Anne Solberg the Role of Turkish Islamic Networks in the Western Balkans

SÜDOSTEUROPA, 55 (2007) 4, S. 429-462

Balkan Muslims and Islam in Europe

Anne Ross Solberg *

The Role of Turkish Islamic Networks in the Western Balkans

Abstract: Since the 1990s, the discussions on the evolution of Islam in the Western Bal-kans have been focused on neo-Salafi movements originating in the Arab world, while comparatively little attention has been given to the Islamic networks originating in Turkey. The purpose of this paper is to map the prevalence of these networks in the region, to describe their objectives and their activities, and to assess their influence within the local Islamic religious institutions and Muslim populations. The paper ex-amines the role played by both the official Turkish Presidency of Religious Affairs (Diyanet) and by non-governmental networks such as neo-Sufi communities and Islamic charity organizations. It argues that although their direct influence is limited, these various networks may still have an indirect influence on the long-term evolution of Islam in the Western Balkans by strengthening bonds between Turkey and the local Muslim communities and fostering a closer identification between Turkish Islam and Balkan Islam. The paper argues also that recent political and social changes in Turkey as well as its bid for EU-membership may further encourage such developments.

In the Islamic world, there is the Turkey model and the radical Islam model. The Is-lamic world and the Balkans should adopt the Turkey model. Turkish Prime Minister Tansu Çiller, Sarajevo, November 1995 1

Introduction

Since the fall of communism and the restoration of religious freedoms, Balkan Muslims have emerged as political actors, and religious identity and discourse have regained currency. Parallel to the local endeavours to reorganize the Is-lamic religious institutions and strengthen Islamic identity, transnational * Anne Ross Solberg, independent researcher, Istanbul, associated with the project

ʺReligion and Nationalism in the Western Balkans,ʺ University of Oslo. 1 Cited in: Turkish Press Review, 29 November 1995, available at

<http://www.hri.org/news/turkey/trkpr/1995/95-11-29.trkpr.html>.

Anne Ross Solberg

Islamic networks have also arrived in the region. They have played a role in the power struggles within the official Islamic institutions, as well as in the diffu-sion of new religious currents. Whereas the influence of neo-Salafi movements2 is a contested subject both within local Islamic institutions and among foreign commentators, comparatively little attention has been given to Islamic net-works originating in Turkey.

This paper is based on fieldwork conducted in Albania, Kosovo, the Former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia (FYROM, hereafter referred to as Macedonia), Bosnia-Herzegovina (hereafter Bosnia), as well as in Turkey. Its main purpose is to give an overview of the prevalence, aims and activities of Turkish Islamic networks in these western Balkan countries, and offer a preliminary assessment of their influence on the ground. In the first section I will deal with the emer-gence of a pro-Islamic civil society in Turkey as one of the explanatory factors behind the development of various Turkish Islamic networks in the Western Balkans. In section two, I will analyse official Turkish foreign policy in the re-gion after the fall of communism; and in section three, I will discuss the role played by the Turkish Presidency of Religious Affairs (Diyanet) and the Di-yanet’s relationship with the official Islamic institutions in the Western Balkans.

Against this background, I will introduce four different Turkish neo-Sufi communities that have evolved out of the Nakşibendi Sufi order (section four), and describe their activities in the Western Balkans (section five). In section six, I will analyse the process by which Turkish Islamic foundations have evolved into international Islamic charity organizations, and describe the activities of some of them in the Western Balkans. In section seven, I will investigate the convergence between the activities and motivations of neo-Sufi communities and Islamic charity organizations. In section eight, I will examine the percep-tions of these Turkish Islamic networks among the local Islamic institutions and Islamic intellectual circles. Finally, in my conclusion, I will discuss the limita-tions of these networks, their possible long-term impact in the Western Balkans, as well as the converging aims of Turkish Islam and Balkan Islam in regard to the nature and place of Islam in the European context.

2 Neo-Salafism is a generic term used to refer to various literalistic and puritan

interpretations of Islam taking the ʺpious ancestorsʺ (salaf al-salih) as exemplary models. Both in the Balkans and in the West, the term ʺneo-Salafismʺ is often used interchangeably with ʺWahhabism.ʺ Wahhabism, however, is a specific neo-Safafi movement named after Muhammad ibn Abd al-Wahhab (1703–1792) and closely associated with Saudi Arabia. In the Balkans, a majority of neo-Salafi activists consider the term ʺWahhabisʺ as a derogatory one.


Secular State, Islamist Parties and Pro-Islamic Civil Society in Modern Turkey

After Mustafa Kemal Atatürk proclaimed the Republic of Turkey in 1923, he embarked on an ambitious program of reforms aimed at modernizing the coun-try. The Caliphate was abolished, and secularism, or more precisely laiklik (from the French term ʺlaïcitéʺ) was adopted as one of the founding principles of the Republic. Laiklik came to be interpreted as state involvement in religious affairs rather than separation of state and religious institutions. Atatürk saw Islam as a potential obstacle to modernization, and sought to put it under strict state con-trol. In 1924, the Presidency of Religious Affairs (Diyanet İşleri Başkanlığı, or Diyanet for short) was established as a state institution affiliated to the prime minister. This initiative was part of an effort to create an enlightened and na-tionalized Islam in the service of the state- and nation-building process. In the early Republican period, however, the Diyanet was as a purely administrative body with minimal functions. Atatürk’s priority was to limit the social influence of religion, and he ordered therefore the nationalization of the religious founda-tions (vakıfs), the closure of the religious schools (medreses) and the banning of the Sufi orders (tarikats).3 Women were forbidden to wear headscarves. How-ever, despite these repressive measures, religion remained influential in the population, and the Sufi orders continued their activities in secret.4

After the transition to a multi-party system in 1946, and particularly after the landslide victory of the Democratic Party (Demokratik Parti) in 1950, the strict secularist policies were softened. Imam-hatip schools were set up for the training of imams and preachers, and the Diyanet’s status expanded from a purely administrative body to a national religious institution mentioned in the 1961 Constitution. After the military coup in 1980, the ideology referred to as ʺTurkish-Islamic synthesisʺ5 became highly influential and led to a reinterpreta-

3 Aside from public religious life in the form of worship in mosques, religious life

in the Ottoman Empire and in Turkey has traditionally been structured around a variety of Sufi orders (tarikats). Sufism (tasavvuf) is the mystic tradition within Is-lam, encompassing a diverse range of beliefs and practices dedicated to Allah. Various Sufi orders (tarikats) offer different ways to worship and achieve close-ness with Allah, through rituals referred to as zikr. Each tarikat is led by a shaykh who acts as a spiritual guide for the dervishes. Spiritual authority is transferred from one shaykh to the next on the grounds of either family relation or spiritual aptitude. The activities take place in the Sufi lodge (tekke), where most often the shaykh also lives.

4 The originators of two of the most influential neo-Sufi communities in Turkey, Said Nursi and Süleyman Hilmi Tunahan, lived and preached during this period (see below).

5 The ʺTurkish-Islamic synthesisʺ was first formulated in the 1970s by a group of

Anne Ross Solberg

tion of the secularist state ideology of the early Republican period. The coup leaders perceived leftist activism as the biggest threat to the country’s stability, and sought therefore the support of the Islamic right. Religious education was introduced as a compulsory subject in school curricula, new imams and preach-ers were employed and hundreds of new mosques were built. The Diyanet was conceived as a chief instrument in the attempt to forge a national identity based on Turkishness, Islamic religious tradition and the secular state system: Article 136 of the 1982 Constitution states that the Diyanet,

which is within the general administration, shall exercise its duties described in its particular law, in accordance with the principles of secularism, removed from all po-litical views and ideas, and aiming at national solidarity and integrity.

6

This ideological shift was accompanied by then Prime Minister Turgut Özalʹs new model of economical development. A more export-oriented eco-nomic policy provided opportunities for religious businessmen from Anatolia, and a new ʺMuslim bourgeoisieʺ emerged, challenging the economic hegemony of the secularist urban elites. Benefiting from the privatization of the media, a number of new Islamic TV and radio stations were established. Pro-Islamic newspapers and magazines proliferated and a new generation of Islamic intel-lectuals emerged.

Parallel to these evolutions of state policies, the Islamist movement7 began gaining ground in Turkish political life. The Milli Görüş (ʺNational Outlookʺ), a movement established by Necmettin Erbakan in 1969 with the support of prom-inent Nakşibendi Sufi shaykhs, was the ideological and organizational backbone of a series of Islamist political parties. Participating in elections under different names throughout the 1970s, and banned in 1980 together with all other politi-cal parties, the Islamist movement reappeared under the name of Welfare Party (Refah Partisi) in 1983. Enjoying a growing support throughout the 1980s, the Refah Party entered the Parliament in 1995 with 21,7 % of the votes. In 1996, it formed a coalition government with Tansu Çillerʹs True Path Party (Doğru Yol

right-wing intellectuals, the Aydinlar Ocağı (ʺHearth of Intellectualsʺ). They main-tained that true Turkish culture is a synthesis of Turkishness and Islam.

6 See the text of the Constitution of the Republic of Turkey, available on the official website of Turkeyʹs prime minister at <http://www.byegm.gov.tr/mevzuat/anayasa/anayasa-ing.htm>.

7 Islamism is a political ideology considering that Islam represents both a religion and a political system. Therefore, Islamist movements are opposed to secular forms of government and want to reintroduce the Shari‛a (Islamic law) as the basis of political and social life in the Muslim countries. Islamist movements claim to be in favour of the political unity of the umma (community of believers) but, in the reality, retain most often a strong nationalist dimension.


Partisi – DYP), and Necmettin Erbakan became the first Islamist prime minister in Turkeyʹs history. In February 1997, the army intervened with the support from the Democratic Left Party (Demokratik Sol Parti – DSP) and the majority of the secularist media, and the government was forced to resign in what has been labelled a ʺsoft coupʺ.

The Refah Party was banned in 1998, reappeared under the name of Virtue Party (Fazilet Partisi), and was banned once again in 2001. The same year, the re-formist and moderate wing split off and formed the Justice and Development Party (Adalet ve Kalkınma Partisi – AKP), while the traditionalists gathered in the Felicity Party (Saadet Partisi). Whereas one segment of the Milli Görüş is now closer to the AKP, another segment has remained loyal to the Saadet Party. Led by Recep Tayyip Erdoğan, the AKP cast off its Islamist roots and redefined itself as a conservative party. In November 2002, the AKP won the parliamentary elections with 34,2 % of the vote. With its promises to continue on the path of democratization, economic growth and EU-membership, the AKP won another overwhelming electoral victory in July 2007 and is set to lead Turkey for an-other term. Though the AKP vows its allegiance to the secularist Turkish Con-stitution, many constituents also expect the AKP-government to ensure greater religious freedom and provide solutions to problems such as the headscarf is-sue.

