M.A. Theses

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Beyond limits :|the mobilization of a wildcat strike in Turkey
(Thesis (M.A.) - Bogazici University. Institute for Graduate Studies in the Social Sciences, 2019., 2019.) Gökçek, Alican Çağrı.; Akan, Murat.
With the increasing poverty and rising social injustice in Turkey, the working class’ grievances have recently become more visible in the public. In this sense, Turkish society witnessed one of the most disruptive and crowded labor strikes during the neoliberal capitalist era in 2015. During these strikes, metal workers mainly targeted the hegemonic partnership of employers and pro-employer trade union, Turkish Metal Union (TM). Both the rising poverty in the social and economic conditions of workers and the untenable forms of practices by the hegemonic partners led workers to rely on their own power and go on a wildcat strike. In this paper, I tried to search for possible answers to two basic questions about this strike wave. First, the nature of crisis which precipitated this mass action and the nature of these strikes were important issues to identify. Second, the influence of the metal workers’ movement led me to think about what this contentious action might bring to social movement theories. For reaching these research intentions, I followed a qualitative method and heavily relied on semi-structured interviews conducted with defiant workers. In addition to those interviews, I also used media news, statistical data, and elite interviews with union officers, union representatives, and labor activists. Essentially, this research should be considered more than a case study to the extent that it tries to look at what the strike wave tell us for developing a more reliable and replicable social movement theory for the future studies.
Comparative study of peace negotiations
(Thesis (M.A.) - Bogazici University. Institute for Graduate Studies in the Social Sciences, 2022., 2022.) Yetim, Orhan.; Akan, Murat.
This study aims to investigate the mechanisms that support the success of peace negotiations. Two main factors are the focus of this work, which are third-party intervention and payoffs of parties. When third-party interventions are combined with payoffs of parties in peace negotiations, cooperation and communication among parties have increased, which supports the success of peace negotiations. Due to certain similarities including ethnic roots of insurgent organizations, their way of organizing and electoral systems, the peace negotiation with IRA that Conservative Party initiated offers an important case that can be compared with Resolution Process in Turkey. Lack of third-party intervention and changes in payoffs motivating parties to defect from negotiations caused problems in disarmament, legal roadmap and incorporation of the opposition issues. Supported by electoral victory of Labor Party, third-party interventions through creating commissions, setting binding deadline and conducting meetings highly contributed the solution of these problems and the signing of Good Friday Agreement in 1998. On the other hand, Turkey had suffered from lack of third-party interventions with regards to disarmament, withdrawal, legal reforms and harsh nationalist critics. The impact of regime change in Turkey on Resolution Process is also addressed as a main reason for declining any third-party intervention in 2013 although AKP government demanded a coordinator from the U.S for ensuring the trans-national collaboration in PKK problem in 2009.
Contemporary women's movement in Turkey: production of different knowledges
(Thesis (M.A.) - Bogazici University. Institute for Graduate Studies in Social Sciences, 2011., 2011.) Şeylan, Dilşah.; Akan, Murat.
