Specter of a Culture War Over Headscarf Haunts Turkey Again
The secular obsession with the hijab as an anathema to the constitutional principle of laicism rekindles an arcane debate around identity politics and culture wars in Turkey.
When I go before a judge wearing a headscarf while I’m on trial, I doubt that she would protect my rights and do justice to me. (Fikri Saglar, former CHP lawmaker)
A former lawmaker from the main opposition Republican People’s Party (CHP) said those words at a televised debate program on Halk TV last week. His remarks rekindled an old but “recently settled” matter of the dress code in the public service. After all, the existence of hijabi women in positions of power was only a recent phenomenon, something that only became possible following a century-long socio-political struggle over the definition of laicism — the constitutional building block of Turkey’s modern political system — and whether hijab (presumably as a religious symbol in the eyes of the seculars) violates that fundamental secular principle.
The country soon devolved into tit-for-tat recriminations between the government and the…
