Violence and nationalist mobilization: the onset of the Kurdish insurgency in Turkey

Abstract

According to theories of nonviolent resistance, violence is counterproductive and undermines the ability of a movement to achieve mass support. At the same time, studies of ethnic insurgencies suggest that violence is the only available method of mobilization in political systems characterized by entrenched ethnic hierarchies. Engaging with these arguments, this article addresses a historical puzzle: What factors explain the timing and ability of the PKK's (Partiye Karkerên Kurdistan) rise as the hegemonic Kurdish nationalist organization in Turkey between the late 1970s and 1990? The article argues that studies that identify Kurdish nationalism as a reaction to repressive policies of the Turkish state without paying attention to prevailing social conditions and oppositional strategies fail to provide a satisfactory response. It argues that the rise of the PKK was primarily a function of its ability to gain support among the peasantry in deeply unequal rural areas through its strategic employment of violence. It also identifies four causal mechanisms of PKK recruitment based on rich archival and field research: credibility, revenge, social mobility, and gender emancipation.

Keywords:

• nationalist mobilization
• violence
• ethnic conflict
• Turkey
• Kurds

Acknowledgements

Earlier versions of this article were presented at the Annual Meeting of the Middle East Studies Association in San Diego in November 2011, and the Annual World Convention of the Association for the Study of Nationalities in New York in April 2012. I thank Yüksel Taşkın and Cihan Tuğal for their valuable comments. All interpretations are mine.

Notes

1. For the nine DDKO bulletins, see Kotan (2003, 466–493).

2. The Barzani movement also received logistical and financial help from the peasants in the border zone (Erdost 1992, 223–228, 251; Bilgin 1993, 41).

3. Kırmızıtoprak (1997), who left the TKDP and established the T-KDP, was influenced by the revolutionary struggles in China, Vietnam, Algeria, and Congo. Inspired by Mao Zedong, he envisioned a long-term popular war, but engaged in infighting and was killed on the orders of Mustafa Barzani.

4. The key translations include Stalin's Marxism and the National Question in 1967 and Lenin's The Right of Nations to Self-determination in 1969 (Maraşlı 2010a, 85).

5. The Iranian Kurdish political leader Ghassemlou (1965) is one of the earliest articulators of this idea. The first signs of the idea in Turkey appeared during the TKDP trial of 1968 (Gündoğan 2007, 172).

6. The works of Beşikçi had a major influence on the popularization of these ideas among the Kurdish intelligentsia (1969, 282–284).

7. Kemal Burkay writing under a pseudonym was the first Kurdish intellectual to systematically express these ideas (Murat 1973, 22–25, 35, 194, 199).

8. Among the Turkish leftist groups, only Türkiye İhtilalci İşçi Köylü Partisi (TİİKP) (1974, 430–432) and Kurtuluş embraced the colonialism thesis regarding the Kurdish question. A group of Kurdish activists in Kurtuluş split and established an autonomous Kurdish nationalist organization called Tekoşin.

9. For more information, see Anonymous (1988, 2309, 2312–2323).

10. For instance, see Rizgarî 3 (May 1977), 107–124; Güçlü (2010); and Maraşlı (2010a, 88–89).

11. For instance, see Yalçın Doğan's articles in Turkish newspaper Cumhuriyet, 21–22 September 1979, 7; Burkay (2010, 12–16, 71–77).

12. A group left T-KDP and established the pro-Chinese Kawa in 1976. Kawa also split into two in 1977 (Gündoğan 2007, 25–33).

13. Detailed information about KUK members is available at KUK (1995).

14. Lenin used this term when he criticized ultra-left tendencies that only accept radical violent measures as legitimate methods of struggle. See www.marxists.org/archive/lenin/works/1920/lwc/index.htm, accessed 1 May 2014. For the criticisms of PKK along these lines, see Büyükkaya (1992, 71) and Burkay (1983, 204–208).

