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Panel on 'Religion, Secularism and Politics in 21st Century Turkey'XVIII SISP ANNUAL CONFERENCE - Perugia (Italy)11–13 September 2014UNIVERSITY OF PERUGIA – Department of Political Science - UNIVERSITYFOR FOREIGNERS OF PERUGIA - Department of Human and Social Studieshttp://www.sisp.it/conferenceDeadline for paper proposals: 15 May 2014To propose a paper, please send a 100-200 words abstract to theaddress: luca.ozzano@unito.itPanel abstract:The relation between religion and politics in contemporary Turkey isvery peculiar, as a consequence of the last two centuries of thecountry’s history. Until the early 20th century, the Ottoman empire wasalso, at least nominally, the seat of the Caliphate, and therefore thecentre of the Muslim world, with a strong influence of the ulemas on theadministration of the Empire. On the other hand, the Republic of Turkeycreated in the 1920s was marked by reforms inspired by FrenchPositivism, which created the strongly secular institutional arrangementtoday still in place. Only since the 1970s, with the rise of theIslamist movement, political Islam could start to play again a role inTurkish public affairs, and to start its conquest of power, culminatedin 2002 with the rise to power of the Justice and Development Party ofRecep Tayyip Erdogan.Today the country is thus deeply divided between secularist andpro-Islamic forces, supporting very different sets of policies, and itis marked by a lively debate about ethical-religious issues, as well asabout the public and political role of powerful brotherhoods such as theHizmet movement of Fethullah Gülen.This panel will include contributions about the relation betweenreligion and politics in contemporary Turkey under different points ofview and methodological perspectives, such as in terms of politicalparties, political participation, social movements, interest groups andpublic policies. Both single-case studies and comparative works arewelcome.