The Fall of an Icon: Institutionalization of Religious Organizations in Turkey

This chapter introduces and analyses the case of Turkey. First, it identifies the theoretically appropriate religious groups and organizations that are active in Turkey, then discusses their institutional interests and policy preferences, particularly regarding civil liberties, and their lobbying capacity. Using data on religious parties’ parliamentary concentration and on inflation rates, the chapter identifies three theoretically distinct periods that correspond to different outcomes for religious organizations’ institutionalization. Based on Hypothesis 1, these conditions predict that religious parties finally found conditions conducive to strengthening Turkish religious organizations starting in 1996. Therefore, it is only after this period that Turkish religious organizations established a formidable institutional presence in the for-profit education, welfare, media, and business sectors. The chapter then uses evidence from an original survey of more than 200 Turkish politicians, analytical narratives from Turkish political history, and quantitative data to test support for Hypothesis 1 and its corollaries in Turkey and finds strong support for them.