The comparison of different approaches to the rise of political İslam in Turkey through a cultural and historical perspective

How can we understand the growing importance of religion in Turkey's social, economic and political life? There are already different approaches in Turkish literature answering this question. A major part of these uses a particular theoretic framework. This thesis is formed by a comparison of the four theoretic models and their answers to our question. These four approaches go under the titles "modernization approach", "center-periphery approach", "an aprproach explaining political İslam by using the concept passive revolution" and the "class approach". The given answers contain essential differences to each other. By comparing these different answers within this thesis we tried to reach a result. As a result, concerning political Islam's rise in Turkey, we see that studies using the historical and cultural analysis entitled by us as "class approach", show a more powerful explanation; in comparison to the others. The basis for reaching this result is E. P. Thompson's "historical and cultural class analysis". While explaining the historical process, Thompson favors building a flexible link between theory and reality. Therefore he tries to explain this historical process with a dynamic model. He is mainly dealing with capitalism, which he emphasizes to be based on economic, cultural and moral exploitation. We are able to find similar theoretical frameworks in the class approach, too. Additionally we see political Islam as a historical phenomenon. According to that, political Islam in Turkey tried to connect with the dominant ideologies of different time periods. Its rise is mainly caused by post-fordisms evolution using methods of culture and religion. In the end political Islam harmonizes with this new capitalism.