This thesis attempts to understand how experiences of women from diverse backgrounds and politicization processes shape the articulations of their positions on gender issues and constitute differences and similarities with other positions in the context of women‟s movement. For this aim, women activists in Turkey have been asked their decisions about the issues of family, sexual violence and headscarf that have been mainly problematized and politicized by different women movements all across the world. In order to get the opinions of the interviewees on family they were asked about the Prime Minister Erdoğan‟s call to give birth at least three children to Turkish women in a meeting that is arranged to celebrate World Women‟s Day. Secondly in order to obtain the viewpoints of women with regards to sexual violence the sexual harassment of a girl by a publicly known Islamist journalist Hüseyin Üzmez and the rape cases attempted against children and women by a state opera artist Şahin Öğüt were opened to discussion. Lastly as a deep seated problem having been instrumentalized by various political forces in Turkey quite a long time headscarf issue was discussed over the proclamation published by AK-DER, known as an Islamist woman organization, under the title “February 28 Should Not Last 1000 Years” by making a call for the removal of headscarf bans. Concerning these issue areas situated at the intersection of diverse political struggles specific experiences and knowledges of women coming from Islamist, Kurdish, Kemalist and feminist backgrounds are found out influential in articulating their positions as a result of the interviews. This supports the argument that there is not a separate, abstract and clearly demarcated identity as „woman‟ but it is spontaneously experienced along with other social attributes such as religion, ethnicity and ideology by women. Rejection of the possibility of such an isolated woman identity encouraged the author to criticize the exclusionary stance assumed by some feminists from time to time on the grounds of their own constructions of womanhood and feminism. Giving an idea about how differences are experienced within the women‟s movement in Turkey, the thesis finalizes its argument by making a call to embrace different production of knowledges by women and view them legitimate which would enhance the possibilities to do politics together between women in the context of women‟s movement.
Entrepreneurial officers:|Examining the commercial enterprises of the Algerian, Turkish, and Indonesian armed forces
(Thesis (M.A.) - Bogazici University. Institute for Graduate Studies in the Social Sciences, 2019., 2019.) Samhan, Omar Talal.; Akan, Murat.
The role of the armed forces within any given polity has been maintained by a sovereign state for the explicit purpose of the application of violence. The Cold War and decolonization provided new opportunities for militaries to step out of their security jurisdiction and undertake roles that would nominally be reserved for civilian administrators. In the mid to late twentieth century the militaries of many developing societies adopted a materialist-economic character, institutionalizing their presence in the corporate economy. Conflating national security with the military’s interests, military generals sought to create intricate networks of pension funds, army foundations, and military-aligned businesses whose aims were to serve, protect, and perpetuate the interests of service officers. This study explores the disparate experiences and issues surrounding the corporate activities of the militaries of Algeria, Turkey, and Indonesia, tracing their evolution as anti-colonial, independence forces to their roles as significant stakeholders in their national economies. Building on the “corporate-materialist” claim, this thesis will seek to argue that the Algerian, Turkish, and Indonesian armed forces initially engaged in economic activities as a military necessity to guarantee a steady supply of war matériel but then soon morphed into economic surrogates to institutionalize their privileges, bolster their economic portfolios, and insulate their corporate interests from unstable domestic politics and sclerotic international conditions.
German call centers in Istanbul: Beyond the global and the local
(Thesis (M.A.)-Bogazici University. Institute of Social Sciences, 2008., 2008.) Neitzert, Alina Belinda.; Akan, Murat.
The 1990s witnessed the rise of call centers as a new form of work organization. The 2000s saw the next stage of the call center phenomenon in the form of large-scale outsourcing of call center operations to low-wage countries. A little-known case of call center offshoring is the existence of German call centers serving the German market from Turkey, especially from Istanbul. This case of offshoring is distinguished from other instances by the fact that these call centers do not rely on a native population that speaks the other country's language for historical reasons, but rather recruit their staff from among Turks who grew up in Germany and later "returned" to Turkey to work, thus reversing established patterns of work migration. The phenomenon of the German call center industry in Istanbul is examined here by method of participant observation carried out in one call center in Istanbul. The research has two foci of attention, on the one hand the call centers themselves, their origins, development and work processes, and on the other hand the people working there and the motivations that characterized their "return" to Turkey. The results of the study show that the rapid growth experienced by the German call center industry in Istanbul in its early years has come to an end by now, that the sector has consolidated itself and looks set to remain a part of Istanbul‟s economic landscape. With regard to the motivations for employees "decisions to "return" to Istanbul, it was found that in the majority of cases the location of close family members in Turkey was a major determining factor, while economic concerns played a minor role.
