Political Islam and the Secular State in Turkey

How safe is Turkey's liberal democracy? The rise to power in 2002 of the right-leaning Islamic Justice and Development Party ignited fears in the West that Turkey could no longer be relied upon to provide a buffer against the growth of Islamic fundamentalism in the Middle East. But the contribution of the JDP (or AKP as it known in Turkey) to civil liberties and basic freedoms, long suppressed by secular and statist Kemalist ideology, has remained unexamined despite more than a decade in government. In this - the first detailed study of the policies and ideology of Prime Minister Erdogan's government - Evangelia Axiarlis examines the extent to which the JDP has worked to improve civil life in Turkey and critically addresses whether a government built on Islamic principles can champion political reform. Exploring how Islam and democracy are neither monoliths nor mutually exclusive, this is a timely contribution to the wider understanding of political Islam.