Mustafa 

Kemal, Design for a modern secular Turkish state, 1925.  This process of reform has been going on for nearly a century, but within the last twenty years it 
has moved with tremendous rapidity. The story in the Western press, usually the outcome of 
The object of the revolution… is to give to the citizens of the Republic a social organization 
the most superficial and hurried observation after a pleasant Mediterranean trip, is that Turkey 
completely modern and progressive in every sense. It is imperative for us to discard every 
was changed overnight from an Eastern into a Western country. This view is more than 
thought that does not fall in line with this true principle. All absurd superstitions and prejudices 
superficial; it is false. Whether the recent reforms could have been carried out by other than 
must be rooted out of our minds and customs.  
terrorist methods is a question to be seriously discussed. And there is no doubt that in time they 
It is shameful for a civilized nation to expect help from the dead. Let the worthy occupants of… 
were bound to be carried out ‐ but whether in three years or in thirteen or thirty years, no one 
tombs rest in the happiness which they have found in a religious life. I can never tolerate the 
can tell. Naturally, one includes among those which were sure to come only the fundamental 
existence, in the bosom of a civilized Turkish society, of those primitive‐minded men who seek 
reforms that will last. The nature of the leading reforms effected by the dictatorial regime in 
material or moral well‐being under the guidance of a sheik, possibly blind and hostile to the 
Turkey confirms, as will he shown, the assumption that they are the continuation of Westward 
clear light of modern science and art. 
movements long under way and are not any sudden departure from the main line of progress 
Comrades, gentlemen, fellow countrymen! You well know that the Republic of Turkey can never  which the Turks have taken. 
be a country of dervishes and sheiks and their disciples. The only true congregation is that of the 
The first and most spectacular of these was the so‐called "hat law," passed in 1925. It was also 
great international confraternity of civilization. To be a real man it is necessary to do what 
the most futile and superficial in comparison with the others which followed. But it was the only 
civilization commands. The leaders of the tekkés (Muslim cloisters, Sufi shrines or ‘monasteries’) 
one which accomplished a change overnight even in outside appearances. In a week it made the 
will comprehend this truth, which will lead them voluntarily to close those institutions as having 
Turks don European hats (the only part of the city‐dweller’s outfit which was still un‐
already fulfilled their destiny… 
Westernized) and made them look like Westerners, although the manner in which it was 
It is said that we Turks have a national costume. However that may be, whatever we wear is  accomplished was utterly un‐Western. The Westernization of Turkey is not and should not be a 
certainly not of our own invention. The fez is of Greek origin. Very few of us would be able to  question of mere external imitation and gesture. It is a much deeper and more significant 
say what constitutes a national costume. For example, I see in this crowd a man who is wearing  process. To tell the Turk to put on a certain headdress and ‘get civilized’ or be hanged, or 
a fez wound round with a green turban. He has on a vest with sleeves, and over that a coat like  imprisoned, is absurd, to say the least. The opposition of individuals among the men on the 
my own. I cannot see what he is wearing below that. What sort of clothing is that anyway? How  street, really much more Westernized than the people who carried the measure through, had a 
can a civilized man consent to make himself ridiculous in the eyes of everyone by decking  note of wounded self‐respect rather than an objection to the wearing of hats. Among all the 
himself out in such outlandish garb? All employees of the Government, and all our fellow  recent measures, this was the most seriously opposed in the country itself. Any opposition to 
citizens, will have to reform such anachronisms in their dress.   the hat law was labeled as reactionary. The interesting fact connected with the substitution of 

