Media Values and Democratization: What Unites and What Divides Religious- Conservative and Pro-Secular Elites?

This article presents a systematic content analysis of three religious-conservative and two pro-secular newspapers in 1996–2004 in Turkey, and discusses some findings and their implications regarding elite values and democratization: considerable internal pluralism within both religious-conservative and pro-secular elites; general consensus on democracy but not on democratic norms’ application to specific issues and groups other than one’s own; a division of values on religion, secularism, and social pluralism; Political value change in favor of liberal democracy but social conservatism among religious-conservative elites; fragmentation and relative cynicism, but not necessarily authoritarianism, among prosecular elites; weak ideational change on the Kurdish issue. The article argues that the press plays a significant political role as a site where elite values change or are reproduced through discussion, deliberation, or silence. Values affect and are affected by political developments. Introduction In 1914, Turkish journalist Ahmed Emin (Yalman) defended his dissertation titled “The Development of Modern Turkey as Measured by Its Press” at Columbia University. In the preface, he states that the press should be taken as a measure of development “because it has always been the leading factor in the Modern Turkish Movement.” A century later observers seem to agree that the press continues to play a leading and active role in Turkish politics. This time, the press is also widely criticized for, among other deficits, ideological-political divisions, corruption, and weakness of democratic values. However, these criticisms are rarely based in theoretically informed and systematic empirical evidence. Often, criticisms seem to be frozen in time. Today as much as two decades ago, Turkish journalist-intellectuals write that basic, electoral democracy has taken root in Turkey but needs to be developed and protected because political elites (including the media elites) lack a consensus on pluralistic democracy. But, as the findings below illustrate, the Turkish press Correspondence Address: Murat Somer, Assoc. Prof., International Relations Department, Koç University, Istanbul, Turkey. Email: [email protected]. FTUR_A_540114.fm Page 555 Monday, January 24, 2011 6:14 PM