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 Chronicle of Higher Education
>From the issue dated July 19, 2002

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  Clash of Turkish Leaders Stalls Higher-Education Reform
By BURTON BOLLAG


Ankara, Turkey
The president of Turkey and the head of the country's higher-education
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ALSO SEE:

Silenced Minority


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aren't speaking to each other -- and that says a lot about the two
directions in which the country is being pulled.

Two decades ago, Turkey's then-military government created a Higher
Education Council to impose order on the country's unwieldy university
system. To keep politics out of higher education, the government =
decided the
council's president would report not to the prime minister -- who =
represents
the political majority in Parliament -- but to the president, who is =
picked
by Parliament but is supposed to be above politics.

But that approach has hit a snag. Since becoming Turkey's president two
years ago, Ahmet Necdet Sezer has shown his disapproval of the =
authoritarian
style of Kemal G=FCr=FCz, the president of the Higher Education =
Council, known
by its Turkish acronym, Y=D6K, by refusing to receive him.

Mr. Sezer is a respected moderate and former chief justice of the =
country's
highest court.=20

He is a strong supporter of Turkey's efforts to enter the European =
Union and
of the democratic reforms that the union is demanding in return.

Mr. G=FCr=FCz, a professor of chemical engineering, is a hard-line =
Kemalist -- a
follower of Mustafa Kemal Atat=FCrk, the founder of the modern Turkish
republic. Atat=FCrk used force to break traditions he considered =
backward as
he tried to mold a modern European state.

The council president often appears to be spoiling for a fight with =
students
or professors whose actions, he feels, threaten Turkey's secular order. =
For
example, during the last three years, fearing a rise in political =
Islam, he
has pushed the universities to expel hundreds of female students who =
refused
to remove their Islamic head scarves.

Responding to a Petition

While Mr. G=FCr=FCz has clamped down harshly on peaceful dissent at the
universities, Mr. Sezer has been a moderate influence, sometimes =
blocking
Mr. G=FCr=FCz's moves. The conflict has prompted the beginnings of a =
national
debate on higher-education policy.

But some educators believe it is interfering with badly needed
higher-education reform.

The two men's differences are illustrated by their attitudes toward a =
recent
petition campaign by students asking for university courses on Kurdish, =
the
language of Turkey's largest minority.=20

Mr. G=FCr=FCz has argued that students supporting the petitions are =
committing
treason.=20

He has pressured university administrations to suspend or expel =
participants
and has loudly proclaimed his support for the criminal prosecution of =
some
200 students who helped organize the campaign.

"There will never be Kurdish-language courses," he said in a recent
interview at Y=D6K's large headquarters in the dry hills above this =
capital
city. "Never, ever. This is nonnegotiable."

A Flexible President

President Sezer, on the other hand, has called for flexibility. He =
favors
accepting the demands of the European Union, which wants Turkey to end =
its
ban on the use of Kurdish in education.

Only two months after Parliament chose Mr. Sezer as Turkey's president, =
he
had his first clash with Mr. G=FCr=FCz. Periodically, faculty members =
at
Turkey's 53 public universities vote for a new rector. They don't make =
the
choice directly, but send the names of six of their colleagues who =
received
the most votes to Y=D6K, which in turn chooses three of the candidates. =


Those names are sent to the Turkish president who designates one of =
them as
rector.

But when Mr. G=FCr=FCz sent Y=D6K's list of candidates for rector for =
22
institutions to President Sezer, he sent them back. The names did not
include all the candidates who had won the most votes, and President =
Sezer
is thought to have objected to that.

For Dokuz Eyl=FCl University, in Izmir, for example, Y=D6K forwarded =
the name of
a candidate who had received only one vote, leaving out another who had
received several hundred.=20

(When there are not six real candidates, several professors usually =
agree to
put their names on the ballot so that the required six names can be =
sent to
Y=D6K.)=20

According to Sureyya Ersoy, head of the Istanbul office of Turkey's
Fulbright Commission, the president "made his feelings clear that the =
choice
of rector should better represent the choice of faculty members." The
president later accepted the list after several changes were made.

Since then, the two men have clashed again openly. In April 2001, Mr. =
G=FCr=FCz
tried to dismiss Fikri Canoru=E7, rector of Dicle University in the
southeastern city of Diyarbakir. Mr. G=FCr=FCz reproached Mr. Canoru=E7 =
for being
"soft" on Kurdish nationalism at the university. But President Sezer =
felt
the Y=D6K president was being too harsh, and canceled the dismissal.

The Higher Education Council has 22 members. Mr. Sezer has appointed =
six
members so far during his term, and all are liberals who have opposed =
Mr.
G=FCr=FCz on a number of occasions.=20

The Reformers

Four of the new members circulated a petition this spring among the =
other
members calling for an extensive reform of Turkish higher education. =
The
petition said a national discussion was needed to make the universities =
more
productive and relevant.

These reformers, appointed by the president, want stronger guarantees =
of
academic freedom, a more effective system to evaluate teaching and =
research,
more diversification of higher-education institutions, and a reduction =
in
the power of the rectors by allowing greater participation by faculty
members and students in university management.

At a meeting of the council this spring, according to one Y=D6K member =
who was
present, Mr. G=FCr=FCz and one of the reformers got into an angry =
argument about
the appropriateness of the petition, and the reformer stormed out of =
the
room. Later, he was persuaded to return.

Mr. G=FCr=FCz argues that Turkish universities already enjoy more =
formal
autonomy than do institutions in a number of European countries.

Draft legislation proposed by the government and supported by Mr. =
G=FCr=FCz
would, if adopted, give universities considerably greater financial
autonomy, including lump-sum government payments, instead of detailed
financial instructions.

While welcoming the change, the reformers say more is needed. They also
argue that Y=D6K abuses the wide powers it has over institutions by =
preventing
dissent or even debate within academe on controversial political =
issues.

=DCst=FCn Erg=FCder, the former rector of Bogazi=E7i University, who =
now heads the
Istanbul Policy Center, a research institute associated with Sabanci
University, feels the conflict between Mr. Sezer and Mr. G=FCr=FCz is =
stalling
moves to modernize higher education. "The universities are in need of
reform," he says. "But the fact that there is deadlock at that level, =
of
course hampers the process."