  the hat for the Turkish fez is that of all the changes of the last four years it attracted the greatest 
attention in the Western world. The many fundamental changes taking place in Turkey have 
Halidé Edib, ‘Dictatorship and Reforms in Turkey’, in Yale Review XIX (September 1929). 
been either unnoticed or criticized, or treated as unimportant items of foreign news in Western 
The continuation under the dictatorial regime of 1925 to 1929 in Turkey of reforms ‐some of 
papers. But the moment the Turks put hats on their heads, the general cry in the West as ‘at last 
them begun long ago ‐ and especially the nature of these reforms, are more interesting and 
the Turks are civilized; they wear hats’. Hence those who enacted the hat law might say: ‘We 
profitable to consider than the terrorist methods by which they are supposed to have been 
have killed a few, and imprisoned a large number, but it was good psychology: has anything in 
made possible.  
the past brought Turkey into the limelight? Has anything brought the Turk nearer to the 
European in the European mind?’ 
 systems of the Ottoman regime, the Turkish mind and, possibilities, so all Turks are pioneers in the country,
as a consequence, Turkish society were bound within which according to the latest Turkish historical theories,
limited areas beyond which excursions were punished by is peopled by the oldest race in antiquity.
social and religious disapproval.
Frontiers may also be the line of division between what If the railroad builders are symbolic, their own activities
also represent a definite policy of the new Turkey: the
has been developed and wlhat remains to be explored
and developed, either in an economic or in a cultural creation of communications with full knowledge that,
historically, improvement in communications has been
sense. The American frontiers in the last century, for
instance, were rarely political ones to American pioneers followed by economic, industrial, social and intellectual
development. Fortunately for the nation, the new Tur-
but were rather the territory which lay just over the ho-
key has been able to step over the covered-wagon and
rizon, economically and socially rich and desirable but
pony express era and achieve immediately the steam and
undeveloped for the lack of ways and means including
the internal combustion engine and the wireless age.
communications. As the American pioneers pushed for-
ward these frontiers receded until they coincided with In developing the railroad system, the government has
the political boundaries. apparently never lost sight of its desire of extending its
railroads to the frontier of Soviet Russia, with which
The new T urkey has been and still is faced with many
Turkey has been on terms of uninterrupted friendship
such frontiers, parricularl y in areas undeveloped eco-
and to the borders of Iran and Iraq, to whom Turkey
nomically, industrially, and educationally. In so much as
is also bound by pledges of mutual friendship and non-
it is the aim of the Turkish people, under the leadership
aggression, renewed in the recently ratified Pact of Saa-
of Atati.irk to push back tihese frontiers until they coin-
debad.
cide with T urkey's political frontiers, or in other words,
to develop Turkey in all aspects to the utmost of her These new railroads when completed, and at the present

o COUnT~Ll
ofPon~~~Q
by: PHILIP W. IRELAND, F. R. G. S., M. A. (OXON), PH. D.
DEPARTMENT OF GOVERNMENT, HARVARD UNIVERSITY.

I
N the eastern vilayets beyond Diyarbalm and The toil of these Turkish engineers and workmen and
between <;etinkaya and Erzincan, thousands of the directing energy behind them, as steel rails are pu-
Turkish engineers and workmen have been toiling shed into valleys and mountains which have never heard
though the cold of winter and the heat of sum- the wl1istle of a locomotive or the roar of train, have
mer, throwing ibridges across the rivers, drilling and become, to the writer, symbolic of the spirit of the new
blasting rock, tumbling mountains into valleys, boring Turkey which he has observed: a nation determined to
tunnels and leveling long stretches of country to make push toward its frontiers in every direction.
the roadbed for new railroads to the east. The northern
line, now completed to Erzincan, will connect the line Frontiers may mean more than political or international
from <;etinkaya with rhat existing from Erzurum to Rus- boundaries. They can lbe and often are the dividing line
si_~-The line beyond Diya11baktrwill pass to a point near between political meum and teunz but frontiers may also
Surt where the line divides. One section will go north- connote the limitations surrounding the human mind,
ward toward Tatvan and Van, from where it will pass either because of the lack of educational facilities or be-
to the Iranian frontier at Kotur. The other section will cause of restrictions imposed on the mind hy some par-
pass toward the Iraqi frontier at Guvara. ticular regime. Thus under the educational and religious Parade miJicaire a !'occasion de l'anniversai.re Die grossc Militazparadc am Mil
de la Republique Jaluesr:age der .Republik Re