Neighborhood projects of education: the case of the Halkevi summer school in Okmeydanı
(Thesis (M.A.) - Bogazici University. Institute for Graduate Studies in the Social Sciences, 2016., 2016.) Murat, Ezgi.; Akan, Murat.
This study aims to analyze the effects of state violence in everyday life on an alternative education program. Halkevleri has organized free Summer Schools for children at their ages of primary and secondary schools in poor neighborhoods since 2008. The Republican People‟s Party established Halkevleri in 1932 as an adult education center to collect social and cultural life under the republican regime. Halkevleri was established as a top-down organization however it has been converted an independent mass organization. The activities of Halkevleri in the field of education rebounded up with the historical changes. Halkevleri Summer School is analyzed as critical education practice because of its alternative education program, the way of the organization of program organized, education program for instructors, the relation between instructors and children and their perception of struggle for education as a part of social struggle. A politically, economically and ethnically marginalized neighborhood, Okmeydanı has been one of the places where Halkevleri Summer Schools organized since 2008. State violence, which is an historical reality of Okmeydanı, has been escalated since Gezi protests. Analyzing Halkevi Summer Schools in a politically, economically and ethnically marginalized neighborhood shows the limitations and possibilities of alternative education practices. While this alternative education opens a new space for children in their everyday life, the organization of the Summer School, participation of children, access to volunteer instructors, participation of parents and the practice of alternative education content is negatively affected by state violence.
Political football: Making football fandom a symbol of political dissent
(Thesis (M.A.) - Bogazici University. Institute for Graduate Studies in the Social Sciences, 2018., 2018.) İncedere, Kamile Sena.; Akan, Murat.
This study aims to examine the role and effects of politicization of football fandom in the Gezi Movement, which was the biggest social upheaval of Turkish political history in the 2000s. This movement brought a lot of people from different backgrounds together, including dissident football fan groups of Turkey. These football fan groups united under the same political objectives and they attracted many unorganized people to join them in the Gezi Movement. This thesis scrutinizes how has it become possible for these unorganized individuals to unite under the same umbrella against a political power and how football fandom became a channel of politicization in the Gezi Movement. In a sense, football fandom was not the igniter of this movement, yet it channelled the political dissent of unorganized people who were already in the Gezi Movement. For this purpose, I mainly benefited from the literature approaching the sport from below, which takes sports or specifically football as the people’s game and as a weapon of football fans in a political sense. Through giving a detailed historical background, through drawing examples from all over the world and through analyzing twelve semi-structured interviews, this study depicts a broad picture of common experiences and collective interpretations of unorganized people engaging with football fan groups in the Gezi Movement.
Sheltered bodies:|Investigating the representations of Syrian refugees in Turkish media
(Thesis (M.A.) - Bogazici University. Institute for Graduate Studies in the Social Sciences, 2019., 2019.) Mamak, Onur.; Akan, Murat.
This study investigates the representations of refugees from the Syrian Civil War in Turkish print media. It does so by quantitatively and qualitatively analyzing all of the refugee related news ran by five newspapers (BirGün, Hürriyet, Sabah, Star, and Yeniçağ) between April of 2014 and March of 2015. Through an in-depth analysis of the legal framework of asylum in Turkey and its political oppositions, these representational strategies are contextualized within the existing refugee regime and its critiques in order to distinguish the practical aims towards which these strategies were mobilized. While the refugees are often conceptualized as a coherent social category both by policy makers and researchers, newspapers consistently rely on already existing ethnoreligious identities in order to represent the refugees and differentiate between them. This thesis aims to uncover the implications of this reliance in both discursive and political contexts.
The ambivalence of Alevi politic(s): a comparative analysis of Cem Vakfı and Pir Sultan Abdal Kültür Derneği
(Thesis (M.A.)-Bogazici University. Institute for Graduate Studies in the Social Sciences, 2008., 2008.) Aslan, Seçil.; Akan, Murat.
