The Construction of the Family Ethic in Turkey

The Republic of Turkey in 1923, is established on the foundations of secularism and modernity. The newly established state, which turned its face to the West by rejecting the legacy of the Ottoman Empire, carried out a modern nation building project with the imagination of a new nation, family and citizenship. Through family planning policies, the modern nuclear family was supported as a disengagement from the Ottoman traditional society. Due to secularist policies, beliefs, morals, values, ethics were accepted as individualistic matters and pushed to private sphere. This family-oriented modernization and ideal of national family required the construction of a new citizen woman who incurred the responsibility of raising new patriot generations devoted to principles of the reformist state. However, this perception of family and woman began to change in the last few decades especially with the neoconservative and neoliberal policies adopted by the rule of the Justice and Development Party (JDP). In accordance with the earlier governments, the family preserved its privileged position, however, with a new assignment on family which instrumentalizes ethics, morals and beliefs in the public sphere compatible with its policies. The birth control policies have come to an end and the care giving services assigned to families instead of public service, which eventually requires a renovation of duties and responsibilities of the family and women. This paper intends to analyze the mobilization of beliefs, morals and ethics for the sake of construction of the social order.