Hegemony in the Classroom: Islamicisation and Privatisation of Education in Turkey

Altınörs G.

Politics and the Good Life: 66th PSA Annual International Conference, Brighton, İngiltere, 21 - 23 Mart 2016, (Yayınlanmadı)

  • Yayın Türü: Bildiri / Yayınlanmadı
  • Basıldığı Şehir: Brighton
  • Basıldığı Ülke: İngiltere
  • Açık Arşiv Koleksiyonu: AVESİS Açık Erişim Koleksiyonu
  • Bilecik Şeyh Edebali Üniversitesi Adresli: Hayır

Özet

This paper will demonstrate how education has been used by the AKP in order to create consent and how social forces have positioned while the consent is produced. The primary aim of this chapter is to make a critical evaluation of the political economy of education in Turkey since 2002. The pro-Islamic AKP has been ruling Turkey since 2002. The educational ‘reforms’ are very central to AKP’s agenda. Education in Turkey is chosen as a case study in this paper because of its importance not only in the shaping of society, but also in the production of consent. In this paper it is argued that there are two consent production processes through education in Turkey: ‘Islamicisation of basic education’ and ‘privatisation of higher education’. Those two processes have assisted the AKP to utilise education for consolidating its dominance over the politics and society in Turkey therefore education represents one of the main pillars of AKP’s hegemony. Education is very central to hegemonic processes, therefore in this paper, education is considered in its broader context, and it is asserted that educated compounds different activities from different sections of civil society in a holistic way. As Gramsci points out that “[e]very relationship of ‘hegemony’ is necessarily an educational relationship and occurs not only within a nation, between the various forces of which the nation is composed, but in the international and world-wide field, between complexes of national and continental civilisations”. Therefore, as well as the AKP’s, the positions of international organisations, capital groups, trade unions and some NGOs (such as Anti-capitalist Muslims) vis-à-vis education are going to be analysed.