New Turkish Business Elites: Resources, Networks, Boundaries and Mobility

In this chapter, we explain how the new Turkish corporate elites mobilise their varied resources in order to seek integration into the business community through their international, national and local networks. Our findings show that intensive use of economic, social and cultural resources accounts for the success of Turkish elites in navigating their way from local settings to international fluency. We draw upon the relational sociology of Bourdieu and the network theory of Granovetter in order to frame the theoretical background of our study. We have three main findings: First, local and international networks are more accessible to new business elites than national networks. In order to access national networks new business elites require higher levels of economic capital. Second, new business elites in Turkey do not have elite tastes. In fact, our study demonstrates that the new elites have common rather than refined tastes. This may be explained by the fact that they have only recently joined elites. Third, education has been exceptionally instrumental in allowing new elites to access elite status in Turkey. The significance of education in allowing for class mobility cannot be overstated in the case of Turkey.