Howard Eissenstat

Howard Eissenstat is a postdoctoral fellow at the Crown Center for Middle East Studies at Brandeis University and an assistant professor of Middle East History at Seton Hall University. His research focuses on the transformation of identities at the end of the Ottoman Empire and the nature of early Turkish nationalism. Eissenstat has also done work on popular violence in the early Turkish Republic and the role of Muslim émigrés from the Russian Empire in the development of Turkish nationalism.

Posts by Howard Eissenstat:

Thursday, October 23rd, 2008

Human rights in the era of the AKP

For human rights advocates in Turkey, all political alliances are necessarily alliances of convenience. The reasons for this are myriad, ranging from the particular militancy of Turkish nationalism, to the bitterness of Turkey’s struggle with Kurdish separatism, to the remarkable trust that Turkish culture continues to bestow on Devlet Baba, the “Father State.” Under the ruling Justice and Development Party (AKP), which is frequently framed as an Islamist Party and just as frequently as a liberal one, supporters of expanded human rights in Turkey have won significant victories and have many, many reasons for concern. [...]

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