Religious movements evolving out of the traditional Sufi orders played a major role in the events described above. After Atatürk prohibited the Sufi or-ders in 1925, they did not disappear, but went through a process of transforma-tion from small exclusive brotherhoods to loosely organized neo-Sufi communi-ties (cemaats) (see below). After the 1961 Constitution provided new civil rights, Sufi orders and neo-Sufi communities began to re-emerge as legally operating foundations (vakıfs) and associations (derneks) (see below). Throughout the 1980s and 1990s, their number increased as they received more funding from the growing class of wealthy religious businessmen. More generally, the new politi-cal and social developments starting in the 1950s and peaking in the 1980s laid the foundation for the emergence of a strong pro-Islamic civil society involved in educational, cultural, social and humanitarian activities.8

8 I use ʺpro-Islamicʺ as an umbrella term for a variety of organizations and move-

ments that are grounded in Islam and therefore can be distinguished from the dominant secularist ideology in Turkey. Some of them can be termed Islamist in the narrow sense of the word (see fn. 7), but a majority of Islamic organizations and movements accepts the secular state and is rather seeking to exert influence at the social and cultural level. Many of them are gathered under the Foundation of Volunteer Organizations of Turkey (Türkiye Gönüllü Teşeküller Vakfı – TGTV). About the activities of the TGTV, see its website <http://www.tgtv.org>; in English

<http://www.tgtv.org/eng/default.asp?islem=oku&alfa=1>.

Anne Ross Solberg

The ideological shift that occurred after 1980 not only changed the power balance between the secularist centre and the Islamic periphery of Turkish soci-ety, but also brought about a new way of conceiving Turkey in the world. The shift from secularist nationalism to the ʺTurkish-Islamic synthesisʺ led to a re-appraisal of the Ottoman past. Both Islamists and ultra-nationalists came to em-brace the idea of ʺneo-Ottomanismʺ and to regard Turkey as the centre of an Is-lamic civilization stretching from Central Asia to the Balkans.9 This reorienta-tion coincided with the collapse of the Eastern Bloc and the Yugoslav wars. As a result, many actors of the Turkish pro-Islamic civil society began turning their attention towards their kin and co-religionists in the Balkans. Before describing their activities in detail, however, it is necessary to take into account the orienta-tions of Turkish foreign policy and the international activities of the Diyanet in the period after the fall of communism.

Turkish Foreign Policy after the Fall of Communism

The Ottoman Empire largely withdrew from the Balkans after the Balkan wars (1912–1913), and the region was therefore not high on Turkeyʹs foreign policy agenda.10 However, as noted by Hugh Poulton, the potential kin for Turkey is vast.11 Due to the long ascendancy of the Ottoman Empire and the heritage of the Islamic Caliphate, Muslims in the Balkans naturally looked to Turkey as their kin state, and a great number of them – both Turkish and non-Turkish – migrated to the Republic of Turkey in the 20th century.12

9 The ultra-nationalists in Turkey are divided between secularists, some of whom

blame Islam for the ʺArabizationʺ of the Turks, and supporters of the ʺTurkish-Islamic synthesis,ʺ who consider Islam as a sine qua non for being a Turk. After the coup in 1980, many nationalists began to identify with the ʺTurkish-Islamic syn-thesisʺ and a group broke away from the Party of Nationalist Action (Milliyetçi Hareket Partisi – MHP) to form the Grand Unity Party (Büyük Birlik Partisi – BBP). The supporters of the ʺTurkish-Islamic synthesisʺ are now the strongest element within the Turkish ultra-nationalist movement.

10 Relations with Greece have remained strained after the population exchange of 1923, and worsened after the Turkish intervention in Cyprus in 1974. Failure to reach a settlement over divided Cyprus continues to strain Greek-Turkish rela-tions, and Turkeyʹs EU accession hinges on solving this problem. The situation of the Turkish minority in Western Thrace has also caused tensions. Relations be-tween the two countries have improved in recent years, however, mainly as a re-sult of Greeceʹs support for Turkeyʹs EU-bid.

11 Hugh POULTON, »Turkey as Kin-State: Turkish Foreign Policy towards Turkish and Muslim Communities in the Balkans«, in: Hugh POULTON/Suha TAJI-FAROUKI (eds.), Muslim Identity and the Balkan State, London: Hurst, 1997, pp. 194–213.

12 About 450,000 Turks migrated from Greece to Turkey during the population ex-change of 1923. The first migration wave from Bulgaria occurred in 1925/1939


Since the end of the Cold War, the Balkans have regained importance in Turkeyʹs foreign policy agenda. Turkeyʹs attitude has primarily been a response to political developments in the region, but has also been influenced by domes-tic political concerns. The repressive assimilation policy that the Turkish minor-ity in Bulgaria was subjected to in the late 1980s led to mass protests in Turkey. The crisis culminated in 1989, when Turkey’s Prime Minister Turgut Özal re-sponded to a challenge by Bulgarian President Todor Zhivkov by opening the borders, resulting in a mass exodus of more than 300,000 Turks fleeing from Bulgaria to Turkey.

Turkey participated in military operations both in relation to the war in Bosnia and the subsequent conflicts in Kosovo and Macedonia, although al-ways being careful to keep its policies in line with NATO and the UN. Accord-ing to Sylvie Gangloff, perceptions of Turkey as ʺthe oppressorʺ have continued to prevail, particularly in Greece, Serbia and partly in Bulgaria. Turkey is there-fore ʺunder constant threat of being accused of returning to its ʹwarrior tenden-ciesʹ of the past.ʺ Since conflicts in Yugoslavia were perceived by people in the Balkans themselves as confrontations between Islam and Christianity, Turkey publicly taking sides with Muslims ʺwould reinforce its image of a Muslim state and therefore cut it off from Europe.ʺ13

During the war in Bosnia there was a growing feeling in Turkish public opinion that Turkey had a moral responsibility for the Muslim communities in the Balkans, and there was significant domestic pressure on the government to assume a more active role, especially from Islamist political parties, the pro-Islamic media, and the numerous associations of Balkan immigrants. However, a balance had to be achieved between this public pressure and the need to avoid any action that might be interpreted as the pursuit of irredentist claims on former Ottoman territories. Faced with these dilemmas, Turkeyʹs official pol-icy in the Balkans has been one of caution. Esra Bulut contends that the reli-gious factor did not ʺconstrainʺ the Turkish government to change its foreign policy.14 Despite speculations about ʺIslamist penetrationʺ into key ministries

(200,000), the second one in 1950/51 (212,000) and the last one in 1989 (310,000). The major migration waves from the former Yugoslavia took place in 1949 (117,000), in 1954/1960 (183,000) and in 1992 (25,000). Source: Pierre HECKER, »Länderprofil No 5: Türkei«, Focus Migration, (April 2006) 5, p. 2, available at <http://www.focus-migration.de/uploads/tx_wilpubdb/LP_05_Tuerkei.pdf>.

13 Sylvie GANGLOFF, The Impact of the Ottoman Legacy on Turkish Policy in the Balkans (1990–1991), Paris: CERI, November 2005, pp. 2–4, available at <http://www.ceri-sciencespo.com/archive/nov05/artsg.pdf>.

14 Esra BULUT, »The Role of Religion in Turkish Reactions to Balkan Conflicts«, in: Turkish Policy Quarterly, 3 (Spring 2004) 1, available at <http://www.turkishpolicy.com/images/stories/2004-01-evasivecrescent/TPQ2004-1-bulut.pdf>.

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since the beginning of this century, there are no signs of a significant change in Turkeyʹs foreign policy in the Balkans. On the contrary, it is claimed by some that Turkey led a more active policy towards its kin and co-religionists in the Balkans in the late 1990s, when the social democratic DSP was in a coalition with the ultra-nationalist MHP, than during the current AKP-led government. In recent years, Turkey has continued its efforts to develop friendly relations with its Balkan neighbours, and has signed economic and military agreements with most of the Balkan countries.

The renewed focus on ʺTurkeyʹs relativesʺ in the Balkans, the Caucasus and Central Asia in the 1990s also coincided with developments within Turkey. Af-ter 1980, the ʺTurkish-Islamic synthesisʺ gained momentum within both ultra-nationalist and pro-Islamic circles in Turkey, and with it the notion of the Bal-kans as an ʺOttoman hinterland.ʺ The last decades have witnessed a renewed interest in Ottoman history, and a reassessment of the Ottoman past and heri-tage as a source of pride. While interest in and references to the Ottoman Em-pire were previously regarded as old-fashioned and reactionary, the Ottoman past has been re-invented in the recent years as a model of co-existence and tol-erance. Together with the collapse of the Eastern Bloc and the Yugoslav wars of the 1990s, this reassessment of the Ottoman past has also led to a renewed con-sciousness about Turkeyʹs kin in the Balkans, both at the state level and at the non-governmental level.

At the state level, one concrete effect of Turkeyʹs renewed interest in the Balkans, the Caucasus and Central Asia was the establishment of the Turkish International Cooperation Agency (Türk İşbirliği ve Kalkınma İdaresi Başkanlığı – TIKA) in 1992. Originally affiliated with the ministry of foreign affairs, this state agency was directly placed under the authority of the prime ministry in May 1999. Its chief objective is to aid Turkeyʹs neighbouring countries and countries where Turkish is spoken, through cooperation and development projects in the fields of commerce, technology, culture and education. The agency also aims to encourage the use of Turkish in these countries. In the Western Balkans, the TIKA runs coordination offices in Macedonia, Albania, Kosovo, Bosnia and Montenegro. Supporting religious activities is not part of TIKAʹs official agen-da. However, in comparison to the diplomats working in Turkish embassies, the staff of the TIKA tends to display less of a strict secularist profile. Many of them identify with the pro-Islamic civil society in Turkey, and this is sometimes re-flected in their networking activities. TIKA coordinators sympathizing with the work done by Turkish Islamic foundations and charity organizations act some-times as informal intermediaries and facilitate contacts with the local Muslim communities and Islamic institutions. TIKA therefore plays a certain role


through its social and cultural activities, but Turkeyʹs official religious network-ing in the Balkans is primarily carried out through the Diyanet.

