Abstract:

By the XIXth century multi ethnic empires like Ottoman Empire, with the accelerating impact of the ideology of nationalism, experienced a process of dissolution which resulted in the founding of new nation states. These nation states were grounded on a homogenous social structure and attempted various “demographical engineering” policies towards the discordant elements. This and also the migrations accelerated both the sharpening and socialisation of nationalist ideology and ventures of the ‘naming’ of those who live in their respective countries. Without doubt, this venture(s) of naming brought up the building of nation on one hand and with the extensificationing of the consciousness and aspects of “us”, suppressing and/or assimilation of the “other”, in short making them invisible on the other. It is a fact that Republic of Turkey, which replaced Ottoman Empire and which was designed in accordance to understanding of a nation-state, too were affected from these developments. As commonly known, the Treaty of Lausanne which was concluded as a result of the Turkish War of National Independence fought against the imperialist forces and their sub-imperial elements, sanctioned the lands of the Turkish nation-state before the international arena and these lands took an unprecedented homogenous appearance. On the other hand, founding fathers of the Republic, who experienced the imperial administration and thus could be defined as being partly in empire and partly in nation-state, with the impact of their witnessing of the process of dissolution in the empire, tried to homogenise all kinds of differences, turn the remnants of an empire into citizens and elevate it to the level of modern civilisation. Attitudes towards the minorities during the homogenisation policies were closely associated with the past experiences and with the nation desired or intended to build. This article aims to focus on the background state of mind of the attitudes towards minorities rather than the policies’ itself.

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