Politicizing Turkish Ethnicity in Southeast Europe: An Institutionalist Approach to Minority Politics in the Post-Commun

1. Constituting and politicizing Turkish ethnicity in Southeast Europe: An institutionalist approach to minority politics in the post-communist and European context Dia Anagnostou

2. Objectives • To understand and explain the politics of ethnic minorities that emerged in Central-East and Southeast Europe in the post-1989 period • Studies have established the role of political-elite construction and structural factors in the politicization of ethnic identity, • Yet, we still have an insufficient understanding of the underlying social-cultural preconditions and dynamics of contemporary ethnic identity. • How did minority nationalist movements emerge in 1989, and what where the social bases from which they drew? Why did nationalist ideas resonate at the juncture of regime transition and why do they continue to be embraced by communities?

3. Theoretical underpinnings • Elite-driven constructivist analyses: historical institutionalist approach than traces how state institutions and the context of strategic interaction that they provide over time lead rationally-motivated leaders to vest a strong interest into politicizing nationalism and diffusing it among the society at large. • But, what is the nature of ethnic belonging, how is it forged and reproduced, why does it resonate among the community at large? This is a central interest of this paper. • Ethnic belonging: constructed and can be politically available but not overnight or in a short period of time; more entrenched but also more ordinary; pass a certain point it may acquire a force of its own that constraints how leaders act and the political strategies that they employ.

5. Case studies: Greece and BulgariaTurkish minority politicization • What factors account for and contributed to the transformation from Muslim religious communities to ethnic Turkish minorities in the post-World War II period, as well as to its politicization on such basis? • What are the ties and practices that constitute Turkish collective solidarity and identity? • What explains different ethnic political strategies of Turkish minorities in the two countries?

6. Ethnicity • Culturalist perspective? • Ethnic belonging: dense clusters of practices that develop over time within specific institutional contexts, and which tightly intermesh cultural ties and social-economic interests in important areas of social action. • Historical institutionalism: institutions shape both interests and identities through historically distinctive processes that are path-dependent. • Path dependence: the same political-economic forces do not necessarily generate similar results everywhere, but the effects of such forces are distinctly mediated and shaped by the specific national context of a given situation and they can often have unintended consequences. • Sociological institutionalism: institutions influence individual and collective behaviour not only by shaping their interests and frame of strategic interaction, but also by constituting their identity.

7. Greece • Post-World War period: extensive institutionalization of transborder political, cultural and economic links between ‘motherland’ Turkey and the minority, thoroughly defined its economic interests, educational opportunities, and political orientations. • The leadership of ethnic Turkish nationalism that appeared in Thrace in the 1980s, as well as the far-reaching communal support that it commands are shaped by and reproduced through these transborder ties and practices, • It is no accident that contemporary minority politics centres around the demand for official recognition of its ethnic Turkish character, and its political strategy is thoroughly shaped by advocacy provided by the kin-state.

8. Bulgaria • State socialism (can be can be said to apply to other states of the region, like Romania and Slovakia) created an indigenous ethnic Turkish elite and an educated strata among the minority. • Despite a number of immigration waves from Bulgaria to Turkey in the 1950s, 1970s and 1980s, the political leadership that emerged in the late 1980s was domestically educated and formed. • It is no accident that its strategy since then has been to operate through and thoroughly utilize national parliamentary and government institutions in pursuit of minority interests. • Well-integrated and widely supported ethnic parties of the sort have emerged as dominant actors across Eastern Europe and have so far prevailed over more radical segments that have mounted nationalist challenges outside state institutions.

9. In conclusion • Constructivist analyses of ethnic politicization expose how political leaders chose to appropriate symbols and grievances in order to frame problems in ethnic terms. • Yet, they are less revealing about why such a strategy resonates more or less among the society and why ethnic belonging is readily available to be politically mobilized. • The mobilizational potential of ethnicity is decisively shaped by a) preconditions such as a pool of minority leaders, activists and a cultural intelligentsia, and b) a deeper collective solidarity based not necessarily on a consciously held ethnic-cultural identity but on institutionalized practices and community-dependent ‘strategies of action’ that define how individuals routinely act in important spheres of their life such as economy and education. • These factors not only elucidate why ethnicity is politically available and potentially resonant but they also influence the kind of ethnic politics and nationalist strategies that emerge.