The Role of the Diyanet in Turkish Foreign Policy

Until the 1970s, the activities of the Diyanet were limited to the domestic sphere, and official contacts with foreign Islamic religious institutions were minimal. As the number of Turkish workers in western Europe grew and came to constitute a permanent Turkish diaspora, Diyanetʹs mission came to include Turks living outside of Turkey as well. After the 1982 Constitution had strengthened its offi-cial status, Diyanetʹs provisory services in western Europe developed into a permanent presence regulating the religious life of Turkish believers abroad. Through its organizational network, the Diyanet has succeeded in establishing a strong institutional position, particularly in Germany and the Netherlands, where Turks are the dominant Muslim population.15 In 1975, the Turkish Foun-dation for Religious Affairs (Türkiye Diyanet Vakfı – TDV) was established to support Diyanetʹs activities both in Turkey and abroad. Funded by donations from Turkish believers living in and outside of Turkey, TDV finances a variety of religious activities and services not covered by Diyanetʹs limited state-allo-cated budget.

After the collapse of the Eastern Bloc and the Soviet Union, the Diyanet ex-panded its foreign services, and in the early 1990s made its first attempts to es-tablish contacts and develop cooperation with the Islamic institutions of the Balkans, the Caucasus and Central Asia. In 1995, the Diyanet invited Islamic re-ligious leaders from these regions to Ankara. The meeting, which was given the name of the Eurasian Islamic Council (Avrasya İslam Şurası, hereafter referred to as EIC), marked the beginning of a new phase of more intense cooperation with the Islamic institutions of the former communist countries. The council has since met on six different occasions, most recently in Istanbul in September 2005. The first EIC meetings were marked by enthusiasm and great expecta-tions about Turkeyʹs role in providing support to the Islamic institutions in the Balkans. Both religious leaders from the Balkans and Turkish participants spoke of Turkeyʹs special responsibility towards its co-religionists in the Balkans. Muamer Zukorlić, the mufti of the Sandžak,16 declared in his speech at the EIC meeting in 1996:

15 See Nico LANDMAN, »Sustaining Turkish-Islamic Loyalties: The Diyanet in West-

ern Europe«, in: Hugh POULTON/Suha TAJI-FAROUKI (eds.), Muslim Identity and the Balkan State, London: Hurst, 1997, pp. 214–231.

16 Sandžak is a region located at the boundary between Serbia and Montenegro.

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It was the Ottomans who brought Islam to the Balkans, but then the Muslims in Al-bania, Kosovo, Bosnia, Macedonia and the Sandžak were left orphans. Their mother left them all alone. We turn to Turkey, not just with an emotional plea, but with the rights of a child to its mother. We want to express that the time has come for Turkey to look after her children.

17

As it became apparent that the Diyanet had neither the financial recourses nor the political backup to support fellow Muslims in the Balkans on a grand scale, expectations were adjusted and the atmosphere in later EIC meetings was far more sober. Many of the ambitious proposals made at the first meetings, like the building of a big mosque in Tirana, have not materialized so far. The EIC meetings have nevertheless led to improved relations and closer cooperation between the Diyanet in Turkey and Islamic institutions in the Balkans.

Since the start of the 1990s, the Diyanet has opened missions all over the Balkans, aimed both to support the Turkish minorities in the area and to de-velop cooperation with the local Islamic institutions. Turkish embassies in Bul-garia, Romania and Macedonia have religious affairs consultants (din müşavir-leri). These are appointed by the Diyanet but they belong to the staff of the em-bassy. There are also religious coordinators (koordinatör din görevlileri) in Alba-nia, Kosovo and Bosnia. These are not formally part of the Turkish embassy and their salaries are paid by the TDV. Their duties, however, are the same: to coor-dinate Diyanetʹs activities in the region and to maintain good relations with the local Islamic institutions. In addition to this permanent staff, the Diyanet sends extra religious personnel to Turkish villages of Bulgaria, Romania, Macedonia and Kosovo during the Ramadan and the Feast of Sacrifice (Kurban Bayramı), and organizes evening meals (iftars) during the Ramadan in cooperation with the local Islamic Institutions.

The main job for many Diyanet representatives consists of selecting and as-sisting the students from the region who go to Turkey to study theology. The Turkish Higher Education Council (Yükseköğretim Kurulu) determines the quota of foreign students from each Balkan country who are eligible for scholarships, a small part of the quota being allocated for Islamic theology students. In addi-tion to state scholarships allocated to students from ʺTurkish and kin communi-tiesʺ in the Balkans, the Caucasus and Central Asia, the TDV also awards schol-arships to students from these regions wanting to study Islamic theology in Turkey.18 Since 1995, hundreds of students from the Balkans have been given 17 Speech of Muamer ZUKORLIĆ, in: II. Avrasya İslam Şurası [Second Eurasian Islamic

Council], Ankara: Diyanet Publications, 1998, p. 176 (authorʹs translation). 18 In the academic year 2006/07, the TDV awarded scholarships to a total of 430 for-

eign students wanting to study in imam-hatip schools and 325 students wanting to study Islamic theology in Turkish universities. See »Eğitim-öğretim faaliyetleri«


such an opportunity. Both the Diyanet and the local Islamic institutions regard these student exchanges as an important measure and would like to see the quota increased. The TDV has also established imam-hatip schools and Institutes of Higher Islamic Studies and in Bulgaria and Romania.

Another aspect of Diyanetʹs activities in the Balkans is the translation and distribution of religious literature. A periodical addressing the Muslim commu-nities of the Balkans, the Caucasus and Central Asia is published regularly, prayer calendars (takvims) and religious literature has been distributed to the Turkish-speaking populations of the Balkans, and 40,000 religious books in Al-banian have been distributed in Albania. In addition, the Diyanet has assisted the Islamic institutions in Albania, Bosnia and other Balkan countries with the preparation and translation of textbooks for medreses. Finally, the Diyanet has contributed to various restoration projects in the Balkans. In Kosovo, for exam-ple, the Diyanet and the Turkish Department of Culture have been involved in the restoration of the shrine (türbe) of Sultan Murat near Prishtina, and the re-storation of the Sinan Pasha mosque in Prizren. A majority of these activities has not been financed from Diyanetʹs budget, but by the TDV.

Although there have been requests for high-cost projects such as the build-ing of mosques, the Diyanet has been forced to turn them down due to its lim-ited budget. According to Hakkı Kılıç, director of the Diyanetʹs Department in charge of the Balkans and Central Asia:

We canʹt do much, we have no money for restoration projects. The Islamic Commu-nity in Albania asked us for financial support, but we were not able to offer that. We were too late in the Balkans. In the last years, requests for support for building mosques and so forth have started coming in, but now the building costs are too high.19

Hakkı Kılıç underscores that Diyanetʹs activities in the Balkans are direct re-sponses to demands from the local Islamic institutions:

As long as we do not receive any requests for assistance in terms of staff, publica-tions, we do not send anything. The initiative lies completely in their hands. It would not be right for us to impose anything.

20

A Diyanet religious coordinator in the Western Balkans confirms the lack of capacity to meet requests for financial help, and conceded that this ʺmay open

[Educational Activities], available on the TDVʹs official website at <http://www.diyanetvakfi.org.tr/hizmetler/yurtdisi/disegtogrtfl.htm>.

19 Personal interview with Mr Hakkı KILIÇ, Summer 2005. 20 Idem.

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the doors for Arab states and groups.ʺ21 The Diyanet has been much more active in western Europe and in Central Asia than in the Western Balkans. This may be because, within the framework of a secular state, the support of ethnic Turk-ish communities, so-called ʺsoydaşlarʺ (people of common descent), is easier to justify than the support of ʺdindaşlarʺ (co-religionists). In contrast, the Turkish pro-Islamic civil society and in particular neo-Sufi communities have emerged in the last years as a significant actor in the relations between Turkey and Mus-lim communities of the Western Balkans.

From Sufi Orders to Neo-Sufi Communities

After Atatürk ordered the ban of the Sufi orders (tarikats) in 1925, many of them evolved into loose religious communities (cemaats). In the following I will refer to these communities as ʺneo-Sufi communities.ʺ There is some divergence in the way social scientists use the term ʺneo-Sufism.ʺ22 I am using it to denote re-ligious communities that are rooted in Sufism, and to a greater or lesser degree retain Sufi characteristics. We may distinguish between two main types of such neo-Sufi communities: firstly, traditional Sufi orders that are still identified ac-cording to a particular school or branch but have evolved into religious com-munities in terms of their focus and organizational structure; and secondly, new Islamic revivalist movements that have roots in Sufism, but are no longer iden-tified according to a specific school or branch.

The first type refers to communities that are still regarded as tarikats and identified according to their particular school (Nakşibendis, Kadiris, Halvetis, etc.), but now take the shape of larger and more loosely organized religious commu-nities (cemaats). The primary aim of these neo-Sufi communities is no longer to pass on mystical knowledge to a closed circle of dervishes, but to promote and keep alive Islamic culture in general, and Sufi culture in particular. Although members of these neo-Sufi communities still express affinity and loyalty to a particular shaykh and retain the emphasis on spiritual lineage, the ritual aspect has been toned down and replaced with a more general understanding of Suf-ism as a certain approach to religion. Although other Sufi orders have survived, and some of the more heterodox varieties have experienced a revival in recent

21 Personal interview with a representative of the Diyanet in the Western Balkans,

Spring 2005. 22 ʺNeo-Sufismʺ can also refer to a movement characterized by a rejection of the ec-

static and metaphysical side of Sufism in favour of strict adherence to the Shari‛a, and by a striving for union with the spirit of the Prophet instead of union with God. See Martin VAN BRUINESSEN, »Origins and Development of the Sufi Orders (Tarekat) in Southeast Asia«, in: Studia Islamika – Indonesian Journal for Islamic Studies, 1 (April–June 1994) 1, pp. 1–23.


years, the orthodox Nakşibendi school has by far been the most powerful in Tur-key.23 The Nakşibendi communities have become increasingly involved in world-ly concerns, and they played a key role in the emergence of the Milli Görüş and the Refah party. Of the Nakşibendi communities active in Turkey today, the Erenköy community is one of the most influential, along with the İskender-paşa community, the Menzil community and the Ismailağa community.

The second type of community that we may refer to as neo-Sufi consists of Islamic revivalist movements that have roots in Nakşibendi Sufism, but are not identified according to a particular Sufi school or branch. The most prominent of them is the highly influential Nurcu community and its various branches, particularly the neo-Nurcu movement of Fethullah Gülen. Another influential revivalist movement with roots in Nakşibendi Sufism are the Süleymancıs. Al-though these movements have sprung from Sufism, they are identified as dis-tinct religious communities with specific identities and aims. These movements, particularly the Nurcus, have retained their Sufi identity to a lesser degree than the Nakşibendi communities mentioned above.