By the late 1980s and especially in the 1990s, after centuries of repression, “suddenly” Alevism/Aleviness became visible in the public sphere. Yet, this visibility was not limited to the borders of the Alevi community. Since Alevis have been a “religious minority” within the larger society of Sunni population and within the state’s “secularist” aura, they have been demanding their religious rights from the state and this time they have emerged political actors within the “secular” borders of the state. Therefore, how Alevis respond to “existing” power balances, how they constitute domination and which discourses they apply are the questions, which must be debated, and Alevism must be analyzed not only as religious identity, but also as a political identity in relation to the state. In this sense, by focusing on the relationship between the state and religion, this thesis aims to analyze Alevism politically and to underline how it was constructed as an identity in the post 1980. Hence, unlike former postulates about Alevism, it emphasizes the process of identification, the determinative role of different actors in defining Alevism, and Alevis’ self-perception/ self-definition such as practices of domination, representation, and struggle over the definition of Alevism. This thesis more specifically focuses on variation in the discourses of two Alevi institutions –PSAKD and Cem Vakfıbased on the textual analysis of periodicals of these institutions under the basic topics of Alevi institutionalization, Alevi politics, Alevi identity, and the EU. In this way, it shows that different actors have different areas of hegemony over Alevism, there are breakages in the identity politics of Alevis and finally Alevi politics is ambivalent. Within the state’s formal ideology of Kemalism and secularist aura, the discourse(s) of these two institutions show that based upon the determinative role of the relation with the state there is Alevi politics which has two extreme tendencies as integration to the system and as marginalization. Yet, these two extremes must be taken within limitations of Kemalist aura in that borders of being “oppositional” are drawn from the axis of “loyal citizenship.” Besides, Alevism has emerged as “signifier” term, which homogenizes Alevis by eliminating differences among them. Hence, there is a process of standardization and construction of Alevism as a religion and in this process; Alevis emerge as a religious community who demand their religious rights from the state. However, in the case of Alevi politics, there is not “always” direct relationship between the identity politics and challenges to the state policies, and identity politics does not “always” have a necessarily libertarian nature. Finally, this study, by analyzing Alevism in relation to power, gives an idea about Alevi politics, political dynamics in Turkey and secular practices of the state.
The Gülen movement: perceptions of democracy, secularism, religion and public sphere
(Thesis (M.A.)-Bogazici University. Institute for Graduate Studies in Social Sciences, 2007., 2007.) Özer, Metin.; Akan, Murat.
This thesis aims to provide an investigation of the Gülen Community’s perception of the state, democracy and secularism as well as the public- private sphere distinction and to provide an evaluation of these perceptions with a theoretical framework, from a critical point of view. The main question for the thesis is whether the Gülen Community contributes to the transition to and the consolidation of democracy in Turkey. Thus, while the weak points in works done regarding this movement up until today will be brought out, its current socio-economic structure as well as the activities on the educational and political domains is going to be analyzed. Taking into consideration the fact that this movement should not be studied only by looking at Fethullah Gülen’s perceptions, the themes that have commonly existed in interviews made with the Gülen movement members among whom nine of them were teachers, three of them were craftsmen and two of them were women interviewees would be analyzed critically. Finally, thanks to these interviews, it would be looked at what kind of state model is desired by the movement and at how the concepts such as democracy, secularization and public sphere are perceived by the community with a critique based on a theoretical framework. Hence, this thesis further aims to find out whether the Gülen Community is a civic organization that promotes pluralism or not in Turkey which has a multicultural society and whether it contributes to the consolidation of democracy or not.|Keywords: Fethullah Gülen, Democracy, Civil Society, Secularism, Public Sphere.
The politics of religion: State policy towards muslims in Post-Soviet Russia
(Thesis (M.A.) - Bogazici University. Institute for Graduate Studies in the Social Sciences, 2017., 2017.) İltekin, Sümeyye Mine.; Akan, Murat.
