Exploring Kurdish Islamist Civil Society and Conflict in Turkey (2015–2018)

Abstract

This article addresses the role and impact of religious civil society in situations of armed conflict through a case study of Kurdish Islamist civil society organisations and activists in Turkey. The focus is on the period following the collapse of the peace process and resurgence of violence in mid-2015 between Turkish security forces and the Kurdistan Workers’ Party (Partiya Karkêrên Kurdistanê). Based on 40 in-depth interviews conducted in the city of Diyarbakir, I identify three main challenges to the effectiveness of religious civil society in peacebuilding processes: (1) relations with the state, (2) legacy and relationship with institutional violence, and (3) advocacy and representation of community needs. This article shows how ethnicity and Islam are shifting, contingent interactions in the construction of Kurdish identity, especially in response to violence. Although the public expression of pro-Kurdish rights claims altered under a securitisation rubric during this period, the demand for a peaceful settlement to the conflict transcends ideological and social differences across many Kurds.