Built on the still-smouldering rubble of the Ottoman Empire, Turkey was the first Muslim nation to enshrine itself as a secular republic in its constitution. The first one in the world and – as it prepares to celebrate the hundredth anniversary of its creation on 23 October 2023 – the only one to date.
Mustafa Kemal Atatürk imposed secularism in reaction to Ottoman theocracy and the institutions of the empire, against the Islam of the ulama and the Sufis, against the Islam of the people, and against the will of the majority.
It was “his” secularism.
Secularism “alla Turca”: the Kemalist method of reducing a religion that
claims to govern everything – the political and the personal, all human
activity, the spiritual and the earthly – to a personal practice.
| Mickaël Gamrasni Director, Writer Chantal de Rudder Writer Simone Harari Baulieu Producer Ted Anspach Producer |
