Ümit Özdağ and the Victory Party between imperialism and migration: An analysis based on social identity

This thesis aims to understand how the anti-immigrant discourse of the Victory Party and its leader Ümit Özdağ is constructed within the context of nationalism/national identity and through the framework of Social Identity Theory. The starting point of the study is to reveal how the Party redefines the phenomenon of migration not merely as a demographic or economic issue but also in terms of social identity, national belonging, and security. In this context, the thesis analyzes the social-psychological dynamics underlying anti-immigrant discourse using the concepts of Social Identity Theory, such as in-group/out-group distinctions, threat perception, othering, and the notion of the "significant we." The findings show that the Victory Party constructs the "Turkish nation" as the subject of the in-group while framing migrants, especially Syrians, as cultural and demographic threats. By contrast, actors such as the EU, the US, and Israel are not positioned in direct conflict but are instead represented under the broader and more ambiguous category of "imperialism" as a singular "great other." Thus, the migration issue is instrumentalized and separated from a mere population movement into a key and transformative element in national identity construction, political polarization, and debates over democratic values.