This thesis analyzes the state’s Muslim policy in post-Soviet Russia with a focus on Putin period. The thesis aims to make a modest contribution to the analyses of the complicated relations between state and religion in post-Soviet Russia. Being the largest minority in the country with a vast number (approximately 20 million), Russia’s Muslim politics is critical in capturing the complicated state-religion relations of the country. The indigeneity of the Russian Muslims as opposed to migrant minority Muslims of the Europe is another distinct pattern that makes important to understand Russian case and that will open the ground for interesting comparisons. The literature on managing religion as a governance strategy of authoritarian regimes constitute the theoretical backbone of the thesis. The data for the study is collected from secondary sources, press material, legal material and statements of political/religious actors. Though the focus is given to Putin period, the thesis covers the discussions of state’s Muslim politics and religion-state relations from Imperial to Putin decade to present the continuities and conjunctures in the state’s politics of religion. Being considered among the tools for “governance” of the Muslim dominated regions of the country, the state’s Muslim politics discussed in relation to broader political dynamics such as regime change, authoritarianism, securitization and nationality politics. In this way, the thesis aims to present major patterns of state-religion relations in post-Soviet era specific to the Russian Muslim community and try to locate it within the broader political dynamics shaping Putin era politics. iv
The politics of the Olympics: The case of the Sochi 2014 winter games
(Thesis (Ph.D.)-Bogazici University. Institute for Graduate Studies in the Social Sciences, 2019., 2019.) Karasaç, Ayşe.; Akan, Murat.
This study aims to analyze the political aspects of the Sochi 2014 Winter Olympics that were held in the Russian Federation after many protests and controversies. The analysis of the Sochi case contributes to our understanding of the politics of the Olympics, the domestic politics of the host state, interstate contestations as well as continuities and changes in the modern Olympics and the Russian Federation. This thesis addresses the question of “Can the Sochi 2014 Winter Olympics be considered politically a distinct case in the Olympics?”. It examines the Sochi Olympics through online news, non-governmental organization reports and opinion polls, and also tries to scrutinize Russia’s Olympic experience by looking at other Olympic host states’ experiences with the contribution of the news, reports and the academic literature on Olympic history. Particularly leading to the LGBT rights’ taking place in the Olympic Charter and host city contract, an ethnic group’s anti-Olympic campaign’s being cause celebre, new security dynamics were peculiar to the Sochi Olympics. Since commonalities in the Olympics such as politicization, experiences of Olympic constructions and legacies predominated, the Sochi Winter Olympics cannot be politically put into a distinct place in the Olympics but the achievements of group protests show the changing dynamics of politicization in the Olympics.
The re-organization of the main islamic communities in Turkey, in the post 1980 coup era
(Thesis (M.A.)-Bogazici University. Institute for Graduate Studies in Social Sciences, 2006., 2006.) Bilgili, Alper.; Akan, Murat.
This thesis aims to provide a preliminary investigation and evaluation of themain Islamic Communities̕ (namely Nurcu, Süleymancı and İskenderpasa Communities) re-organization during the post 1980 coup era. This thesis argues that these Islamist Communities became more active in this period in the political andsocio-economic spheres. Thus, the tendency to link the current political andeconomic structures of these communities to their early organizations will bequestioned. While doing this, their organizations before the coup, during the coupadministration, and in the Özal era are going to be analyzed, in chronological order. The organization in this thesis includes these Communities̕ activities in the political,economic and media spheres. Their re-organizations in the post coup era, in thesefields will be analyzed comparatively. Hence, this thesis further aims to find out the possible relations between this increasing level of activities of the Communities andthe political and economic policies of the governments. These aims will be realized through the investigation of the State and Military reports on these Communities, the secondary sources written on them, a close reading of these communities̕ own journals and Newspapers and an investigation oftheir economic institutions.|KEYWORDS: Naqshibandis, Nurcu Community, Suleymancı Community, Iskenderpasa Community, Policies of the Özal era .

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