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 rate of construction this should not be in the too far dis- Recent increases in passenger and freight traffic indicate
tant future, will bring all of Turkey's political frontiers vice. Additional orders, including one for Lt. 16.000.000 iron and steel plant at Karabi.ik, the exploitation of the
that the railroads are playing their part in the develop-
for the first time into direct connection with Ankara will give Turkish railways the most modern equip- coal and mineral deposits of the country are but a few
ment of the country by providing greater ease in travel,
and with other parts of the country, thereby assisting in increased facilities for marketing grain and fruit, for ment, including refrigerator, ore and grain cars. of the aspects of the First Five Year Plan and of the
in the work of national unification. In addition, when wider distribution of products manufactured in State- Second Five Year Plan, already initiated. It is too early
Air services have also been encouraged and developed,
the governments of Iran and Iraq have completed their to calculate the exact effect of these programs on Turkey
owned factories, for the establishment of new industries roads have been improved and many bridges built. Mer-
own proposed lines to the Turkish frontiers, through in various parts of the country and for the exploitation but competent observers point to the unmistakable in-
chant shipping has been encouraged, the tonnage under
services should be possible between the capitals of these of the great mineral wealth of Turkey. crease in national income and the recent reduction in
the Turkish flag being increased five-fold from 1923 to
countries. These through services should provide fa- taxation as evidence that progress is being made in the
1938, with 15 vessels now being built in England and
cilities for greater commercial intercourse, now available In the regions to lbe traversed by the new railroads one economic life of Turkey.
Germany for the account of the Deniz Bank, entrusted
only by motor traffic, and for the growth of friendly re- may expect the development and settlement of the fer- with promotion of maritime affairs. As important in the eyes of the government as pushing
lations between the peoples of these nations of Wes tern tile regions of the eastern vilayets and the exploitation backward economic frontiers is that of pushing back the
Asia. of the forests and of the minerals. These regions As one of the factors responsible for the development
frontiers of the mind: to liberate intellectual energy held
have already been studied by the M. T. A. (Mining Re- in communications, one cannot help noting the per-
Turkey's progress in ibuilding these lines and others since in bondage by illiteracy, by the Jack of educational fa-
sonality and energy of the Minister of Public Works,
search Bureau) and the E. I. E. (Electrical Research Bu- cilities and by religious restrictions. The many refom1s
1923 as well as in bringing the foreign-owned lines under H. E. Ali (:etinkaya, who has transmitted his own vigor
reau) and a number of promising sites have been se- instituted by Atatiirk from the early days of the new
state-ownership must be regarded as a distinct achieve- and activitity into all branches of his ministry.
lected for development under the Second Five Year Plan, Turkey and now familar to every reader, bear witness
ment, particularly when the difficulty of obtaining na-
now being initiated. to the state's recognition of the necessity of removing
tional capital is considered. In 1923, the government The Turkish Government has been no less active in pu-
owned none of the existing 4085 kilometres of railroads. The Anatolian Express and the Taurus Express were the restrictions on the intellectual and natural abilities of
shing back uhe industJ.iial and economic frontiers of the
Io January, 1938, 6902 kilometres of railroads were in only through train services when the writer last visited the Turks.
country. The creation of modem factories owned by the
operation of which the state controlled 6469 kilometres. Turkey a few years ago. He has now observed with in- State, many of which have :been visited by the writer, The creation of education faci1ities from village schools
The new lines will add about 11<80 kilometres to the terest and pleasure that through trains, many of them and the encouragement of private industry to utilize raw to universities at istanbul and Ankara and the proposed
total. Additional lines are also under consideration, as with Wagon-Lits are run in every section of the country, materials produced in the country and to reduce the im- new university at Van, establishment of various technical,
for example a line from Arifiye to Ankara, passing and being run punctually. In addition much new equip- portation of goods from aibroad, rhe establishment of an professional and agricultural schools, the sending of Tur-
through the region of Bolu. ment, ,both passenger and freight has been put into ser-

furquie Richterinoen der neuen Tiirkei Agriculture is modernized in

12 13
 The People's Party and the Halkevi or Houses of the The interest which village people take in providing a
People, maintained by the Party, also play important school and a People's House as the finest buildings in
parts in pushing back the frontiers of the mind. Through the village, the eagerness with which deputations are
lectures, schools for adults , newspapers and journals, received in the villages, the avidity with which news-
reading rooms, cinemas, by means of encouragement of papers and reading material are received and the fre-
sports, art and drama and through deputations of doc- quent requests to travellers for their old newspapers
tors, lawyers and professional men from town to the seem to be significant of a people with minds newly
villages, the Turkish people are being encouraged to liberated, with interest in themselves, in their nation and
increase their knowledge of agricultural methods, of in the world outside.
hygiene and sanitation and of all that can make their
lives more profitable and interesting.
That much of which the Turkish nation can be justly
Not the lease of the tasks set itself by the Government proud has been done to push back the frontiers on every
and the People's Party has been pushing back the hand is quite apparent ro even a casual observer. That
frontiers of local feeling and of provincialism and of mud1 remains to lbe done is readily admitted by Turkish
encouraging national unity, which together ,, ith the lea- authorities. What seems of more importance to the
dership of Atatiirk, has been one of the primary ele- writer is the presence of the will and the determination
ments of strength of the new Turkey. of the Turkish people to continue co press forward the

Jeunes filles d 'un institut apprcna.nl

...

Cours de botanique a l'lnstiru1 Gazi Botanischer Unterricht im Gazi lnstitul A course in natunJ nudi~s at the
Gni lnstirute in Ankara

kish youths abroad to study, the employment of foreign ply of teachers for the 40.000 villages must remain in-
experts are only a few of the methods initiated by the adequate for many years, the experiment was initiated
government to push back rhe frontiers of the mind in of sending the most promising corporals and sergeants,
after they bad finished their military training, to a spe-
Turkey.
cial school and then out to conduct three year courses
of education in the villages. The outcome of the ex-
Formal educational methods have not been relied up'.>n periment will be watched with keen interest by the
alone. When it was realized, for instance, that the sup- educational world.

14 15