Both types of neo-Sufi communities represent a transition from the inward spirituality of esoteric Sufi brotherhoods to the outreaching activities of reli-gious communities involved in hizmet. This notion of hizmet (service to Allah and humanity) plays a crucial role in the self-understanding of these communi-ties, although it can be interpreted differently from one case to the next. The core idea is that serving a fellow Muslim in particular and humanity in general is an important part of oneʹs religious duty. It is shared and cited as an impor-tant motivation factor in the outreach activities of the neo-Sufi communities both in and outside of Turkey. In the following, I will first describe the main characteristics of the Turkish neo-Sufi communities that are the most active in the Western Balkans.

1. The Nurcus24

The followers of Said Nursi (1876–1960), a Turkish Islamic scholar of Kurdish descent, are often referred to as the members of the Nur community (Nur

23 Compared to more heterodox Sufi currents, the Nakşibendis belong to the ortho-

dox end of the spectrum. While some Sufi orders use songs and music in their rituals, and others engage in ascetic practices such as self-mutilation, the Nakşi-bendi zikr is silent and secret. See chapter 6 on the Nakşibendi Sufi order in Hakan YAVUZ, Islamic Political Identity in Turkey, Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2003, pp. 133–139.

24 About the Nurcus, see Şerif MARDIN, Religion and Social Change in Modern Turkey: The Case of Bediüzzaman Said Nursi. Albany: State University of New York Press, 1989.

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Cemaatı) or Nurcus. The basis of this neo-Sufi community are the works of Said Nursi, particularly the 6,000-pages long Risale-i Nur (ʺEpistles of Lightʺ), an ex-planation of and commentary on the Qur’an. Nursi wished to restore the Is-lamic faith by renewing the understanding of the Qur’an and showing that there is no contradiction between religion and science. The Nurcus have become one of the most powerful neo-Sufi communities in contemporary Turkey, and the number of followers is estimated to be between two and six million. The Nurcus are a reading community rather than an activist community. Their pri-mary aim is to disseminate the ideas and works of Said Nursi, and their empha-sis is on faith and on the message of the Risale-i Nur. In addition to publishing and translating Nursiʹs works into different languages, they run reading circles (dershane) led by ʺolder brothersʺ (ağabeys25), where the texts of Said Nursi are read aloud and discussed. The classic Nurcus tend to be more conservative than the members of the Gülen movement (see below) in terms of their interpreta-tion of Islamic tenets regarding dress code and gender segregation. However, their focus is on the enlightenment of the individual and the community. They strive to bring religion back into modern life, not to change the social and politi-cal order.

2. The Gülen movement26

The Gülen movement, also known as the movement of the Fethullahcıs, started as a small neo-Sufi community gathering around Fethullah Gülen (born in 1941 in Erzurum27) while he was preaching in Izmir. Gülen was influenced by Said Nursi, and since he is heavily drawing on Nursiʹs ideas about synthesizing Is-lam with modernity and science, the Gülen movement is often referred to as a ʺneo-Nurcu community.ʺ This community has now developed into a vast trans-national network of schools, media outlets, publishing houses, financial institu-tions, foundations and associations. The degree to which those working in these various establishments identify themselves as being part of a specific commu-nity varies. Whereas some have been socialized within the Gülen movement and developed a strong in-group identity, others merely sympathize with Gülenʹs ideas. However, they are connected by a common vision and work to

25 Ağabey is widely used in Turkey as a respectful term of address. 26 About the Gülen movement, see Hakan YAVUZ/John ESPOSITO (eds.), Turkish Islam

and the Secular State: The Global Impact of Fethulah Gülenʹs Nur Movement, Syracuse: Syracuse University Press, 2003.

27 According to Turkish official birth records, Fethullah Gülen was born on 27 April 1941, but it is claimed that his real birth date is 10 November 1938, the same day Atatürk died.


put Fethullah Gülenʹs ideas into action. It is a religious community in the sense that those working in the schools, media outlets, publishing houses and busi-nesses considered as part of this community are generally pious Muslims, but in terms of the broad spectrum of its activities and the diversity of those affili-ated with it, it differs from many other neo-Sufi communities.

The Gülen movement has turned into a transnational network that pro-motes less Islam as such than Turkish-Islamic spirituality and culture. Its dis-course has also developed from a specifically Turkish-Islamic one to a global discourse of love, peace, morality and inter-cultural dialogue. A key notion in the global Gülen movement is the idea of raising a ʺgolden generationʺ of young people who are both morally conscious and well-educated. The Gülen movement has established about 300 private schools around the world, a major-ity of them located in Turkey, Central Asia and the Balkans.28 Most of these schools are general ones, and religion is taught only so far as it is part of the na-tional curriculum. However, as faith is regarded as a prerequisite for morality, religiosity in general is encouraged, and emphasis is placed on setting a good example and building discipline and good manners.

3. The Süleymancıs29

The community of the followers of Süleyman Hilmi Tunahan, known as the Süleymancıs, emerged in the 1920s as a reaction to the closing of the medreses. As with many other neo-Sufi communities in Turkey, the roots of the Süleymancıs lie in Nakşibendi Sufism; its spiritual leader, Bulgaria-born Süleyman Hilmi Tunahan (1888–1959) was from a family of Nakşibendi Sufi shaykhs. The Süley-mancıs are especially influential in the west and south-west of Turkey, and among Turkish immigrants in western Europe. According to some sources, they run a total of around 1,500 Qur’an courses and student dormitories in Turkey.30 Through a variety of foundations and associations, they also run hundreds of Qur’an courses and dormitories for Muslim students all over the world. The

28 See Bayram BALCI, Missionnaires de lʹIslam en Asie centrale: Les écoles turques de

Fethullah Gülen, Paris/Istanbul: Maisonneuve & Larose/Institut français dʹétudes anatoliennes, 2003; Bekim AGAI, Zwischen Netzwerk und Diskurs: Das Bildungsnetz-werk um Fethullah Gülen, Hamburg: EB-Verlag, 2004.

29 About the Süleymancıs, see Gerdien JONKER, »The Transformation of a Sufi Order into a Lay Community: The Süleymanci Movement in Germany and Beyond«, in: Jocelyne CESARI/Sean MAC LOUGHLIN (eds.), European Muslims and the Secular State, Aldershot: Ashgate, 2005, pp. 169–182.

30 Okan Konuralp, »Türkiyeʹnin tarikat ve cemaat haritası« [Türkeyʹs Tarikats and Cemaatsʹ Map], Hürriyet, 17 September 2007, available at <http://www.hurriyet.com.tr/pazar/5097892.asp?m=1&gid=112&srid=3432&oid=4>.

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Süleymancıs prefer religious education to be community-run, and are critical of state-controlled religion as represented by the Diyanet. They emphasize tradi-tional Qur’an education, which is taught in a scholastic manner (traditional memorization of the Qur’an in Arabic). As is the case with many revivalist movements rooted in Sufism, the Süleymancıs are not organized as a traditional Sufi order, but as a loose community or network. Within the community there is a strong sense of in-group identity, and they are regarded as a relatively closed and secluded community. They practice strict gender segregation, and believe that young people should have no or minimal contacts with members of the opposite sex until they are married. The Süleymancıs are traditionalist in their interpretation of the tenets of Islam, and generally distance themselves from both Islamist political parties31 and neo-Salafi interpretations of Islam. They aim to discipline Muslims according to the Turkish Sunni-Hanafi tradi-tion.

4. The Erenköy community and the AMHV32

The Foundation Aziz Mahmud Hüdayi (Aziz Mahmud Hüdayi Vakfı – AMHV) is linked to the above-mentioned Erenköy community. The AMHV was estab-lished in 1985, in honour of the memory of Shaykh Aziz Mahmud Hüdayi (1541–1628), the founder of the Celveti branch of the Bayrami school of Sufism. At first this foundation was mainly preoccupied with social services, particu-larly food distribution to the poor in Üsküdar, the area where Aziz Mahmudʹs türbe, tekke and mosque are located. After some years it started establishing stu-dent dormitories and Qur’an courses. Most of AMHV’s founders belong to the Erenköy community. Musa Topbaş, the last shaykh in the lineage of the Erenköy community33 played an important role in the establishment and the financing of the foundation. The AMHV runs a variety of activities in and outside of Turkey, including publishing houses, Qur’an courses, student dormitories and charity organizations. Much of its financial resources come from Turkish religious businessmen, many of them with Balkan origins, who wish to support their Muslim kin in the Balkans.

31 The Süleymancıs have tended to vote for centre-right parties rather than for

Islamist parties in Turkey. 32 About the activities of the AMHV, see its website <http://www.hudayivakfi.org>. 33 Today Osman Nuri Topbaş is considered to be the leader of the Erenköy commu-

nity, though generally not referred to as a shaykh.


The Neo-Sufi Communities in the Western Balkans

Over time these various neo-Sufi communities have turned into transnational networks. Much of their activities outside of Turkey are directed towards the Turkish diaspora in Europe, America and Australia. Their activities in the West-ern Balkans, however, are mostly directed towards non-Turkish Muslims. They legitimize these activities not only by appealing to co-religionist solidarity, but also by insisting on a shared history and sense of cultural affinity. Turkish Mus-lims have a special responsibility, they maintain, for their Muslim brothers and sisters in the Balkans. All these neo-Sufi communities have in common that their origins can in some way be traced back to traditional Sufi orders and that they represent Sunni-Hanafi Islam. They differ, however, in terms of their ap-proach and their activities.

1. The Nurcus

For the Nurcus, hizmet is limited to spiritual awakening and renewal of the Is-lamic faith through the spreading of Said Nursiʹs message. Nurcus from Turkey are encouraged to move to the Western Balkans and open new reading circles there. They are also engaged in translating the works of Said Nursi into local languages, and distributing these publications to religious bookshops and among the local Muslim population. The first efforts to spread Nursiʹs ideas in the Western Balkans began in 1991/92. The presence of the Nurcus in the region is therefore a recent one, and the process of translating Nursiʹs works into local languages is still ongoing. There are no signs that the Nur community is grow-ing to any significant degree, and most of its activities are still run by Nurcus who have come from Turkey.

