Turkish Ontological Security In The Early Republic Era: Identity, Regime, and State

Abstract

This study examines under which factors of Turkey’s ontological security has been formed and how it has been occurred in the early period of the Republic of Turkey. The main claim of the study is that the national identity, the nation-state, and the Republican regime are inseparable and complementary parts of the Turkish ontological security. This study applies the historical analysis method. In the early period of the Turkish Republic which can be deemed as a process of structural and fundamental changes, Turkey’s security concept consists of not only border security. The political regime as a continuation of the aim of protecting the Republic’s revolutions, including national sovereignty and secularism, and westernization, constituted the prominent factor of Turkish ontological security. Having said that, considering the new geography vision, policies towards Islamic geographies and Central Asia were considered as revisionist and it was aimed that the protection of the status quo both in and outside the country. In accordance with the territorial state model, the Turkish biographical story was reconstructed with the nation-state models as the framework of the national society and the national society itself, and therefore it was accepted as the integral parts of the Turkish ontological security.