15. While there is no evidence suggesting that Öcalan actually read Frantz Fanon, his ideas about the emancipatory role of violence are very similar to Fanon's (2005) analysis of colonialism. For the PKK's portrayal of the attacks of 15 August 1984, from a Fanonist perspective, see www.hezenparastin.com/tr/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=177:k-kuran-hpgye&catid=34:hpg&Itemid=298, accessed 1 May 2014.

16. See Turkish newspaper Milliyet, 19 August 1979, 8; 20–22 August, 9; 23 August, 9; 2 September, 5; 3 September, 1, 5. Because of this violent conflict, the population of the Siverek town dropped from around 40,000 in 1975 to less than 30,000 in 1980.

17. Milliyet, 17 July 1981, 7.

18. Most of the state positions were unfilled. Milliyet, 3 September 1979, 5 and 9 August 1980, 6. Also see Akar and Dündar (2008, 268–269).

19. Ibid., 274–276.

20. For PKK's self-criticism, see PKK (1982b, 118) and Bayık (n.d., 63–65).

21. Kalkan (n.d., 12); Yalçın Doğan, Cumhuriyet, 25 September 1979, 7.

22. Personal communication, İstanbul, 15 November 2012. In its early years, the PKK was known as Apocular, literally the followers of Apo, the nickname of Abdullah Öcalan.

23. For a summary of the PKK strategy in Mardin region, see Gülmüş (2009).

24. Personal communication, Batman, 3 December 2012.

25. In contrast, the PKK leadership was primarily composed of individuals with some university education.

26. For how few revolutionaries may change preferences of a large population, see Weingast (2005).

27. Personal communication, Kızıltepe, 6 October 2012.

28. Personal communication, Diyarbakır, 8 October 2012.

29. Also, see Milliyet, 4 September 1979, 1, 12. For the complicated relationship between the state, Kurdish nationalists, and tribes, see Belge (2011).

30. The life story of Vahap Geçmez, an illiterate teenager who joined the PKK and became one of its leaders, is illustrative in this regard (PKK 1998, 85–87).

31. Adife Sakık, an illiterate peasant girl born in 1964, joined the PKK in 1981, and was killed in a firefight in 1985, is an early example of young women joining an armed movement to escape from their patriarchial family (Çelik 2000, 116; Berxwedan, 30 June 1989, 2, 22). She is the half-sister of prominent Kurdish parliamentarian Sırrı Sakık.

32. Çağlayan, Analar, Yoldaşlar, Tanrıçalar, 178, 206–207; Aklın Ötesindeler, 124.

33. The story of Hanım Yelikaya, an illiterate peasant girl who joined the PKK at the age of 14 in the late 1970s is one of the earliest examples. See Berxwedan, 30 June 1988, 2, 9.

34. Ala Rizgarî also made an aborted attempt to initiate guerilla warfare (Ballı 1991, 83–84, 90–91).

35. For a similar effect among the Palestinians, see Sayigh (1997, 91).

36. Central references were Mao Zedong and Vo Nguyen Giap. PKK (1982b, 102, 1983, 255–262, 277).

37. The life story of Leyla Zana, one of the most famous Kurdish nationalists, is illuminating in this regard. Zana was an illiterate teenager when her husband Mehdi Zana, the mayor of Diyarbakır, was arrested in 1980. She developed a strong political consciousness and was elected to the Turkish Parliament in 1991. She was imprisoned from 1994 to 2004 (Bildirici 2008).

38. In this regard, the similarities with the IRA's hunger strike in 1981 and armed struggle are striking. See Feldman (1991, Chap. 6) and O'Heam (2009).

39. There is a vast literature on factors making an insurgency feasible (e.g. Fearon and Laitin 2003; Collier, Hoeffler, and Rohner 2009).

40. For instance, see the story of Ahmet Kutan, a poor shepherd who join the insurgency after a group of militants visited his village (Serxwebûn, December 1986, 7), and Ramazan Gezginci, an illiterate poor peasant, who joined the PKK while working in construction in Lebanon (Serxwebûn, December 1987, 27).

41. For the role of violence in South Africa, see Seidman (2001).

Additional information

Funding

Fieldwork for this article was supported by a grant from the Harry Frank Guggenheim Foundation.