The activities of the Nurcus in the Western Balkans are based on voluntary work, and the resources for active proselytising efforts are limited. The reading circles are run on an open-door basis, and anyone can attend them. In the West-ern Balkans, these circles are rather small. They tend to be diverse in terms of age, socio-professional status and educational level, but there are more circles for men than for women. In Macedonia and Kosovo, where there is a sizeable Turkish-speaking population, the reading circles are attended by both Turkish and non-Turkish Muslims. Most of them are run by Turks from Turkey, but some are run by local Muslims. The Nurcus are addressing Turks and non-Turks alike. In areas where many Muslims speak Turkish, such as western Ma-cedonia, the readings are conducted in Turkish, but otherwise they are con-ducted in the local language. There are active Nurcu reading circles in Mace-

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donia (Skopje and Gostivar), Kosovo (Prishtina and Prizren), and Bosnia (Sara-jevo and Mostar).34

2. The Gülen movement

The Gülen movement strives to spread Turkish-Islamic culture and widen Tur-keyʹs sphere of influence. For Fethullah Gülen, Turkey is the continuation of the Ottoman Empire and the centre of a civilization stretching from the Balkans to Central Asia. In 1989 he called on his followers to open schools and businesses in the post-communist states of the Balkans and Central Asia, in order to foster a morally conscious and well-educated elite in these countries. The Gülen com-munity is the most influential Turkish neo-Sufi community in the Western Bal-kans. Its main activities are in the field of private education. There are currently about 20 primary and secondary schools linked with the Gülen movement in the Western Balkans, the first one having been established in Tirana in 1993. Most of the schools have experienced a steady growth in the number of stu-dents, and new schools continue to be opened. There are ten such schools in Albania (seven in Tirana, two in Shkodra and one in Durrës) and three in Kos-ovo (two in Pristhina and one in Prizren), with a total of more than 3,000 stu-dents in 2005, five schools in Bosnia (three in Sarajevo, one in Tuzla and one in Bihać), with a total of 770 students in 2005, and three in Macedonia (in Skopje, Gostivar and Struga), with a total of 700 students in 2007.35 The Gülen commu-nity is also financing three medreses in Albania (in Tirana, Elbasan and Kavaja).

A local edition of Zaman (ʺThe Timesʺ), the Turkish daily newspaper closely associated with the Gülen movement, is published in Macedonia.36 The news-paper contains mostly general news and articles about cultural, educational and religious issues. Although the Macedonian edition of Zaman has other owners than the Turkish one, the two newspapers are closely linked. Articles and col-umns from the Turkish edition are regularly published in the Macedonian one, in particular those dealing with religious matters. Currently, Zaman is pub-lished in Macedonia in three different languages: a weekly magazine in Turkish (circulation: 2,000), a monthly magazine in Albanian (2,300) and another one in Macedonian (1,000).

34 According to a Nurcu website, there are also reading circles in Albania, but I have

not been able to confirm this or ascertain their location. 35 Regarding the schools run by the Gülen movement, see the website

<http://www.turkokullari.net>. 36 There are also local editions of Zaman in Bulgaria and Romania. See

<http://www.zaman.bg> and <http://www.zaman.ro>.


In Turkey the Gülen movement runs study circles and dormitories known as Işık evler (ʺHouses of Lightʺ) where video cassettes with Fethullah Gülenʹs sermons are shown and his ideas are discussed. According to people involved in the Gülen community, until recently there has been little such core commu-nity activities in the Western Balkans. One exception is the Atmosfera study cen-tre in Prizren. Run by Turks from Turkey, this centre was established with the declared aim of spreading Gülenʹs ideas. In Atmosfera, Gülenʹs books are avail-able in Turkish, Albanian and English, together with Said Nursiʹs works and other books about Islam. Besides functioning as a drop-in centre welcoming passers-by interested in reading the books, reading circles for students are or-ganized on a regular basis. Those running the centre also participate in book fairs in and around Kosovo to promote Gülenʹs books. Although the activities of the Gülen movement in the Western Balkans are concentrated around private education, this centre may be a harbinger of more outreaching religious activi-ties.

3. The Süleymancıs

The Süleymancıs want to teach Balkan Muslims about the Turkish Sunni-Hanafi tradition and protect them from the influence of neo-Salafism, which they con-sider as a deviation from Islam and as inappropriate for European Muslims. The Süleymancıs have a very well-organized network in the Western Balkans, and they run student dormitories and Qur’an courses across the region through a number of different foundations. Their activities are mainly focused on a pro-gramme of free accommodation for Muslim students, combined with strict dis-cipline and religious education according to the principles of the community. In some places the Süleymancıs offer Qur’an courses that are open to the public and organize seminars where they coordinate their activities and train their own teachers of religion.

Most of the students living in the dormitories run by the Süleymancıs attend regular school or university, but they are expected to attend a programme of re-ligious education (Qur’an, Islam and Islamic ethics) taught by Süleymancı teach-ers. They are also requested or encouraged to perform prayers five times a day. In many dormitories the students are given lessons in Turkish. Most of the dormitories are for boys, but some dormitories for girls exist as well. Known for their strict discipline, these girlsʹ dormitories are regarded as an opportunity for female students from traditional and rural families who would otherwise be re-luctant to let their daughters leave home to study. The Süleymancıs have been active in Albania since 1996, and run nine dormitories in eight different loca-tions around the country (Peshkopi, Kukës, Durrës, Kavajë, Bushat, Shkodra

Anne Ross Solberg

and Prrenjas). They have been active in Kosovo, Macedonia and Bosnia since the early 2000s. They manage five dormitories in Macedonia, (two in Gostivar and one in Skopje, Debar and Tetovo), four dormitories in Kosovo (two in Gjilan/Gnjilane and two in Prizren) and three in Bosnia (two in Sarajevo and one in Travnik). They are also aiming to expand their activities and open new dormitories in many regions.

4. The Erenköy community and the AMHV

The AMHV came to Kosovo in the late 1990s to provide humanitarian aid dur-ing and immediately after the war. It set up an association, the Istanbul Interna-tional Brotherhood and Solidarity Association (IBS), and opened a permanent office in Prishtina in order to coordinate its humanitarian activities in the re-gion, consisting mainly in food distribution and assistance to refugees. Since then, the AMHV has developed its activities along similar lines as in Turkey, setting up student dormitories and Qur’an courses. The head coordinator of IBS in Prishtina explains that their chief aim is to ensure that the Turkish Sunni-Hanafi tradition will remain the prevailing form of Islam in the Balkans:

The local Islamic authorities asked us to help them against the Wahhabis. Many young people here identify with the Wahhabi way. Our aim is to keep the Turkish-Islamic culture alive.

37

There are currently four dormitories run by the AMHV in Kosovo, accom-modating each 30 to 40 students. The first one was a boy dormitory for medrese students established in Gjilan/Gnjilane in 2000. Later on, two dormitories for medrese students were established in Prizren, one for boys and one for girls. Fi-nally, the AMHV re-opened an old medrese in Gjakova/Ðakovica in 2006, and uses it as a boy dormitory and a hifz, a school where boys become hafiz, some-one knowing the Qur’an by heart.

Upon the request of the Islamic religious institutions of Kosovo, the AMHV has also built a mosque in Viti/Vitina, a small town in the south of Kosovo. Completed in 2004, the Medina mosque is the first one in Viti/Vitina. The offices of the IBS are located in its basement, along with a youth centre where local young people can study the Qur’an, learn English and take computer courses run by the association. Many of the students coming to the centre would like to attend medrese and study in Turkey. The association has sent twelve Kosovo-Albanian students to Turkey to study theology, and in 2005 they organized an excursion to Turkey for fifteen medrese students.

37 Personal interview with the head coordinator of IBS in Prishtina, May 2005.


The AMHV is also active in Albania, where it finances the Haxhi Sheh Shamia girlsʹ medrese in Shkodra. There is a picture of Osman Nuri Topbaş, the leader of the Erenköy community, on the wall inside the school. The AMVH also supports financially the Islamic religious institutions in Albania and runs Qur’an courses with their explicit approval. In 2002, a meeting was organized in Shkodra to promote a book written by Osman Nuri Topbaş, indicating the close-ness between the AMVH and the Erenköy community.

The AMHV has no dormitories in Macedonia at the present time. As the need for humanitarian aid was perceived to be greater in Kosovo due to the war in 1999, the AMHV decided to channel its resources to that region. In Mace-donia, the AMHV cooperates with Deniz Feneri (ʺLighthouseʺ), one of the big-gest Islamic charity organizations in Turkey (see below). AMHVʹs financial re-sources are limited compared to those of Deniz Feneri, which has only recently entered the region. With the assistance of the AMHV, Deniz Feneri has financed the reconstruction of Hamidiye medrese in Štip (eastern Macedonia). The new four-storey medrese building can accommodate 120 students, including 70 board-ing students, and will also house the offices of the mufti. Deniz Feneri and the AMHV also financed the refurbishing of Kadinana mosque, one of the two mosques existing in this city.

The Turkish Islamic Charity Organizations in the Western Balkans

In addition to the neo-Sufi communities described above, a number of Turkish Islamic charity organizations are also active in the Western Balkans. Charitable institutions have a long tradition in Turkey. In Ottoman society, educational, welfare and health services were mostly provided by religious foundations (vakıfs). These foundations were nationalized in 1924, but the Islamic institution of vakıf provided a model for the pro-Islamic civil society in the 1980s and 1990s. Especially for Nakşidendi neo-Sufi communities, foundations (vakıfs) and associations (derneks)38 became the main instrument to channel the monetary gifts from wealthy businessmen into religious and charitable activities.39 Since being a Sufi involves a more intense and active way of worship, it is also re-flected in the believersʹ way of interpreting the religious notions of hizmet (see

38 Foundations (vakıfs) and associations (derneks) fall under two different laws in

Turkey. Whereas foundations are formed on the basis of an endowment for a par-ticular purpose, associations are organizations set up by a group of people for a common purpose (with the exception of financial gain).

39 See Nevzat ATAL/Erdal ŞIMŞEK, »Tarikata yakın şirket ve vakıflar« [Companies and Foundations Linked to Sufi Orders], Sabah, 21 September 2006, available at <http://www.sabah.com.tr/2006/09/21/gnd139.html>.

