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Politics and Society in Cold War Turkey (1960-1980) offers a comprehensive examination of Turkey’s transformative era between the military coups of 1960 and 1980. Analysing the period within global Cold War conjunctures, it investigates profound socio-political, economic, and cultural shifts. It explores the institutionalisation and subsequent erosion of a liberal constitutional order, alongside the rapid mobilisation of dynamic social forces, including the socialist left, trade unions, women, and marginalised minorities. Conversely, it highlights the severe polarisation driven by the radical right and political Islam. By exploring foreign policy crises, urban informalisation, and cultural production, this seminal work offers an indispensable guide to understanding modern Turkey’s most pivotal era.
"The [book's] “central assumption” is that 1960-1980 constitutes a distinct, coherent and explanatory era, a period in which constitutional order, social transformation, ideological struggles and foreign policy were simultaneously reshaped. This is a compelling intervention because it challenges the prevailing scholarly tendency to fragment the period into separate stories " — Tunahan Yıldız, Middle East Technical University
Halil Akkurt received his PhD in Modern Turkish History at Yıldız Technical University and is an Associate Professor at Ağrı İbrahim Çeçen University. He is the author of Debates on Ottoman Social Structure among the Turkish Left 1960–1980 (İmge, 2020), and editor of Portraits from Turkish Political and Intellectual History (Tarihçi, 2021), both in Turkish. He received a PhD scholarship from the Turkish Historical Society (2012–2016), the Young Social Scientists Award (2019) from the Turkish Social Sciences Association, and an International Postdoctoral Fellowship (2023) from TÜBİTAK. He was a researcher at Leiden Institute for Area Studies (2023–2024).
Contents
List of Illustrations
List of Abbreviations
Chronology
Population Statistics of Turkey, 1927–2025
Introduction
Halil Akkurt
Part I. Institutional and Systemic Framework
Chapter 1. The 1961 Turkish Constitution: A Critical Step Towards Liberal Democracy
Seda Dunbay
Chapter 2. From Hope to Darkness: Coups, Crises and Contradictions in Turkish Politics, 1960–1980
Zafer Doğan
Chapter 3. Transformation and Crises between the National and the Global: A General Overview of Turkish Foreign Policy between 1960 and 1980
Hazal Papuççular
Chapter 4. The Remembered and Forgotten ‘Outer Turks’ in Turkish Foreign Policy: An Analysis of the Cold War Period
Radiye Funda Karadeniz
Chapter 5. Birth of Welfare State, Second Age of Industrilization, and Rise and Decline of ISI in Turkey (1960–1980)
Ekin Mahmuzlu
Part II. Political Actors and Ideological Conflicts
Chapter 6. The Centre-Right in Cold War Turkey (1960–1980): Pragmatism, Anti-Communism, and Polarization
Adem Çelik
Chapter 7. The Republican People’s Party and the Pursuit of Democratic Identity in Turkey amid Crises and Power Struggles
İhsan Ömer Atagenç
Chapter 8. The Rise and Fall of the Socialist Movement in Cold War Turkey (1960–1980)
Halil Akkurt
Chapter 9. Turkish Radical Right between Nationalism and Islamism (1960–1980)
Ferit Salim Sanlı
Part III. Identities and Social Dynamics
Chapter 10. Change in Methods and Actors: The Kurdish Movement in Turkey, 1960–1980
Bayram Koca
Chapter 11. Between Invisibility and Hypervisibility: The Political Trajectory of Alevis in Turkey, 1960s–1970s
Besim Can Zırh
Chapter 12. Non-Muslim Minorities in Turkey between 1960–1980
Nihan Akıncılar
Chapter 13. Women in Turkey: A Feministisation Process
Nur Sinem Kourou
Chapter 14. Two Decades of Ascendance: The Pinnacle Years of the Turkish Trade Union Movement (1960–1980)
Canan Özcan Eliaçık
Part IV. Space and Cultural Production
Chapter 15. Migration and Urbanization in Turkey (1960–1980): Informalization, Gecekondu-ization, and Social Change
Aykut Aykutalp
Chapter 16. Between Art and Politics: Turkish Literature during the 1960s and 1970s
Ekin Kadir Selçuk
Chapter 17. The Conflicting Situation of National Cinematography: Turkish Cinema during the Yeşilçam Period
Tunç Yıldırım
Afterword. From Turkish Military Coups to Cold War Conjunctures: Turkey’s Second Republic (1960–1980) in Global and Regional Contexts
Alp Yenen
Index