly. In the past such incidents grew out of proportion and led to polarization, big clashes and, eventually, military coups. But we don’t want to watch the same film over and over again. Look at the actor they used. He is like a comic figure. He is like a Swiss Army knife. There is something for everybody in him. He has an Islamic beard; he has a symbol on his forehead that Alevis use; he is linked to ultra-nationalists; he is also like a bodyguard. This is all related to how authoritarian the higher education institutions are in Turkey and how the country’s youth has been perceived.

You see universities as lumber manufacturing plants, if I’m not mistaken?

Universities are lumber factories. This is the role the regime finds appropriate for them. You put different sizes of logs onto the chopping table and cut the standard sizes needed according to the demands of the country. This type of uniform production creates a human model that follows orders -- it does not matter whether it’s coming from right or left or center -- without thinking, and this human is ready to fight when called to duty. There is no creativity, no pluralism and no freedom of thought at universities. The pictures we have seen at Akdeniz University campus are not absurd under these circumstances. And it happens in Antalya, which has a governor who allegedly has relations with deep-state figures.

So it is not by accident that student clashes happen in Antalya…

Yes, plus the president of the university [Mustafa Akaydın] has been elected to head the Inter-university Board [ÜAK], which is a body that supports the status quo. He has been known for his fervent opposition to headscarf-wearing students at universities. Akdeniz University has a modern campus and lots of security. How armed students could enter the campus is quite questionable. Apparently, somebody turned his head and looked the other way.

A few days after Chief Prosecutor Abdurrahman Yalçınkaya of the Supreme Court of Appeals asked Turkey’s highest court to shut down the AK Party over its alleged anti-secularism, your group filed a complaint against him with the Supreme Court of Appeals. Do you expect to obtain results from this complaint?

In the Şemdinli case, because there was a mention of the top general’s name in the indictment, the prosecutor was disbarred. The reason shown for his punishment was a supposed technical error he had made in the indictment. According to the Constitution, the president cannot be accused of any crime except treason. Yalçınkaya in his indictment went against the Constitution and wanted the president banned from politics [along with some senior party members and the prime minister]. Ours was a symbolic appeal against this. I don’t think we will get any results out of it because we cannot speak of the rule of law in Turkey.

How do you think law is practiced in Turkey?

In Turkey, law has been seen as a safety valve to protect the status quo. But law relates to the rights of individuals. The powerful side is the state, so it is the individual who needs protection for his rights. In the Turkish system the focus is on the protection of the state. We saw [coup general and former President] Kenan Evren confessing this.

Do you refer to his words in promoting the 1982 constitution?

When he was promoting the ‘82 constitution, he said the 1961 constitution made individuals powerful, so it was time to make the state powerful again. This is laughable. How can an individual be more powerful than the state? All powers, including the military and the judiciary, are in the domain of the state.

Turgay Oğur
As a response to my request for a brief biography, he described himself as follows: I am an average citizen of the Turkish Republic who was born at a hospital in this country; who went to schools in this country; who loves this country neither more nor less than anyone else; who does not wear anybody’s uniform; who has no connection with violence; who hates clichés; and who would like to have a long and healthy life. I studied political science at the Middle East Technical University (ODTÜ). I have worked at Parliament, the Prime Ministry and Sabancı University.I am involved in politics not to save the world, but because what happens around me bothers me and my lifestyle. You see, being involved with Young Civilians is an existential need for me. Aside being involved in nongovernmental activities, I write regularly for a few publications assuming fictional identities. I cook well.

Young Civilians' Website / Interview from TDZ 18-6-07 / Comment on CHP in TDZ 1-4-08 / Comment on the Constitution-BIA-Net 12-9-07 / Aliye Öztürk YouTube Campaign Video