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above), zekât (ritual alms) and sadaka (voluntary alms). According to Hasan Kamil Yılmaz, the president of the AMHV, zekât is a form of worship, and pious Muslims ʺfeel a need to give.ʺ40

Until the 1990s, Turkish Islamic charity organizations were mostly operat-ing at the local or national level. In the last two decades, however, a number of new organizations have been established in Turkey, which also run activities di-rected towards Muslims in other countries. Active among Muslim communities in the Balkans, Central Asia, South East Asia, the Middle East and Africa, these organizations have been set up by various Islamic foundations, Islamic TV sta-tions or Islamist political parties. Their activities in the Western Balkans peaked during and after the war in Bosnia (1992/95), the war in Kosovo (1998/ 99) and the conflict in Macedonia (2001). In addition to providing humanitarian aid, many of these organizations have also supported the local Islamic institutions, among others by distributing religious literature. Some have established them-selves on a permanent basis, such as the AMHV (see above).

One of the first Turkish Islamic charity organizations present in the Western Balkans was the Humanitarian Relief Foundation for Human Rights and Free-doms (İnsan Hak ve Hürriyetleri İnsani Yardım Vakfı – IHH), established in 1993 by the German branch of the Milli Görüş

41 and supported by the Refah Party. It is now close to the AKP and the reformist wing of the Milli Görüş.42 The IHH was established with the purpose of providing humanitarian aid to the war victims in Bosnia, and it was the first and only Turkish charity organization to enter this country during the war. Later on, the IHH expanded its humanitarian aid ac-tivities to other areas in the Balkans, Central Asia, the Middle East and Africa. The IHH distributed 155 truckloads of humanitarian aid during the war in Kos-ovo, as the largest Turkish charity organization operating in this region. It pro-vided humanitarian aid to refugee families in Albania, Macedonia, the Sandžak and Bosnia, and brought wounded victims to Turkey for treatment.43 In addi-tion to humanitarian aid, the IHH also emphasizes the need to offer ʺspiritual supportʺ to Muslims in the Balkans, particularly in areas where there are Chris-tian missionary activities. In 2006, IHH distributed 10,000 Qur’ans in Albania and Kosovo and 5,000 books among children in Tirana. Although the IHH is now focusing on other areas such as the Palestine and Lebanon, it still distrib-

40 Personal interview with Hasan Kamil YILMAZ, January 2006. 41 In Germany, the IHH is known under the name Internationale Humanitäre Hilfe (see

its website <http://www.ihh.com>). 42 About IHHʹs activities, see its website <http://www.ihh.org.tr>. 43 See »İHH İnsani Yardım Vakfı Kosova faaliyetleri« [IHH Humanitarian Aid

Foundationʹs Activities in Kosovo], available on the website of the Kosovo branch of the IHH at <http://kosova.ihh.org.tr/kosovafaaliyetleri.html>.


utes aid during Islamic religious holidays and maintains close ties with Islamic institutions and Muslim communities in the Western Balkans.

Cansuyu Aid and Solidarity Association (Cansuyu Yardimlaşma ve Dayanışma Derneği) is another Turkish Islamic charity organization which has recently be-come active in the Western Balkans. Cansuyu (ʺThe Water of Lifeʺ) was founded in 2005 in response to the earthquake in Pakistan, with the support of the Saadet Party and the traditionalist wing of the Milli Görüş.44 In 2006, Cansuyu distrib-uted aid packages to 500 Muslim families in Kosovo (Prishtina and Prizren ar-eas) and to 500 more in Macedonia (Gostivar area). They also held iftars for around 250 people in Gjilan/Gnjilane (Kosovo) and in Gostivar, inviting politi-cians and representatives of the local Islamic institutions and of Turkish NGOs. Cansuyu also distributes aid during Islamic religious holidays in Bosnia and in the Sandžak.

Deniz Feneri (ʺLighthouseʺ) is one of the biggest Islamic charity organiza-tions in Turkey. It started as a television programme on Kanal 7, a Turkish TV channel that has a moderate pro-Islamic profile and is close to the AKP. The television programme aimed to draw focus on and alleviate poverty, and in 1998 Deniz Feneri was established as a permanent association.45 In 2005, Deniz Feneri decided to expand its activities abroad, focusing on the Balkans in par-ticular. Deniz Feneri distributes humanitarian aid and supports educational in-stitutions throughout the Balkans. In 2005, it distributed humanitarian aid val-ued at 200.000 YTL (about 112.000 €) to poor families in various regions of Kos-ovo, and provided clothes for 40 students of the Faculty of Islamic Studies in Prishtina. In 2006, it organized and paid for the circumcision of 497 boys in east-ern Macedonia and, in cooperation with the AMHV, it financed the construction of the Hamidiye medrese in Štip. Deniz Feneri also cooperated with the AMHV in Albania, co-financing the girlsʹ medrese in Shkodra, and in Kosovo, where they financially support the medrese in Gjakova/Ðakovica. It also supported the con-struction of the new building of the Faculty of Education at the University of Mostar (Bosnia).46

The fourth major Turkish Islamic charity organization active in the Western Balkans is the Istanbul International Brotherhood and Solidarity Association (IBS), which was established in 1994 to run aid activities in the Balkans, the Caucasus and Central Asia. This charity organization is linked to the AMHV

44 About Cansuyuʹs activities, see its website <http://www.cansuyu.org>. 45 About Deniz Feneriʹs activities, see its website <http://www.denizfeneri.org.tr>. 46 Deniz Fenerʹs coordinator in Sarajevo is also employed at the International Univer-

sity of Sarajevo (IUS), a private university set up by another Turkish Islamic foundation, the Sarajevo Education Development Foundation (Saraybosna Eğitimi Geliştirme Vakfı – SEDEF).

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(see above) since this association has a permanent presence in the Western Bal-kans and is identified by local religious leaders not merely as a charity organi-zation, but as a distinct religious community.

In the early 2000s, these Islamic charity organizations were granted the le-gal status of public benefit associations by the AKP government. This means that they do not need permission to collect money and that they are exempt from paying taxes.47 They are not only collecting money in Turkey, but also from Turks living in Europe, through networks such as the Milli Görüş. They also benefit from their close relations with the pro-Islamic media.48 Newspaper articles and television programmes praising the work of these organizations, as well as grand-scale marketing campaigns, have created public awareness about their activities and attracted new donors. Their increased financial strength and the legitimacy provided by their political backing have led to an upscaling of their operations both at the national and international level. Consequently, there has been a marked increase in the activities of these four Turkish Islamic charity organizations both in the Western Balkans and in other parts of the world with a Muslim population. Apart from their humanitarian aid activities, these charity organizations have played an important role in establishing contacts between the pro-Islamic civil society in Turkey and the Muslim communities and Islamic institutions in the Western Balkans.

The Convergence of Turkish Islamic Networks in a Transnational Context

Turkish Islamic networks active in the Western Balkans vary from neo-Sufi communities with a specific message to spread, to religiously motivated charity organizations. The activities of the Nurcus are exclusively focused on spreading the ideas of Said Nursi. The Gülen movement has a broader approach and promotes Turkish-Islamic values through activities in the field of private educa-tion and media. The Süleymancıs are exclusively involved in running student dormitories and Qur’an courses in line with the principles of their community. The AMHV also runs student dormitories and Qur’an courses, but its approach is quite different from that of the Süleymancıs. Firstly, the AMVH is both a

47 See »Beş İslami Derneğin Yükselişi« [The Rise of Five Islamic Associations], in:

Radikal, 27 April 2007, available at <http://www.radikal.com.tr/haber.php?haberno=219537&tarih=27/04/2007>.

48 In particular, the Islamist daily newspaper Milli Gazete (ʺNational Newsʺ) sup-ports Cansuyu and the IHH, the moderate pro-Islamic daily newspaper Yeni Şafak (ʺDaybreakʺ) supports Deniz Feneri and the IHH, the magazine Altınoluk (English title: ʺThe Rain of Wisdomʺ) supports the IBS and the TV channel Kanal 7 sup-ports Deniz Feneri.


Nakşibendi neo-Sufi community and an Islamic charity organization, which shows that the distinction between the two can sometimes get blurred. Sec-ondly, the AMHVʹs affiliation with Nakşibendi Sufism does not play an overt role in its activities in the Balkans. Hasan Kamil Yılmaz, the president of the AMHV, states:

We do not teach tasavvuf [Sufism] as ritual or engage the students in zikr. However, our connection to tasavvuf is reflected in the fact that the teachers will make the stu-dents familiar with important religious figures of Sufism. The students will in this way be made familiar with the Sufi culture. Also, [the Sufi affiliation] is reflected in the fact that our style is ‘soft’.49

The other charity organizations also belong to the wide spectrum of Islamic movements with roots in Nakşibendi Sufism. Cooperation between these organi-zations is therefore unproblematic, as we have seen in the case of the AMVH and Deniz Feneri.

The above-mentioned Turkish neo-Sufi communities and Islamic charity organizations possess specific in-group identities within the mosaic of the pro-Islamic civil society in Turkey. However, in a transnational context, the supra-identity of ʺTurkish Islamʺ acquires a special importance. Notably, the ʺTurkish Islamʺ referred to here is one that has roots in orthodox Sufism, not in hetero-dox interpretations of Islam such as Alevism and Bektashism.50 The ideological differences between these Islamic networks are less noticeable, as they describe themselves and the motivations behind their activities in the Western Balkans in similar terms. They perceive themselves as representing a healthy, moderate ʺmiddle wayʺ that is opposed to ʺextremism,ʺ but still represents Sunni-Hanafi orthodoxy against religious ignorance and unbelief. They stress the need to en-lighten the Balkan Muslim communities about Islam, because they have either ʺforgotten their religionʺ or have a ʺwrong knowledgeʺ about it. They also re-gard religion as a prerequisite for morality, and emphasize the positive benefits of spreading knowledge about Islam for the individual and the society. At the same time, however, they wish to ʺcurb Wahhabi influenceʺ and ensure the pre-valence of the Turkish Sunni-Hanafi tradition in the region. They promote not only Islam, but also Turkish-Islamic culture, and place emphasis on the democ-

49 Personal interview with Hasan Kamil YILMAZ, January 2006. 50 Bektashism is a heterodox Sufi order founded in the 13th century by Haci Bektaş

Veli. The veneration of Imam Ali is central to its religious doctrine, which is a blend of Sufi and Shi‘a elements. Alevism shares with Bektashism the veneration of Imam Ali and Haci Bektaş Veli, but its origins and its relation to orthodox Sunni Islam are disputed. In contemporary Turkey, Alevism is not a Sufi order but a distinct religious and ethno-cultural community. The same holds true for Bektashism in Albania.

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ratic and humanistic character of Islam as practiced in Turkey. Additionally, the Süleymancıs, the AMHV, the IHH and Cansuyu express particular concern about Christian missionary activities in the Balkans, stressing the need to protect Mus-lims from this influence.

