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Turkey's Constitutional Debate

Not without my Headscarf

By Annette Grossbongardt in Istanbul

The Turkish government is currently considering adopting a new constitution that would lift a legal ban that prevents women who wear the headscarf from attending college. But the country's staunch secularists are outraged, saying it threatens to create a "religious pressure" in the country that could have a snowball effect.

Fatma Benli is a lawyer. The official accreditation from the bar association hangs on the wall of her Istanbul office in a gold frame next to her university diploma. Despite her impeccable qualification, the 34-year-old is limited in the extent to which she can practice her profession. She isn't allowed to appear in court because of the yellow and brown headscarf she uses to cover her hair for religious reasons. In strictly secular Turkey, women wearing headscarves are not allowed to work as either judges or doctors. Nor are they allowed to work as civil servants -- or attend university.

For her part, Benli has had better luck than many. She went to college during the early 1990s -- a time of lax enforcement of the headscarf ban in Turkey. But that changed in 1997, when the Turkish military forced the Islamist government of Necmettin Erbakan out of power. "Suddenly, guards stood by the university gate and refused to let us in," Benli recalls.

At the time, Benli was working on a dissertation that she would never complete. "I would have had to remove my headscarf during the oral examination, which was something I couldn't do," she says. Instead, the devout Muslim opted to relinquish the prospect of a doctoral title. A professional attorney today, she's also found a workaround for court appearances, where lawyers are forbidden from wearing headscarves -- she sends a partner who doesn't cover up.

Turkey is currently debating the details of a possible new constitution, and part of the strict ban, as headscarf-wearing women like Benli are now hoping, could be lifted with it. The country's existing constitution, which was ordered by the military after the 1980 coup, is expected to be revamped. One possible change that is being hotly debated is permitting universities to once again open their gates to women who wear the headscarf.

Expectations have been created by the proposed draft created by the commission of legal experts charged by Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan with drafting the new constitution. This draft explicitly states: "No one can be refused the right to a higher education because of one's clothes." An alternative formulation of the same text reads: "There are no restrictions on clothing or appearance at higher education institutions." Softening the ban on headscarves -- which was introduced to keep the influence of Islam on the state and the public in check -- would represent a historic landmark for strictly secular Turkey.

The debate over the headscarf is one of the most contentious issues in contemporary Turkey, and any change to it has been taboo. The country's secular elite fear that if the ban is lifted, it will shift the societal balance in Turkey -- pushing it in a more conservative religious direction.

University rectors, for instance, traditionally part of the kemalist establishment, called on Erdogan to halt work on the draft constitution. The country's chief prosecutor, who has the authority to close down political parties, warned the prime minister in a tough statement that lifting the headscarf ban could lead to "chaos and polarization" and could "spark a wave of anger and hatred."

Conscious of the powder keg nature of the debate, Prime Minister Erdogan has erred on the side of caution and avoided stating that his party will definitely lift the ban as part of the new constitution. Nevertheless, he makes no secret of the fact that he personally believes the ban is wrong and that he would like to see it changed in the future.

"Freedom of religion and conscience is a part of democracy that cannot be neglected," Erdogan said this week in an interview given to reporters from SPIEGEL, the Financial Times and the New York Times. "The same applies to the right to obtain an education. I believe that anyone who calls himself a democrat thinks that a person cannot be denied a university education simply because that person wears a headscarf."

Still, despite lengthy discussions within the AKP and with the party's legal experts, Erdogan was unable to present a draft of the constitution to the public this week. More work is needed, he announced.

Erdogan also lashed out at journalists for their excessive focus on the headscarf issue, which comprises just one of over 120 paragraphs in the draft document. The prime minister dismissed concerns that pressure on women who don't wear the headscarf would increase. "They should not worry at all," he said. "We have been in power for five years. Was there anything wrong during that period?"

"There Is No Islamist Threat in Turkey"

Religious Turks aren't the only ones pushing for the change. Many liberals have joined them. "Denying a woman the possibility of attending a university simply because she wears a headscarf is a violation of human rights," says Can Paker, the director of the renowned Turkish Economic and Social Studies Foundation (TESEV). "The ban must be lifted," he adds. Tolerance of women wearing headscarves is one of the democratic liberties Turkey must grant its citizens along the path to European Union (EU) membership, Paker believes. He also feels the decision wouldn't pose a threat to Turkish secularism: "Our studies show there is no Islamist threat in Turkey." Only a small and continuously shrinking minority of Turks dream of transforming the country into an Islamic state that observes Shariah law.

Still, such figures have done little to calm Turkey's staunchest secularists, who are still in the process of recovering from the shock of openly religious Abdullah Gül's election as president. Now, it's the draft constitution that is provoking their ire.

Lifting the ban on the headscarf would create a "religious pressure" whose effects could go well beyond clothing and appearance, warns Hikmet Sami Türk. The left-leaning former justice minister says it would also endanger the "freedom and independence of university teaching."

That, some fear, could have a snowball effect. Pollster Turhan Erdem even goes so far as to predict that female students who eschew the headscarf could become a thing of the past within a year. "In the end we will have to introduce separate classes for men and women," he believes. Others are already speaking of the "end of the republic." The Turkish daily Sabah printed a caricature showing a man digging a grave for the Turkish constitution and wearing a vest featuring the letters "AKP." The gravestone in front of the grave features the words: "Secularism Rest In Peace, 2007."

Critics of the headscarf feel the European Court of Human Rights is on their side. The court turned down a 2005 case pleaded by Turkish medical student Leila Sahin, who tried to sue the Turkish state to allow her to attend university wearing a headscarf.

The court ruled that the ban on headscarves doesn't violate the European Convention on Human Rights. The Strasbourg judges went even further, expressing support for Turkey's "legitimate goal" of protecting the liberties of citizens who have other beliefs or are not religious. By upholding the principle of secularism, Turkey protects its democratic system, the judges found.

Protecting Non-Muslims?

According to TESEV director Paker, the judges in Strasbourg "wrongly assumed that an overwhelming Muslim majority is oppressing a minority in Turkey." Still, he is also calling for the new constitution to guarantee the protection of non-Muslims and maintain the ban on headscarves for those exercising public functions.

AKP, which promised to deliver a new constitution during its election campaign, has not yet formulated a position on the draft constitution penned by the commission of experts.

During his first term as prime minister, Erdogan avoided openly calling for an end to the ban on headscarves, a reform measure the AKP is principally in favor of and which the majority of the party's voters is expecting. The wife of the new president, Hayrünnisa Gül, was also unable to attend university because of her headscarf. And Erdogan's own daughter studied in the United States so that she could wear a headscarf at school without disturbance.

In the past, Erdogan always argued that a social consensus needed to be established before the ban could be lifted. Now, however, his overwhelming electoral victory could embolden him to undertake the mission. At the end of the day, AKP leaders have promised, Turkey's citizens will decide on the reform in a national referendum.

Addressing public fears of creeping Islamization, Erdogan's justice minister, Mehmet Ali Sahin, has said that such concerns are unfounded. The planned new constitution, he argues, will strenthen the secular system rather than weaken it.