Kurdistan in Search of Ethnic Identity

Kurdistan in Search of Ethnic Identity

Turaj Atabaki
Margreet Dorleijn 

Houtsma Foundation Publication

So much violence has surrounded the Kurdish question in Turkey that observers - including the Turkish and Kurdish political elites -have come to perceive it in terms of a simple dichotomy, of a conflict between the Kurds on the one hand, and the state and the Turkish political elite on the other. Too often it is only the nationalist dimension of the problem that observers take account of, neglecting other social realities. The Middle East is a complex mosaic of local communities, in which people are bound by various types of communal and ethnic loyalties. The ideal model of society as an association of free citizens that is implicit in nationalist discourse, ill fits this situation. Solidarity groups such as the tribes or religious orders continue ...