These ideas are to a large extent shared by the Diyanet. The Diyanet has tra-ditionally had an uneasy relationship with religious communities escaping its authority, and with the Süleymancıs in particular. In the Western Balkans, like in western Europe, the Süleymancıs and the Nurcus first entered the region and the Diyanet has been forced to compete with them. However, there are indications that the gap between ʺofficialʺ Islam as represented by the Diyanet and ʺunoffi-cialʺ Islam as represented by the neo-Sufi communities has narrowed. In recent years, the Diyanet adopted a more tolerant position towards these ʺunofficialʺ religious communities. Its general attitude is that they do not represent a cause for concern, as they are part of the Turkish Sunni-Hanafi tradition. Although the Diyanet would still prefer to be in control, its representatives concede that there are no major ideological differences between the Diyanet and most of the neo-Sufi communities. In a transnational context, their principal goal converges: ensuring the continued prevalence of the Sunni-Hanafi interpretation of Islam. Diyanet representatives underline also that they are in favour of a healthy ʺmid-dle wayʺ between ʺextremismʺ (represented by neo-Salafism) and ʺreligious ig-noranceʺ (represented by popular interpretations of Islam, with strong elements of superstition).

Convergences between state and non-state Turkish Islamic networks can also be seen in the involvement of the Turkish International Cooperation Agen-cy (TIKA, see above) in some projects run by Islamic charity organizations. The TIKA has equipped the computer room at the girlsʹ medrese in Shkodra, which is co-financed by Deniz Feneri and the AMHV. TIKA representatives were also present at the opening of educational facilities financed by Deniz Feneri and the AMHV in Macedonia and Bosnia.

The Local Perception of Turkish Islamic Networks

Through the Eurasian Islam Council meetings (see above), official cooperation between the Diyanet and local Islamic Institutions in the Western Balkans has been strengthened. Diyanet representatives maintain close contacts with the lo-cal Islamic institutions and cooperate on matters such as the selection of theol-ogy students eligible for scholarships, the publication of religious material and the organization of joint iftars during the Ramadan. Most of the non-state Turk-ish Islamic networks active in the Western Balkans have also some contacts with the local Islamic institutions, both officially in order to obtain permission for


their activities and through informal contacts and acquaintances. The activities of these networks are for the most part condoned by the local Islamic institu-tions, which regard their work as valuable efforts to teach Islam and rekindle the spirit of Islam among young people.

Local Islamic institutions generally take a positive view of the Turkish Islamic charity organizations. The AMVH has been working closely with the Is-lamic institutions of Macedonia, Kosovo and Albania. In Macedonia, the AMHV has cooperated closely with el-Hilal (ʺThe Crescent Moonʺ), the humani-tarian organization established by the local Islamic institutions. The IHH has also worked with el-Hilal, and has particularly close relations with the Islamic institutions and the reisu-l-ulema Mustafa Cerić in Bosnia. In addition to the of-ficial Islamic institutions, a number of organizations and individuals in the Western Balkans play a key role as contacts and intermediaries for these Turk-ish Islamic charity organizations. In Macedonia in particular, this applies to Turkish associations such as the cultural centre Abdülhakim Hikmet Doğan (ADEKSAM) in Gostivar or the cultural association Köprü (ʺThe Bridgeʺ) in Skopje, and to Islamic intellectuals and activists such as Behuciddin Sehabi, Adnan Ismaili, Kenan Mazlami, Muhammed Aruçi, Salih Murat and Süleyman Baki.51 In Kosovo, the IHH has worked with the local humanitarian organiza-tion Kalliri i mirësisë (ʺSpike of Kindnessʺ) and the Association for Culture, Edu-cation and Teaching (Asociacioni për Kulturë, Edukim dhe Arsim – AKEA), and in Bosnia both the IHH and Cansuyu are in close contact with the organization Mladi Muslimani (ʺYoung Muslimsʺ). The IHH also supports the womenʹs asso-ciation Sumejja (ʺSumayaʺ) in Sarajevo and the cultural association Preporod (ʺRebirthʺ) in Goražde. In Albania, Mehdi Gurra, an Albanian imam with a de-gree from Turkey, has assisted both the IHH and other Turkish Islamic net-works. Many of these individuals and organizations are close to the Islamist ideology, and therefore feel an affinity to organizations such as the IHH or Cansuyu.

The Turkish neo-Sufi communities are also generally on good terms with the local Islamic institutions. The Süleymancıs are regarded as sincere and de-

51 Behuciddin Sehabi is the president of the humanitarian organization El-Hilal,

Adnan Ismaili is the president of the humanitarian and cultural organization Merhamet (ʺMercyʺ), Kenan Mazlami is the general secretary of the Party of the Right Path (Hak Yolu Partisi), Muhammed Aruçi was the editor of the main peri-odical of the Islamic religious institutions and is currently a research fellow at the Center for Islamic Studies (İslam Araştırmaları Merkezi – ISAM) in Istanbul, Salih Murat is the general secretary of the cultural centre Abdülhakim Hikmet Doğan and of the Union of Turkish NGOs in Macedonia (Makedonya Türk Sivil Teşkilatlar Birliği – MATÜSITEB), and Süleyman Baki is the president of the humanitarian organization Ensar (ʺHelperʺ) and of the MATÜSITEB.

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voted exponents of the Turkish Sunni-Hanafi tradition. In Albania, they have close ties with the Islamic institutions. In Kosovo, they run their activities through the foundation Süleymaniye, which is officially recognized not only by the Islamic institutions, but also by the local authorities and the United Nations. Moreover, municipalities encourage the expansion of their activities by granting them land and planning permissions. In Macedonia, the Süleymancıs also seem to be on good terms with the local Islamic institutions, but their status is not formalized to the same extent. Sources I spoke to within the Islamic institutions expressed the wish to exert a closer control over the Qur’an courses and other religious activities set up by various foundations. The Nurcus operate on a smaller scale and have only sporadic and informal contacts with the local Is-lamic institutions, which neither support nor oppose them. Due to the different nature of its activities, the Gülen movement has more contact with local au-thorities than with the local Islamic institutions.

In general, then, both local Islamic institutions and Islamic intellectuals and activists condone, and sometimes support, the activities of the Turkish Islamic networks in the Western Balkans. However, there are also some ulema (religious scholars) and Islamic intellectuals that are less favourably inclined towards them. In the following I will deal more specifically with the perceptions among Albanian ulema and Islamic intellectuals in Macedonia and Kosovo. Some of them are suspicious of Turkish networks that seem to develop their own activi-ties and recruit their own followers. As the Süleymancıs, the Nurcus and the Gülen movement follow a certain path or religious leader and function as sepa-rate religious communities, it is argued that they have a ʺsectarianʺ mentality and that they are detrimental to the unity of Muslims. Some Islamic intellectu-als dismiss the Süleymancıs as ʺuneducatedʺ and ʺunsophisticated.ʺ52 According to a prominent Albanian Islamic intellectual of Macedonia, such views are pres-ent among representatives of the Islamic institutions and among Islamic intel-lectuals.53

The criticisms against the Turkish Islamic networks are exceptions rather than the rule, and should be understood in the context of religio-ideological di-visions. Among the young ulema who have received their education in Arab countries, some have come to identify with neo-Salafism. Those young ulema and the Islamic intellectuals who are close to neo-Salafism tend to be hostile to-wards the Turkish Islamic networks and their aim to ʺcurb Wahhabi influence.ʺ

52 I came across this view several times when speaking to Albanian Islamic intellec-

tuals in Macedonia. One of them stated that he took great exception to the idea that someone from ʺdeepest Anatolia,ʺ who has never seen the face of a ʺgiaourʺ (ʺnon-Muslimʺ), should have anything to teach to Balkan Muslims.

53 Personal interview, September 2006.


These criticisms should also be understood within their larger ethno-political context. Many Albanians in Kosovo and Macedonia express a feeling of kinship with Turkey and Turks in Turkey, but have an ambivalent relationship with those who identify as Turks in Macedonia and Kosovo, because their endeavour to assert a separate Turkish identity is perceived as conflicting with Albanian national interest. Therefore, Albanian Islamic intellectuals tend to be more sup-portive of Turkish Islamic networks that they consider as Islamist or ʺpan-Islamistʺ than those that emphasize Turkish national identity, language and cul-ture.

The Nurcus, the Gülen movement and the Süleymancıs are regarded as separate religious communities who ʺkeep to themselvesʺ and ʺdo their own business.ʺ Consequently, some argue, these groups have little or no influence among the local Islamic religious leaders and Islamic intellectuals. Since repre-sentatives of these neo-Sufi communities seldom speak the local language, their influence is largely limited to the local Turkish communities, which are under-represented in the Albanian-dominated Islamic institutions of Kosovo and Ma-cedonia. Islamist thinkers from the Arab world such as Hasan al-Banna, Sayyid Qutb and Yusuf al-Qaradawi have much more influence among the young gen-eration of ulema and Muslim believers than Turkish religious scholars like Said Nursi.

Conclusion

The activities of the Turkish neo-Sufi communities started in the Western Bal-kans in the early 1990s, after the fall of communism, and intensified during and after the wars in Bosnia and Kosovo. In the case of the Nurcus, the level of activ-ity remains low. The Gülen movement, the Süleymancıs and the AMHV are ex-panding their activities at a moderate rate. However, the direct influence of Turkish neo-Sufi communities among local ulema and Islamic intellectuals re-mains minimal and, despite the growth in the number of dormitories, Qur’an courses and private schools, their ability to recruit a large number of followers is limited. Since the early 2000s, Turkish Islamic charity organizations such as the IHH, Deniz Feneri and Cansuyu have contributed to strengthening the bonds between Muslim communities in the Western Balkans and in Turkey. The Diyanet, for its part, is an extension of Turkeyʹs diplomacy in the region, and its mandate is limited. Islamic intellectuals and activists both in the Western Bal-kans and in Turkey tend to regard the Diyanet as a passive representative of the Turkish state.

This does not preclude a more indirect influence of the Turkish Islamic networks on the long-term evolution of Islam in the Balkans. Firstly, these vari-

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ous networks play a considerable role in strengthening the links between Islamic intellectual and activist circles in the region and the pro-Islamic civil so-ciety in Turkey. Some key figures of the local Islamic circles serve as intermedi-aries for Turkish Islamic networks. These individuals do not necessarily belong to any specific group, but they participate in meetings and conferences in Tur-key, and invite Turkish Islamic intellectuals and activists to their own country. Therefore, it is not a one-sided relationship whereby Muslims from Turkey provide support to the Muslim communities in the Balkans and get little or nothing in return. Instead, a mutual relationship of solidarity and exchange of ideas has developed.

