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Ousseina AlidouTurkeyTurkish women enjoy a broad array of constitu-
tionally guaranteed rights that remain largely un-
paralleled in the rest of the Muslim world. Turkey’s
drive to become a full member of the European
Union (EU) has added great impetus to democrati-
zation in general and to the expansion of free
expression in particular. Yet, Turkey’s rigidly pro-
secular policies, while enabling women to compete
with men professionally and socially, have also
restricted free religious expression of openly pious
women.
Bans on the Islamic-style headscarf in govern-
ment institutions and in both state and privately
run educational institutions are viewed by overtly
pious Turks as one of the chief restrictions on reli-
gious freedoms. Merve Kavakçi, a Western-trained
engineer, who covers her head, was stripped of her
parliamentary seat and of her Turkish nationality
after appearing at the parliament’s inaugural ses-
turkey 183sion in 1999 wearing her headscarf. Her candidacy
on the ticket of the Islam-oriented Virtue Party in
the 1999 parliamentary elections was also cited as
one of the main reasons for the party’s closure by
the constitutional court in 2001 on the grounds
that it was seeking to overturn secular rule.
The French parliament’s decision in February
2004 to ban religious “symbols” including the
headscarf in state-run primary schools and lycées
was perceived as a blow by Turkish women cam-
paigning to lift such bans in Turkey as it provided
ammunition for those who argue that the headscarf
is a political symbol used to advocate Islamic mili-
tancy. Fearing retribution from the military, the
conservative Justice and Development Party (AKP),
led by a group of former Islamists, which came to
power alone in the November 2002 elections, did
not field any female candidates who wore the
Islamic-style headscarf either then or during muni-
cipal elections held in March 2004. The wives of
AKP cabinet members, including the wife of Prime
Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan, continue to be
barred from attending state functions because
they cover their heads. Some pious women have
resorted to wearing wigs over their headscarves so
as to circumvent the ban, especially in high schools
and universities. Religiously observant Turks are
especially irked by the fact that the headscarf is not
allowed even at coeducational state run religious
schools where imams and preachers are trained and
students, in addition to learning all subjects taught
in secular schools, are taught about the life of the
Prophet Mu™ammad and how to read the Qur±àn.
Turkey’s powerful armed forces continue to label
Islamic fundamentalism as the main threat to the
country’s security and have played a major role
behind the scenes in clamping down on any overt
expression of Islam in public life. Turkey’s own
peculiar brand of secularism is exercised through
the strict control of all aspects of religious life
through the state-run Religious Affairs Directorate,
which appoints all the country’s imams. Members
of Turkey’s minority Alevi sect, who practice a lib-
eral form of Shì≠ìIslam, have long accused the state
of discriminating against them by not including
information about their faith in mandatory religion
classes taught in government run schools. They also
accuse the Religious Affairs Directorate of bias
because it regards them as a cultural rather than a
religious group. Tensions between the Alevis and
Turkey’s SunnìMuslim majority have occasionally
escalated into outright violence. In one of the worst
such incidents, in 1993, some 37 Alevi intellectuals,
writers, and poets were burned to death in a hotel
in the eastern province of Sivas by a crowd of people