Trends of Radicalisation

Turkey/3.2 Research Report May 2021

Abstract

All four types of radicalization, namely jihadist, right-wing, left-wing and separatist, led to violent acts in the Turkish history. The violent attacks motivated by religious and right-wing sentiments dates back to the Ottoman period developments, which laid the grounds for divisions on the basis of religious and ethnic differences. D3.2 Turkey report addresses the trends of radicalization around two formative events, referred as the hotspots of radicalization: assassination of a journalist from the Armenian minority, Hrant Dink in 2007; and the attack on the members of the Alevi minority during a cultural festival in Sivas in 1993.

In D3.2 report chooses these two events as hotspots as they were part of the general trends of radicalization that led to specific events; preceded and succeeded by violent acts of similar nature. It argues that absence of a minority regulation regime which recognizes the ethnic and religious diversity led to downplaying of the assaults on the minorities by jihadist and right-wing radicalized groups; and the state institutions failed to pursue thorough investigations into the scope of these events which could otherwise prevented future events.

In both cases, the report finds that personal feelings of moral outrage and revenge play role within the wider radical milieu endorsed by vilifying media discourses, racial public opinion and an absence of state policies which recognize the different ethnic and religious identities explicitly and adopt policies of deradicalization. The acts were facilitated through the public officers’ playing down the attacks on the minorities on various occasions; and failure to investigate into the neglect and misconduct of the public officers in due process. The coding of the motivational factors indicates that abstract feelings of injustice based on perceived threats to their values rather than personal safety nourished similarly abstract grievances and feelings of alienation. In both hotspots, the perpetrators were motivated by feelings that the foundational characteristics of the social fabric were threatened by the minorities and the state institutions did not take any measures to eliminate the threats. These feelings appear to have motivated a heightened sense of polarization, engulfing the divide between “us” and “them; and resorting to violence to eliminate the others.