Secondly, the presence of Turkish Islamic networks in the Western Balkans is likely to increase the number of students who go to Turkey to pursue their university education in theology or other subjects. Most students staying at the dormitories and educational institutions set up by these networks learn Turk-ish, and develop an affinity for Turkey and Turkish culture. The Gülen move-ment, the Süleymancıs and the AMHV encourage students to study in Turkey, either by providing scholarships and accommodation or assisting them in other ways. The Diyanet also provides scholarships. The percentage of young Mus-lims from the Western Balkans that choose to pursue their theological education in Turkey rather than in Arab countries is therefore likely to increase. In the long term, this would increase the number of religious leaders and imams who speak Turkish and feel closer to Turkey than to the Arab world. In Macedonia, it may also strengthen the role of members of the Turkish communities within the presently Albanian-dominated Islamic religious institutions and Islamic intel-lectual circles.

Strengthened relations with Turkey will also have the effect of counterbal-ancing the influence of the neo-Salafi movements originating from the Arab countries. Ensuring the continued prevalence of Sunni-Hanafi Islam is one of the declared aims of all Turkish Islamic networks in the Western Balkans. This does not mean that these networks regard neo-Salafi movements as a serious threat. Representatives of the Diyanet and of neo-Sufi communities estimate their influence to be relatively marginal, particularly within the Islamic institu-tions. The Diyanet representative in Kosovo, speaking of the cooperation with the Islamic institutions of Kosovo, stated that he was ʺpleased to see that our aims are converging.ʺ54

Since the early 1990s, there has been an increase in the exchanges between the Muslim communities of the Western Balkans and of Turkey, both at the lev-el of official Islamic institutions and at the level of the non-governmental net-

54 Personal interview with the Diyanet representative in Kosovo, Spring 2006.


works and circles mentioned above. In order to assess the possible impact of these exchanges, one must take into account the context in which both Turkish and Balkan Muslims have formulated their Islamic identities and how these identities have evolved in recent years, how Turkey and Turkish Islam is per-ceived in the Balkans, and the internal diversity of Balkan Islam itself. Islamic identity has become politicized both in Turkey and in the Western Balkans. Turkish Muslims have formulated their Islamic identity in a predominantly Muslim country, and in relation to a staunchly secularist state. Balkan Muslims have formulated their Islamic identities within multi-religious and/or multi-ethnic states, and often as religious and national minorities. Both in Turkey and in the Western Balkans, there have been efforts to reinforce the links between Is-lam and national identity. The ʺTurkish-Islamic synthesis ideologyʺ has gained influence in Turkey since the 1980s. In a similar way, after the fall of commu-nism, some ulema and Islamic intellectuals have made attempts to reinforce the links between Islam and the Bosniak or the Albanian national identity, but to disassociate them from the Turkish national identity and the Ottoman legacy.

Against this background, we may identify a number of different (but not mutually exclusive) discourses that are shaping exchanges between pro-Islamic and Islamist circles in Turkey and the Western Balkans. Firstly, there is a dis-course on shared history and cultural affinity. All Turkish Islamic networks stress the affinity between Turkish and Balkan Muslims rooted in a shared Otto-man cultural legacy and in the Sunni-Hanafi tradition. Sometimes this leads to attempts to contrast negative representations of the Ottoman past as the ʺOtto-man yokeʺ with positive representations of Ottoman civilization as a model of inter-religious co-existence. This type of discourse is particularly prevalent within the Gülen movement. In Turkish state institutions and nationalist circles, this ʺneo-Ottomanʺ discourse sometimes contains also perceptions of Turkey as a ʺnatural leaderʺ in the region.

However, the emphasis on the Ottoman origins of Balkan Islam or the Bal-kans as a kind of ʺTurkish hinterlandʺ sometimes conflicts with the efforts of the Balkan Muslims to formulate their own national identities. Local ulema and Is-lamic intellectuals concerned with asserting a distinct Albanian or Bosniak iden-tity dislike what they regard as attempts to promote a particular Turkish under-standing of Islam. Moreover, there are rivalries among Balkan Muslims them-selves. Some Albanian Islamic religious leaders and Islamic intellectuals in Kosovo and Macedonia express dissatisfaction with the status of Bosnian reisu-l-ulema Mustafa Cerić as the primary representative of Balkan Islam in Europe. Referring to the larger number of Albanian Muslims as compared to Bosnian Muslims, they complain that they are not sufficiently represented in pan-European forums where Balkan Islam and European Islam are discussed. Thus,

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within the general discourse on Balkan Islam as an indigenous and moderate tradition of Islam in Europe, national Islamic identities, i.e. Albanian and Bos-nian Islam, are to a certain extent competing for influence. There are also ideo-logical, political and generational conflicts within the Islamic institutions and in the Islamic intellectual circles.

Secondly, there is a discourse on Muslim solidarity. The activities of the Turkish Islamic networks are often justified in terms of solidarity with Balkan Muslims that have been the victims of violence and oppression. Since Balkan Muslims are perceived to have suffered precisely due to the fact that they are followers of Islam, this discourse can contain elements of hostility towards the West. Among the most politicized Islamist activists, the oppression of Balkan Muslims is juxtaposed with the issue of religious freedoms in Turkey, and with the headscarf issue in particular. Due to these unresolved issues, Turkey is hardly perceived by Balkan Muslims as a model in the definition of the rela-tionship between state and religion. There are signs, however, that the strict definition of secularism in Turkey is undergoing a process of change, brought forward by domestic political demands, the present pro-Islamic government and the European Union. The discourse of Turkish Islamists has undergone sig-nificant changes since the 1990s. The electoral victory of the reformist AKP and the low results of its traditionalist counterpart, the Saadet Party, have been in-terpreted as a sign of the failure of Islamism in the sense of the demand for an Islamic state. A large portion of the Turkish Islamic activists has abandoned the dream of an Islamic state and the reinstitution of the Shari`a, demanding in-stead a redefinition of secularism and pointing to some west European coun-tries as an example. AKP and its many supporters within the pro-Islamic civil society have come to believe that modern western-style democracy is the best way to protect the religious rights of Turkish believers.

Thirdly, there is the discourse on ʺEuropean-nessʺ and the place of Islam in Europe. Many Islamic religious leaders and Islamic intellectuals in the Western Balkans tend to regard Balkan Islam as the ʺgenuine European Islam,ʺ referring to its location in southeastern Europe and to centuries of inter-religious coexis-tence. Some of them dismiss the idea that Muslim Turks from Anatolia could have anything to teach them about how to be modern and European Muslims, and take therefore a slightly disparaging attitude towards the Turkish Islamic networks. However, a potential Turkish EU-membership is likely to alter the perception of Turkey among Balkan Muslims. As a member of the European Union, Turkey would constitute the largest Muslim country in Europe. Thus the common features of Turkish Islam and Balkan Islam in terms of a common Ot-toman legacy and Sunni-Hanafi tradition would probably come more to the fore in the development of a European Islam.


Regardless of the outcome, Turkeyʹs EU candidacy and the continuing ne-gotiation process have important implications, including for Turkeyʹs influence in the Muslim world. Turkeyʹs bid for EU-membership paradoxically has the ef-fect of highlighting its identity as a Muslim country. It is a common perception that one of the main benefits of the integration of Turkey in the EU would be the creation of a bridge between a supposedly Christian Europe and the Mus-lim world. This focus has given Turkey a new and important position as a Mus-lim country. Tellingly, in 2004, Ekmeleddin Ihsanoğlu was elected as General Secretary of the Organisation of the Islamic Conference (OIC), as the first Turk to hold this position in the history of the organization.55 Preceding the election, the Turkish ministry of foreign affairs was involved in intense diplomatic efforts to ensure the victory of the Turkish candidate despite the opposition of Saudi Arabia and other Arab states.

Domestic changes in Turkey, Turkeyʹs place in Europe and its changing role in the Muslim world are all factors that are likely to favour a closer relationship between Turkey and the Western Balkans. In all these countries, European inte-gration is high on the agenda and religious leaders emphasize the compatibility of Islam with western-style democracy and European values. It remains to be seen whether this will also lead to institutional networking at the European level, and whether national differences and rivalries or cooperation based on common interests will prevail in their endeavours to play a decisive role in the shaping of a European Islam.

55 Between 1980 and 1994, Ekmeleddin Ihsanoğlu was the founding director of the

International Research Centre for Islamic History, Culture and Arts (IRCICA), an institution linked to the OIC and based in Istanbul.

Anne Ross Solberg

Acronyms and Abbreviations

ADEKSAM ʹAbdülhakim Hikmet Doğanʹ Eğitim Kültür ve Sanat Merkezi – Centre for Education, Culture and Art AKEA Asociacioni për Kulturë, Edukim dhe Arsim – Association for Culture, Education and Teaching AKP Adalet ve Kalkınma Partisi – Justice and Development Party AMHV Aziz Mahmud Hüdayi Vakfı – Foundation Aziz Mahmud Hüdayi BBP Büyük Birlik Partisi – Grand Unity Party Cansuyu Cansuyu Yardimlaşma ve Dayanışma Derneği – Cansuyu Aid and Solidarity Association Diyanet Diyanet İşleri Başkanlığı – [Turkish]Presidency of Religious Affairs DSP Demokratik Sol Parti – Democratic Left Party DYP Doğru Yol Partisi – True Path Party EIC Avrasya İslam Şurası – Eurasian Islamic Council EU European Union IHH İnsan Hak ve Hürriyetleri İnsani Yardım Vakfı – Humanitarian Relief Foundation for Human Rights and Freedoms –

Internationale Humanitäre Hilfe ISAM İslam Araştırmaları Merkezi – Center for Islamic Studies IUS International University of Sarajevo MATÜSITEB Makedonya Türk Sivil Teşkilatlar Birliği – Union of Turkish Non-Governmental Organizations in Macedonia MHP Milliyetçi Hareket Partisi – Party of Nationalist Action OIC Organisation of the Islamic Conference SEDEF Saraybosna Eğitimi Geliştirme Vakfı – Sarajevo Education Development Foundation TDV Türkiye Diyanet Vakfı – Turkish Foundation for Religious Affairs TGTV Türkiye Gönüllü Teşeküller Vakfı – Foundation of Volunteer Organizations of Turkey TIKA Türk İşbirliği ve Kalkınma İdaresi Başkanlığı – Turkish International Cooperation Agency

Anne Solberg the Role of Turkish Islamic Networks in the Western Balkans

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